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OTOH, you might be better off deleting
this stuff and reading the back of a cereal box.
^_*
I don't have any cereal boxes handy... guess your C&C will have to do.
And sorry in advance if I'm a bit snippant... it's a stressful time for
me, and I tend to be very defensive when I'm stressed. Just a warning.
A General Time Paradox
Chapter 2: A New Class of Evil
Later that afternoon, five girls and two cats
gathered in the living
quarters of the Cherry Hill shrine to discuss the
events of the day. The
meeting was originally designed to be a study-group
meeting to help
Serena pass her classes, but none of the girls felt
like studying after
their tough battle, even the usually bookish Ami.
Rei had brought in a
tray of cookies, hoping to cheer everyone up, but
only Mina had any high
spirits left. Even the usually relatively cheerful
Lita was down in the
dumps.
@@A nice beginning.
I will say I'm a "purist" about names.
The original Japanese names all had meaning
and were an integral part of the story. MIXING
the Japanese names with the <shudder> Dub names . . .
I'll _try_ not to cringe too often. ^_*
Who's mixing anything? Since I have only seen the American dub, those
are the names I'm using. Serena, Ami, Rei, Lita, Mina... they didn't
change ALL of the names when they dubbed the series, you know. I know
better than to mix Japanese and English. I don't even use rather common
Japanese expressions like "arigatou" in my fanfiction... it's easier to
just stick with one language or the other.
As for the original names, I'm well aware that their meanings were
important, but I'm not familiar enough with those names to trust myself
to use them correctly. I'll slip up somewhere, believe me.
Twitching a bit over "Darien" and "Negaverse".
Once again, I'm not mixing anything. Those are both names from the dub.
If that's the only reason you're twitching, on the other hand... maybe I
should label this story [SM Dub crossover].
"Hard work or not, there has to be a way to beat
them," said Mina.
"Everyone has a weakness."
"The problem is," put in Artemis, "your powers
were designed for
fighting the creatures of the Negaverse. If Ami's
right about these new
opponents not being from the Negaverse, you could
very well be in over
your heads with this fight!"
@@Personal POV. Looking at all 200 episodes of SM,
this doesn't _quite_ jibe. I can see how it _could_
work.
But it's difficult to put aside the SM universe. One
of the
problems with writing fanficion . . .people who are
familiar
with the series have their own idea about how things
work or should work. IMO, you might want a bit more
detail.
You're talking about the seasons after the first, where they're fighting
evil in other forms, right? Well, I haven't seen it but I do know a few
things that might explain my stance a bit better...
1) The Sailor Scouts all died and were revived with no memory of the
whole Negaverse incident after Beryl's death, weren't they? (Yes, it's a
spoiler, but I figured that anyone who's read this far is probably
planning to read the whole story, and that's a major point in the next
chapter.) When their Sailor Scout powers returned, maybe they were
altered somewhat to affect the new opponents...
2) In later seasons, the Sailor Scouts have more powers and don't use
their original powers much. There are even several points where their
powers fail to work, and the Scouts (particularly Sailor Moon) have to
learn new powers that will be effective against more powerful opponents.
3) Who's to say that Luna and Artemis fully understand the powers? Since
they can't remember how the Scouts can increase their power, there might
be other hazy details.
4) They can't see the future... maybe the powers are designed to work
against creatures that are inherently evil, and the Negaverse monsters
are the only example that they've seen so far.
"What?" asked Ami, sweatdropping. "I haven't got
a plan!"
@@IMO, "sweatdropping" or "sweatdrop" is
a fanfic convention that is better off NOT used.
I realize other writers use it, along with <shudder>
"facefault", but IMO . . .it's "cheating", a way to
avoid
developing real descriptions.
MY POV only.
It's a fanfic and ANIME convention. (I don't read enough [read "any"]
manga to know whether the sweatdrop appears in them or not...) I don't
use sweatdropping, facefaulting, and other such conventions in series
that don't have them. Sailor Moon characters sweatdrop rather
prolifically; so in keeping style with the show, I follow the
convention. In my original anime works, I don't.
"New powers?" asked Serena. "Where do we find
those?"
@@TV: "Come on down to Powers-R-Us! All this week,
Hyper-Beam-Destructo-Ray, only 9999.95 Yen. And to the
first one hundred customers . . .A brand new Magical
Girl
Theme Song by Mayo Okamoto!"
Please allow six to eight episodes for delivery.
"I think there's a way to rise to a higher level
of Sailor Scout
power," offered Luna, "but I can't seem to remember
what it is."
