Because I offered this service through Reddit, I won't charge you for this review. You'll also bypass the severity scale, so my tone will remain neutral yet constructive.

I glossed over your title and cover multiple times and I regret not making a note in my notepad about how incredible it is. Your cover looks like it was made by professional graphic artists and the color scheme is perfect for the plot. The play on words, Waste Deep, was also brilliant, and without a description, it gives us an idea of what the story is about.

10/10

I noticed a few grammatical errors. Here's the correction for that:

The formatting was stiff at times, so I wrote a suggestion:

——waste walkers fat-burgs

Aside from the errors, I thought it gave enough information along with the cover for the reader to know what to expect by reading this.

8/10

There are a lot of them, but I'll focus on the few that stuck out to me.

(Lemmy Greigs) I loved his and Asha's chemistry. I'm not good at conveying humor in my books, which I hope will change with time, but I really enjoyed seeing how different he was compared to the other wealthy people. He reminds me of Marilyn Monroe's dumb, basically manipulative, persona with charisma and intellect. Maybe it's because I was watching Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, but his humor is reminiscent of Jane Russell's character.

(Asha Meadows) I was in awe of her enigmatic personality. She doesn't speak much but when she does, you're either filled with questions or left intimidated by how direct she is. Her question to him, asking if he was terrified, and the monotonous delivery of that question made me wonder if she's the eat the rich type or just basking in the fruits of her parents' labor. Either way, I wouldn't trust her as a friend. By the way, I'm impressed with her ability to read and hold a conversation.

(Harvel Gillis) What stuck out to me about him was what I assumed was him being an insomniac because of his living conditions. Before reading the description, I assumed that he was close friends with Dibbuk and that they were both minors. I thought he was underage because of how easily he succumbed to peer pressure when Don offered him alcohol. I don't know much else about him, but you've given me enough information to understand him. Hopefully, as I continue, I'll understand why he and his sister are there.

(Dibbuk Valez) I noticed how polar opposite she is to her brother when it was mentioned how often she sleeps. At first, I brushed it off as her being depressed but now I'm not so sure. Either she's using sleep as a method of escapism or she's sick; those are my two guesses. I was also going to ask if she was either dirty or a victim of mutation and when I found out she's a lizard, it took me a while to process it.

(Don Lindon) He along with the other drunks bothered me until I learned about how difficult their jobs are. What struck me was how often people died and how desensitized they were to it. They're so certain that a medical call will just be a dead body that they bring both bags just in case, and maybe I'm thinking too deeply into it, but it reminds me of 2020. I also loved the part about the alcoholics outliving the sober ones. It's like when smokers never seem to get cancer but those around them often do.

If Asha doesn't change, I hope Lemmy becomes the savior for the other wealthy people. This may be controversial, but not every rich person is evil. If they're walking around with their noses in the air like Sternum Bloch, then I'm all for the Monopoly mindset, but not everyone at that party is stuck up. Take Lemmy for example, he hates everything about the life he lives and how mundane his silver-spoon peers are because it's all one-dimensional bragging and envy. He mentioned how basically if one person gets one thing, like a boat, others try to one-up them by getting the same in multiples. Though he doesn't like the woes that come with his lifestyle, I'm sure he'd rather not fork over the financial security that also comes with it.

I hope Harvel finds a way to get some sleep because I'd honestly be upset if he passed out while on duty or if something fatal happened to him. I imagine if something killed him and his sister slept through the ordeal, that would tear her to pieces. Especially considering that Don warned them that her oversleeping could hurt them when a call comes in.

As for Don, I know drinking is probably the only thing that keeps him sane, but I hope he finds a better way to cope.

I love the futuristic style. The first chapter reminds me of Detroit Become Human and a dystopian Steampunk type of movie which isn't as jarring as the prologue's Victorian/Edwardian way of showing how high society treats each other. Now that I think about it, the majority of down-to-earth people are below the surface of the world and the snooty people are above ground. It's like you symbolized how there are those who'll get their hands dirty and compromise their health to do the grunt work that those who get paid more refuse to do.

(Incorrect or unnecessary words) In the prologue, you wrote: and I think using clinked is enough. I know tinkled is synonymous with clinked, but in this context, it didn't fit.

Change tantamount to equivalent or something similar. Unless your style involves consistent college-level words, this isn't necessary.

Impotent is the wrong word. It should be vain.

In Chapter one, is the alcohol that Don and Harvel drank called Bullrutters or Bulfuchers? You alternated between the two.

(Wrong punctuation for dialogue tags, tense changes, and minor formatting errors) This should be: "

Should be:

Should be:

Here's the correction:

By the way, her speech is a monologue, and it can bore readers. I would take a break at some point and describe their body language or something to make this natural.

When I wrote this in my notepad, it was to point out the confusing first sentence, but after reading it now, I noticed how choppy this paragraph is. Here's a suggestion:

This needs to be rewritten:

What did you mean by operative?

You often use ellipses which don't work as well as an em-dash. Also, after a pause in speech, the next word should be lowercase. Should be: If you meant for it to be capitalized, then change it to:

I would recommend Grammarly for small punctuation errors.

5.5/10

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