Hi Owen. Congratulations on completing your first draft. My criticisms are all intended to be positive and help to polish your novel. Ignore if you disagree. I would make the text in the opening paragraph more present tense and intriguing ie : Akiva rode through most of the night./ The rain fell hard soaking her clothes through to the skin. / Water dripped from her wide brimmed hat running between her shirt and back. / The icy rain sent chills through her body with every drop./ Exhausted from a lack of sleep she was glad to see the faint light of an inn flickering in the distance./ she urged her horse forward eager for the comforts of a warm bed and a hot meal... Akiva stopped briefly on a small rise in the middle of the road. The mud here was deep and thick, sucking gently at her horses hooves with every step... etc

sorry 'horse's'

Hi there. I read the first chapter and while this is totally not my genre of choice, I thought it was easy enough to follow and there was a fair amount of activity within. Characters are well described and I could agree with Kalo's comments above - don't be afraid to get descriptive and really pack a punch. As you edit, see where you could enhance, make things more colorful or intense. I do have to say the first chapter drew me in enough that I would keep reading, so that's a great start. Wishing you all the best, Toni

Congratulations! I look forward to reading Legends of Nuvia: The Soul of Kaesh.

I will try to get to it. I have 4 other books before you. I can give you advice on some of it later today. I do see your chapters are very long. Not many readers want to read past about 3,500 words. SO I would suggest you think about that. I can maybe do a chapter a night or two. I belong to a writing group on line in Writer's Village. A very good site without gimmicks. $99.00 for first year. I am a co- moderator in one of the groups. I have one published novel, and one short story. I HIGHLY advice you get an editor before trying to self pub. Your first book is you most important. Readers will base everything on that one novel. Most first book are not over 100,000 words either.

I see lots of passive writing and some run on sentences in just the first page. I highly advice you to join a writing group to get your book polished. to be honest, it could take a year to get through such a large novel.

I am co-moderator in one called Novel Writer's group. A great place. We limit our chapter wording to the max of 4,000, but most only post 3,000 or less so we can all give a detailed review. You would be expected to do three a week, but no worries, you will catch one soon enough how to do it. I live not far from you.

great