"Neither can I," said Artemis. "I wish I
could... I've forgotten far
too much."
@@AMI: (thoughtfully) "There's some interesting new
research on how lowering testosterone levels improves
memory."
SERENA: " Really, how do you do that?"
AMI: "Castration"
SERENA: I don't see how oiling the wheels on the sofa will help Artemis
remember anything!
ARTEMIS: "It's all coming back to me."
There's a reason Artemis can't remember the details, and it's brought up
(sort of) in the next chapter, when Pluto explains why the situation is
so grave. This particular fact is not explicitly mentioned, but the
Sailor Scouts discovering new powers would be as dangerous as them
getting killed at this point.
<SOME SNIPPAGE OF MY OWN>
"You will," replied Beryl. "A simple spell
should be enough to
obscure your bangles from mortal eyes and give you
the appearance of a
common schoolgirl at Grass Valley Junior High
School. We are quite sure
that most of the Sailor Scouts attend one of those
two schools."
@@RYOKO: "Why don't we just kill everyone
at both those schools??
BERYL: "You FOOL! That would reveal our presence to
the humans."
RYOKO: You mean, more humans than the ones you've already attacked and
failed to kill, who've already seen your generals and know who it is
that the Sailor Scouts are fighting?
RYOKO: "Yeah, but the only ones who can stop you
would be dead."
Beryl doesn't want to kill more innocent humans than she has to, believe
it or not. What would be the fun of taking over a world without innocent
people to torture?
"We're supposed to kill innocent girls? That
wasn't part of the
deal!"
"The deal is anything I choose to make it," said
Beryl. "If you
value what the crystal holds, you will do as I say!"
@@Nicely sinister.
Thanks.
With that, Beryl turned and walked toward the throne
@@BERYL: "Alright, who left the lid up again!"
And what's a toilet doing in an anime anyway? Nobody ever uses them...
at least, not often. Yes, even I could name an exception or two.
<SNIP RANKO'S ENTRANCE>
@@Rather static description, not very original.
Not bad, but you want to grab the reader, give them
something new. It's HARD, I know. AND not always
possible,
with the best of intentions. I just got slammed for
the same
thing. However in this case I think you can fix it
with a minor re-write.
Example::
"Class, we have a new student."
"Ummm . . .Hi," she nervously twisted her
short, red pony-tail between her fingers. "My . .
.ummm
name is Ranko. Ranko Tendo."
The temperature in the room went up
ten degrees when she waved, shyly, and when she
smiled the sudden testosterone storm almost blew
down the walls.
Ranko, shy? Maybe if she's hoping to get something for it, like a free
scoop of ice cream. NOT if she's forced to go to school as a girl for
the purpose of hunting down and killing other girls.
I do like your description, which is exactly why I can't use it. Not
only because it is now YOUR description, but because I'm trying to set a
mood. Class is boring. We'll get more explicit description of this later
on, but for now, the school day is hateful for Ranko, and the dry
description gets a bit of that across. Think about The Wizard of Oz...
it starts and ends in black and white. Do you think people complained
because the scenes weren't colorful enough? (Well, maybe, but there was
a reason for that too.)
@@NOT the only way to do this, of course.
It does illustrate a couple of points.
1) get past the teacher ASAP. Nothing
very interesting there. (Unless the teacher
is a youma or a character from another series.
Ganpachi Chabane from "Ultimate Teacher", for
instance. ^_^ I like to slip in little cameo's, if
it doesn't interfere with the plot, just to keep
things interesting. But it's not necessary and some
readers find it annoying. ^_*
No, no cameos here. The teacher is indeed uninteresting. As mentioned,
it is an uninteresting scene for a reason.
2)I've shortened the whole thing and made
the descriptions more active. You want to get
to the real heart of the scene . . .sitting next to
Serena. <whimper.>{ that's twice I've had to use
_that_ name}
I do prefer active descriptions, actually, as you'll see in most of my
stories. I even resort to no description over passive description.
But... well, you know the reason by now.
Ranko
sighed. Having to kill innocent girls she could
probably learn to deal
with. Going to school was another thing altogether.
@@<ouch> That's cold. ^_*
Cute, but rather breaks the mood, IMO.
The mood? MY intended mood was that Ranko's bored and fed up with being
pushed around, but has to hold back for Akane's sake. Hence the boring
description... well, enough about that.
Amelia examined Stephanie's cheerful smile and
long dark hair.
"Don't get me wrong. I'm not a very friendly
person."
@@Who is saying this? "Amelia"? Or Stephanie?
