Copy-Pasted Disclaimer: I reserve the right to be totally wrong, to misquote
facts and to make errors in judgment. I also C&C as I read, so what I said at
one point can easily be retracted on the next, depending on how the story
progresses. I don't claim to be the authority on fanfiction writing... Hell, I
see C&Cing as a learning experience. Agree? Disagree? Corrections on my
corrections? I'll thank you for it. Ignore all my comments in applying to your
fic? You have the right to do so. Take it with a grain of salt, use what you
can use and ignore the rest. ^_^
It also occurs to me that my lexicon may not be at par with yours, so any
unfamiliar word I ask about isn't necessarily a correction but just general
ignorance on my part (as pointed out by a certain Thomas Michael Edwards). As
such, it'd be appreciated if you'd have the patience to clear up some of my
questions on those particular instances. Thanks.
And, without further adieu, my current victim is... ^_^
On 2/27/06, Morgan Hudson <dataraven_659@hotmail.com> wrote:
Well, I have a funny story about this one.
(waits for it)
Not really funny, so much as "the list ate my last chapter, and I decided
that was for the best".
One of the Sharks from "Finding Nemo": AHAHAHA... I don't get it.
I was not entirely satisfied with my first take on
Chapter 5, and when the FFML decided to have it for a snack instead of post
it, I took that as a sign and went back to the drawing board.
It's cool. Shit happens for a reason.
I cut out
pretty much the entire original ending and re-wrote
rewrote (dictionary-verifiable word, no need for the hyphen)
Anyway, as always I hope that some of you kind souls will find it in your
hearts to send me some more C&C.
Heh. You can never have enough, eh?
Anyway, on with the fic! I hope you all enjoy!
Just for reference, you said in chapter 3 'on to the fic'.
REVAMPED LEGAL DISCLAIMER: Whatever else may have changed in this story
of mine, trust me - the Sailor Senshi still belong to Kodansha and
Cloverway, and the Samurai Troopers are the legal property of Sunrise and
Bandai Entertainment. So are all of their related friends and associates.
Takeuchi and Yatate: (pouts)
Kodansha, Cloverway, Sunrise, and Bandai: (making faces at Takeuchi and Yatate)
Chapter 5: The Ghosts That Haunt Me
Suggest: The Ghosts that Haunt Me (the Title Case should not have articles,
conjunctions, linking verbs and the like capped; only verbs, adverbs, nouns,
and words that _need_ to be emphasized in the title should be capped)
Hyperion had politely disagreed. At his command, Prince Endymion
and the armies of the Earth were dispatched to aid their comrades in the
land of dreams. Prince Orcus
Will you look at that? Touma the supporting character has quite the influence
in this story. I approve of your use of supporting characters in the proverbial
'main event' scene. We certainly don't need each and every last major role cast
by the original protagonist Ryo, after all.
and Prince Endymion had based their armies
in a gleaming ruby palace that they had
Hmmm. Three sons. I'm counting two. One's missing... I wonder who?
dubbed the Crimson Nadir, for
surely it had seemed to be the lowest point that the armies of Man had
ever reached. From that stronghold, the newly strengthened armies had
Suggest (though I'm not so sure about this one): newly-strengthened armies
(compound descriptors should be hyphenated)
begun a steady advance in all directions against the bulwark of youma that
besieged them on all sides. In the west, a brilliant tactician named
Kunzite outmanuevered
outmanuevered --> outmaneuvered
Or, since you're using archaic Commonwealth rules (:P), might I suggest:
outmanuevered --> outmanoeuvred
...Though I gotta warn you, _that_ particular spelling of the term is as old as
the alternate spelling of jail ('gaol'), and is only used by the likes of Angus
MacSpon. ^^; Your
Commonwealth/Australian/British/Canadian/Most-Anything-Non-American English
spelling and grammar mileage may vary.
The east had been the domain of Jadeite, the
youngest and least experienced of Endymion's centurions.
Jadeite: (frowns) HEY! Fic, you've broken the pattern of the paragraph! I
should be described at length as a great general as well!
Fic: (sticks its tongue out at Jadeite)
that now filled each facet of formerly pure ruby. The marbled floor was
buried under millenia
millenia --> millennia
riddance, in his opinion. It still sickened him to remember how he used
to faun
Methinks: faun --> fawn
"Will you, now?" Jadeite stoked his chin thoughtfully.
I may be mistaken (I usually am), but suggest: Jadeite stroked
Badamon ground his teeth together with frustration and watched as
Jadeite wandered off with the female youma. On the one hand, Radanthus
Suggest: On one hand, ('the' muyo)
"Nise Suiko," Badamon hissed, his voice rasping through the
darkness that enveloped him. Like a wraith, the crimson armoured youma
crimson-armoured youma (compound descriptors should be hyphenated)
Too bad that Nise Suiko's under Mum-Ra the Ever Living. It violates all things
badass about him.
"I'm guessing he's got evil twin envy," Shuu suggested. "You know
Ryo's always wanted one. They're like the ultimate sign of heroism. Nobody
takes a guy seriously as a hero unless he's got an evil twin."
Truer words have not been said.
"I don't have evil twin envy!" Ryo objected, sitting up on the
couch and glaring spitefully at Shuu. "I'm just saying that we've been
doing this for almost two days, now,
You don't need the comma after 'days'.
"Look, I'm sorry if I don't find watching you do geometry to be
utterly fascinating," Ryo said, rolling off of the couch and onto his
feet, "but if I have to count these ceiling tiles one more time I am going
to freak out.
