The Social Media Bride | K Elliot

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This is a very messy composition, too busy, probably because of the doubled overlaid picture. It's not particularly "bridal", and even if we get that the phone is meant to tie in with the title, it's not working. The title text is difficult to read where it is pink on pink and the author's (Wattpad user)name is cramped at the bottom, crowded by, well, everything.

Fay: "This looks like someone got a hold of a sticker book and was left unsupervised."

Sal: "I do like the font size and style of the title a lot. I think if it's moved further up and only had the flowers (no pink), it could draw eyes in."

Oliver: "Did you know that cell phones could be used as actual phones and not just Instagram camera?"

Fay: "Oliver is from ancient times, he says a lot of very strange and likely untrue things."

The title fits the romance/chicklit genre. It's not off-putting and sounds like some kind of light romcom, but it's not overly appealing either.

Oliver: "The title screams chicklit, but it got me intrigued as I have no idea about what a social media bride could be. That counts for something."

Kate couldn't be more excited to be getting married until everything goes horribly wrong at the altar.

Not only does she find herself unmarried, she loses her job after her reaction is posted to social media and soon faces moving back in with her parents.

As Kate navigates the rules of social media justice and tries to find closure, she learns it's never too late to overcome a scandal and that even the best things can come out of the worst situations.

____

The first sentence is heavy and would probably work better if simplified, perhaps something like: "Kate is excited to get married until everything goes horribly wrong at the altar."

Overall, the blurb doesn't introduce the MC or the plot conflict beyond an inciting event. The last paragraph is vague and we are not sure what the stakes are. She is hit with a wedding catastrophe and her life is (sort of?) ruined, but then what? What does she do, what challenges is she faced with, that would form a story? It seems from the blurb that the only interesting thing that happens is the MC being dumped at the altar. There's not much to hint at a plot or driving conflict aside from her having job trouble and "finding closure".

The social media scandal part could be interesting but we fail to see how someone could lose their job over their reaction to being the victim of such a dump. If anything, we think the guy would be the one who faced backlash. (After reading the first chapter, we confirm this first impression).

Sal: "The blurb did pique my interest. I like left-at-the-altar stories since they often turn out to be quite humorous. [...] All in all, I would at least open the first page to take a peek if I saw the book on a bookshelf."

Oliver: "The blurb depict a very cliché story and doesn't intrigue me at all. I just don't care about the character or what happens to her."

Fay: "I feel like the blurb as a whole is somewhat arbitrary, stilted even. It lacks style. A blurb is supposed to use language that intrigues. This fell flat for me, though it has possibility." 

Paragraph one:

Starting with a paragraph focusing on Maddie instead of the MC is a bit confusing. Despite the grammatical clues, Maddie's dialogue, actions and description made us think that this was her PoV, not Kate's. The whole thing seems a bit backward and it's not obvious enough whose eyes we are seeing through. The focus of the first few paragraphs could be more on the narrating POV, especially on her feelings (excitement, tingle in the stomach, fear, etc...).

Furthermore, Maddie's dress description is unclear (it's too tight all right but what is overflowing exactly, boobs or back fat?). But more importantly, we're not sure if an excited bride would still be mentally noticing the shortcomings of the dress. That's usually put to bed during bridesmaid's dress shopping.

Starting with a dialogue tag including a heavy adverb isn't working and left us concerned about the rest of the story. Action tags and descriptions are almost always smoother to punctuate a dialogue. All three of us agree about "say" not being as silent as people want it to be and "conspiratorially" is both quite a mouthful and doesn't convey much. Is Maddie's voice low, is her face mischievous, is she rubbing her hands like a Disney villain? Show us Maddie instead of using a vague word.

All in all, the real problem is the blatant lack of hook of this first paragraph. The first line is full of promise, but what follows deflates it instantly.

Paragraph two:

Maddie's remark doesn't sound that obnoxious. It seems like the sort of joke many sisters would make. Or maybe Kate has no sense of humor. Furthermore, Maddie is first introduced as the maid of honor and only then as the sister. It's seems unlikely for Kate to think about her in that order.

The comment about "not even her family..." seems to hint at a bad relationship, but feels like an expositional line.

Paragraph three:

What main doors? Were they outside? In a dressing room? There is no scenery whatsoever, no description of their surroundings. Readers have to assume everything which could lead to strange mental pictures on their side.

Oliver: "Not everyone has the cliché vision of the wasp wedding at the church."

In any case, the first sentence is a grammatical mess (especially the "who took" part, misconnected).

To be as thorough and nitpicky as always, ten seconds seems a long time to hold your breath (try it at home, we did).

Paragraph four:

The line about her dream wedding in reference to being surrounded by friends and family is contradictory with the previous statement about the said family.

The descriptions feel rushed. What is "beautifully decorated", exactly? A few lines early on to show the decoration would help with immersion--and using other senses, like smell (wafting scents from floral arrangements, for instance) would help as well. So far, we are not grounded in this scene, and feel this is a case of "white room" syndrome.

Some of the narration also has a stage direction feel when aligned. It's very clinical instead of coming from Kate's guts. We are meant to care at least a little about her by the time she is dumped at the altar, so using the precious few paragraphs you have before the action starts for character building is essential.

Fay: "The whole thing also seems almost sarcastically perfect? Is that intended, as a strong, maybe even exaggerated juxtaposition for what follows?"

Oliver: "So far, it's very cliché and not enticing at all. It has been read and seen millions of times."

Sal: "Most readers (at least those reading that type of romance) know how it works. I think the overall hook could be stronger to really draw the reader in."