Amelia. Stephanie spoke in the previous paragraph. Not that it COULDN'T
be her, but... considering the context, I thought it was pretty obvious
who was speaking.
Stephanie smiled again and straightened up in
her desk, her chest
jiggling slightly as she did so. "People say that I
have a fiery heart
that simply burns with congeniality!"
@@Only those people who have stopped their medication.
Nah... it's one of those deus ex machina things. You know... the bad
guys are always led to suspect the wrong person by some strange
coincidental twist of words or events. I have Amelia suspecting
Stephanie because it fits the feel of the show.
"Really?" asked Serena. She cast a quick glance
at Ami and swallowed
the food in her mouth. "I can't imagine a school
tougher than
Crossroads."
"Oh, you'd better believe it!" said Ranko. "The
Principal of
Furinkan was a lunatic!
@@Mixing English with Japanese names.
IMO this is VERY annoying. Why not just
stick with Japanese throughout?
Because I'm sticking with dub names throughout. Ranma's school was
called Furinkan even in the dub.
I take it you're not very familiar with the dub names?
<SNIP DIALOGUE - IT'S NICE, BUT LONG>
@@A nice bit of dialogue. Flowed fairly smoothly.
More importantly if flowed _naturally_, as if
people were really speaking and interacting.
Not perfect, BUT . . .feels very natural. You want
to try to get ALL of your dialogue and scenes
to flow smoothly and naturally at this level or
better. IMO, use this bit as your standard
of comparison for the rest of your writing.
This should be the baseline. You want
everything at this level or above.
That is my usual style and level of writing.
Good work.
^_O
Overall: C+
(A+ would be Krista Perry or Jamie and Bridget Wilde)
Let's put it this way... Everyone, it seems, is being compared to Krista
Perry, and I've ranted about authors whose works are used in similar
ways on other lists. I'll spare you that rant. I don't aspire to that
level of writing because I believe that the focus is no longer on the
writing but on the name of the author. I do admire her work, yes... but
I have my own style. I don't want to see every author on this list start
to write in her style, or things will get rather monotonous. What would
happen if everyone started writing in Shakespearean?
(Was going to put an example of that here, but I think the rhetorical
question speaks for itself.)
I prefer not to be as heavy on description as the authors whose styles
are so highly praised, so that I can focus on the action. Active
description, as you mentioned earlier, is a big part of that. All
personal decisions, of course... but I can generally turn out new
chapters more frequently than the more descriptive authors.
Interesting idea and I like the idea of using Ranma
as a bad guy. Mixing Japanese with English names is,
IMO,
a VERY bad idea.
Mine too. That's why I never do it. ^_^
You also need to spend more time on
polishing your dialogue and descriptions. You've got
one scene in there that is VERY good, very smooth and
natural. Just try to make all of them like that.
They usually are... Are you sure it's not one scene that's very dry,
that you want me to NOT write like ever again?
Plot development is weak, but shows promise. Mostly
you must spend more time developing things, add more
detail. Make it come alive. Don't try to rush the
story
or force issues. Put the characters in situations and
see what they
do. Again, go for smooth and natural.
Oh, there will be plenty of development. I just can't stand shelving the
plot for as long as it will take to develop things that way.
*sigh* You really want me to go back over this and majorly rewrite,
don't you? Well, I suppose I'll see what I can do. I'm definitely going
to stay away from the scene you gave me, particularly because Ranko is
NOT going to be shy. But I may be able to capture some of that effect
without ruining my original intent for the scene.
I think it's got potential, especially if you work
with Ranma. A LOT
of dynamic tension possible with him. Conflict between
Akane's life
and innocent lives. PLUS, all the people who will die
if the Senshi die.
(I _refuse_ to use the "SS" word. ^_^)
You don't like Lina and Ryoko? They've got tension too. I'm just leaving
that until later.
Good luck with the rest. I hope I've helped at least a
little.
Well, if you've helped my writing, you've crippled my free time. But
sincere thanks in either case. I will look this chapter over again and
possibly vivify the description a bit.
LOVE the pun in the title, btw. I only wish I could do
things like that.
Really? It was a working title... but I guess this is a vote for keeping
it.
- Nidoking
BURNS: What is this? Some kind of force field around these vegetables!
HOMER: That's the sneeze guard. You have to lean under it to get food or
sneeze on stuff.
JOHNNY BRAVO: *sigh* The only woman I ever really loved... and she's
gone. I wonder if I'll ever get over - Hey! Nuggets!
JACKIE CHAN: Oh, sorry. I broke your spy camera! (pause) SPY CAMERA?!
My webpage: http://www.rose-hulman.edu/~katinamp