I have dozens of stories I've both written AND illustrated around the past two decades that will never see the light of day, but whatever this kid wrote will probably end up as a best-seller in every book store. FML too, OP.

A lot of my friends are "writers" but I can honestly say that only one of them would actually have a shot at being published. I love reading, and my friends would always show me the stories they were working on because I can generally offer up some pretty good ideas for them to hook on to and fashion something out of. I can imagine stories in my head but I'm just not very great at organizing them and putting them on paper. Not only that, but I just really like seeing what they come up with. The thing is though, I tell what I'm thinking when I'm reading it. I tell them where I feel like they can improve and offer my personal criticism. I don't say "Oh this is a steaming pile of awful" or "This is really great." Both of those statements are pretty open-ended and offer basically no real feedback to the content. I address these things delicately though because they obviously put a lot into their stories. In a way, showing someone their story in progress is sort of like exposing a very intimate inner portion of themselves and straight up telling them it is garbage is not going to do anything to help them. Suggest grammatical corrections and maybe sit down with him to come up with a more structured story line with the same sort of basis. You may think it is drivel when someone else could think it really great (grammatical errors aside). Encourage his creativity and be grateful he isn't out there druggin' it up or whatever. Best of luck!

I think you should read the whole thing before saying anything, positive or negative, about it to him. Maybe it gets better. You say he's been working on it for 4 years. I have a feeling that means he started writing it at the beginning 4 years ago and just kept writing until now and he may not have revised it. If he's a teenager, 4 years would make a huge difference in what he's capable of as a writer.

Maybe he wrote the first part when he was younger and as it goes on it gets better since he got older and his grammar and vocabulary has probably improved :)

Well since you know your son must value your opinion is go for the honest but kind way of giving it. He obviously showed you so you could help him and not just give false compliments. If it's a good plot, just try to help him fix the grammar and let him know you're proud of him. After all, a lot of kids these days have much worse hobbies than book writing!

does he spell " THE " da?

What teen writes a 297 page book?

4 years? Maybe the grammar is better towards the end of the book.

If it involves "swag", "yolo", "you're" and "your" used incorrectly..then twitter posts may be the answer to the problem. But help him out if there are some slight mistakes. My dad always helps me with my essays and it means the world.

At least he doesn't do drugs... Or does he...