First paragraph:

Mentioning Kate's father by name feels unnatural, intended for readers only, placing even more distance between us and her PoV.

The part about the dad's hair reads as if it looks less grey just because of his mood, which is weirdly put. Something like "seemed to look less grey" would convey Kate's impression instead of her sounding like stating a fact. Furthermore, the end of the sentence is clunky: as is, it means that wrinkles usually resemble his usual stress, which makes little sense.

Finally, as Kate is the last subject before the speech line, it reads like she's the one asking her dad if he's nervous.

Sal: "I couldn't relate to her calmness."

Second paragraph:

Kate takes her father's arm when he already tucked her arm into his elbow. Kate's gesture here is either redundant or unclear.

We were thrown off track by the mention of her being 30 years old and finally getting married, as if she had been on the track to becoming an Old Maid prior to the union. This arbitrary age limit doesn't match the current reality of modern western countries, and it came across on the judgy side. This doesn't really help with relating to her or bonding. Furthermore, getting married and being single are two very different things. People now can stay together for a very long time, have kids, and never formalize their relationship via marriage. 

First paragraph:

The next paragraph is contradictory: she says it doesn't matter what others think, so why mention it in the first place? In later parts of the chapter, it's also very clear that Kate is very much concerned about what others think of her.

As Kate walks down the aisle, the narration is all over the place. It jumps from the guests, to the decorations of the pews, to her hair and then her dress. Again, we would've preferred more internal observations than cold external ones, mingled with more atmospheric descriptions of scenery for scene setting.

The bit about her hair not even escaping the flowers tripped us up for a moment before we realized she went with flowers and pink when she doesn't like either. Who decided in her stead? Who's wedding is it? Some families may hold on to weird traditions (Sal: "I had to wear the veil that was in our family for three generations and my husband got my grandpa's old wedding band"), but we don't know if it's the case here. If she buckled for some unknown reason, it should be mentioned here.

So far, connecting to her as a character is hard.

Third paragraph:

"Continued to smile" is an ugly phrasing.

"She was really going to marry him. This was really happening to her right now," doesn't really convey Kate's bewilderment. It falls flat like a straight fact we already know about.

"No one else and nothing around them mattered," sounds like she's lying to herself (and by extension, to the reader). Everything proceeding to this showed that it very well matters.

We're not sure about "elderly" when a simple "old" works just fine. But more importantly, the description comes as if Kate just discovers the man. At this point, after religious prep and rehearsals, she should know him quite well. Doesn't he have a name at least?

The "I object" felt too melodramatic. We would have preferred if the best man had simply interrupted with a "sorry, I can't do this". The effect would have been the same but delivered in a more natural way.

Oliver: "For anyone wondering, the objection during a wedding is only used in movies for instant drama, it's not a real thing. Ministers don't ever ask the audience anymore."

Fay: "Damn, the guy had to wait until NOW? What an ass."

Why does she think she could have misheard the objection or may "have to look far". This is the best man, standing next to the groom, hence in close proximity. She surely must recognize his voice. Even if they are not friends, there must have been plenty of interaction during the wedding prep. Why not simply say she turned and made eye contact? This was an awkward transition.

"The silence continued" is an ugly pharising again. "lasted" would likely read better. Furthermore, why is there so much silence. It feels like the preacher would have said something rather quickly and not just stood there like a cheap prop. However, we are finally getting somewhere. After paragraphs after paragraph of mundane setting, the action is about to start.

Sal: "I thought the twist was cool (even if cliche) and I enjoyed the dialogue and actions that pursued. I could picture it and it drew me in."

The description of Matt's expression feels forced--why not show his face change instead of telling us what he's feeling? It would be more in PoV for Kate. Also, despite being all tell, this bit about his expression and body language drags on.

Fay: "Ha, so he got hammered and banged a prostitute or a friend?"

Oliver: "Who cares about who it was, what kind of best man is this to stab the groom in the back? And more than that, maybe ruin two lives running his tongue. It may be immoral, but the consequences are far worse than what seems to be a slip. The whole beginning of this story feels like it happens in the early 20th Century with bigots."

Fay: "He shouldn't have cheated on the eve of his wedding. If that's a pattern it would not make a good relationship. But if he is a friend of the bride as well, he should have told her BEFORE they were on the altar."

Sal: "There are do-righteous people who do that since they otherwise feel the marriage is built on a lie. Granted, he shouldn't have waited, but I think it works in the overall scheme of things. It's a suspension of disbelief I can accept. I found this section intriguing and fun. Sure, it's cliche, but for a romance chicklit story like this, it worked for me. There could be some more showing about reactions that could improve this section, but the general idea is good. Just some fine tuning needed."

Like for the previous part, we disagreed about the content:

Oliver: "Jordan is a moron!"

Sal: "I admire his courage, lol."

Fay:" Lol, if this happened to me I would be shattered so... I wouldn't be able to go through with it either. I don't blame her for running. But the actual wedding drama could have been easily avoided, not to mention extra expenses and everyone's time being wasted."

Oliver: "I don't criticize the reaction, I criticize the whole situation and don't buy it. It feels like it's meant to be dramatic, it all reads artificial."

Fay: "Artificially manufactured drama via stupidity on several fronts."

Sal: "About the drama, I have to disagree. Readers who pick up this type of story can tell from the blurb that there will be moments of exaggerated drama. For me, that's part of the fun of reading this type of story. Hence, I'm not sure if the target audience would mind."

However, we did agree about the

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