On Mon, 1 Aug 2005, Zorknot wrote:

I thought this WAS funny. Especially the bit about
Nabiki acting like a cat. Nice parody on Lovecraftian
themes. I don't like Lovecraft's writing so much but
his themes are excellent.

Thanks.

The main problem I had was
with the summary of events in the beginning about
Ranma's relationship with Akane and so on.

You mean the "situation in Nerima" section in general, or just Ranma's
relationship with Akane?

I dislike the presence of the section itself, and if I was not writing
this in a "two strangers meeting" scenario, then I would not have included
it at all.  And since, by self-choice, the fic is limited to a continuing
dialogue, I couldn't just put in a summary or a time omission.  So I tried
to just throw out the relevant facts that a stranger would need to know to
understand the story, and no more.  (I was stuck for a LONG time trying to
explain the fiancee situation, until I realized that there was no point).

If you mean the specific contents of the summaries (Akane has deep
feelings for Ranma, Genma's status, and Ranma's fighting style against
Ryouga), well, I've tried to incorporate the comments (yours and others)
on the Refuge while keeping the information that paragraph is supposed to
provide.  I'm not really sure what else I can do that would address the
problem while stating the basic info necessary to establish that Ranma had
an ostensible reason for staying at the Tendos, the signifigance finding
Genma's life-drained corpse, and why Ryouga is in the same cage.

It wasn't until the bit with the ears flickering that it started to get
interesting for me.

Heh.  And that was the part that I really wanted to start at, too. ^_^

Also Nabiki gets a tad too expositional.

Probably.  If I was doing a conventional fic (or even a normal
dialogue-oriented fic), I'd throw in more byplay between the characters.
But the intentional pauses don't really convey much information, so I
couldn't do that very effectively, unless I wanted a fic where a third of
the lines said [Silence]. ^_^ The bit about Nabiki taking her coffee with
cream is an example of what I could do, without going overboard.

Any spots where the exposition gets particularly bad?  I'll see if I can
work up a fix.

But overall an interesting and entertaining read.

Thanks for posting

And thank you for both your kind comments, and your critique.

-Natsume Ranma Ranma
-------
The sardines weren't worth the trouble.  A few more shots, then
Ryoga-san would overheat and explode.  Ducking around a corner,
I managed to lose him as I entered the ramshackle residence of
my Anime supplier.

One look at his face and I knew that I had been betrayed.  "Tell me,"
I insisted.  He refused, so I slammed him against the wall.
"Last chance.  Where can Ranma-Ranma find good fanfics?"
"Try Jason Liao," he whispered, before he slumped to the floor.
I heard the sounds of a door splintering as I left through the
window, one step ahead of Tendo Heavy Industries...

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