Shinji Ikari: Nothing wrong with counting ceiling tiles. I've done it, and look
how normal I've turned out.
"Oh." Ryo thought about for a moment, then shrugged. "Well, either
way, that's where I'm going to be. Catch you two losers later. Ja ne!"
Hmmm. That was rather digressive. But since your 'fanboy Japanese' ratio has
been good so far, I'll let it slide. Just don't overdo it.
"Oh, no," Shin said, suddenly bolting to his feet and casting a
worried glance at the door. "My God, Shuu - it's today, isn't it? Today
is the day that Luna...."
Luna: Meowr? Er, I mean, what?
"What?" Shuu glanced over at the calender
...And what's that? A lender from California? :P
calender --> calendar
knowledge was largely second-hand,
Suggest: secondhand (d-v-w)
Touma gasped, and woke with a start.
Suggest: and woke up
Also: and awoke
slowly filtered its way into his expression. With a frown of consternation
the boy tested his bonds experimentally and gave Toshitada a suspicious
Suggest: consternation, the boy
"Had I been wiser, I would have included a gag!" Toshitada snapped
back in reply, his steely eyes flashing with anger. "Honestly, you Samurai
Troopers whine about everything: 'you tied me up', 'they stole my family',
'he wants to destroy the planet'... do us all a favour and grow up! My
Suggest: ... Do us all a
Or (since you favor terminating a previous clause when separating two
independetn clauses with an ellipsis): .... Do us all a
back is aching from carrying your weight -as usual- but at least I don't
irritate the cosmos by complaining about it!"
Yeah. You're more of an introspective whiner. The up side is that you're not
bothering the cosmos; the down side is that you're bothering the reader who has
to read about your angst.
"First of all, nobody asked you to come here. Secondly: how the
hell can you carry me, anyway?
Suggest: carry me anyway? (no need for the comma)
I thought you were supposed to be a ghost!
What's going on, here?"
Suggest: going on here?" (no need for the comma)
Grammar Rule #21: Eliminate commas, that are, not necessary. Parenthetical
words however should be enclosed in commas.
Was he becoming real again? The idea was disconcerting, to say
the least. What did it mean, when the dead began to take flesh once more?
Kikyo: (opens her mouth to speak, but reconsiders)
"I had been thinking something similiar,"
Suggest: thinking of something (add 'of' in between 'thinking' and 'something')
Also, revise: similiar --> similar
Toshitada/Shutendoji/Monk: No, no... I meant 'similiar', as in something that's
both similar _and_ familiar.
...Shut up. -_-
"Patience, young warrior," Toshitada placated him. "Your princess
is very close, now.
Suggest: is very close now?" (no need for the comma, it merely provides an
awkward pause when read aloud)
"Princess?" Touma looked confused. "Hey, if that's another one of
your little barbs about her, you can just cut it out. As a tutor, it's
only natural that I should be concerned for the well-being of my student.
Not really. Oh yeah...
wellbeing (d-v-w, hyphen muyo)
After all, her academic success is as much a reflection on me as it is on
her - if she fails Physics, I will lose face as an educator!"
Flimsy excuse.
have a solemn duty to both rescue Mako-chan *and* do it with enough time
to finish her make-up Physics report! Anything less would be an insult to
makeup (d-v-w, hyphen muyo)
early last month, her math teacher had been giving her increasingly more
difficult questions every week. With summer break approaching, Miss
Kikuchi had decided to take advatage
advatage --> advantage
The blue haired girl
blue-haired girl (compound descriptors should be hyphenated)
"Hi," Ryo said cheerfully. "You're... Ami, right? I was just in
the neighbourhood, and I thought I'd stop in and see how you girls were
doing. Can I come in for a minute?"
Aw. They've revealed their secret identities and shit. They're, like,
super-close now!
Wordlessly, Ami forced her head to move up and down in a close
approximation of a nod. Clutching her textbook to her chest, she stepped
aside and let the boy enter her hotel room. Ryo nodded graciously and
wandered over to one of the beds.
Heh. That last collection of sentences, if Ami were to realize it, is blush-
inducing on its very own.
Ami forced herself to nod again and held her book a little bit
tighter. What was going on, here?
Suggest: going on here? (no need for the comma, awkward pause)
Sweet merciful gods, Ryo Sanada was in her room. The realisation
hit Ami like a bucket of cold water. There was a boy in her bedroom! Well,
her hotel room, technically, but it still had several beds in it.
Actually, since it's a hotel room, that's several degrees worse than a normal
bedroom.
Ami blinked. What, he expected her to talk, now?
Suggest: talk now? (no need for the comma, awkward pause)
Oh, Lord, he
Suggest: Oh Lord, (no need for the comma, awkward pause)
he said, after a pause, "there's no point hanging around this place, then.
Suggest: this place then. (no need for the comma, awkward pause)
The dark-haired youth shrugged expressively as he pushed off of
the windowsill and wandered glumly back towards the door. As he brushed
past, Ami turned to watch him leave. She caught a barely definable scent
Suggest: barely-definable scent
as he moved past her - it was a musky, smoky smell, like damp cedar
boughs smoldering on hot coals. She thought she detected a bit of
sandalwood, too: the scent reminded her of incense, and campfires, and
(waxing nostalgic of the scent-centric themes found in Rurouni Kenshin
Kenshin-Kaoru 'ship fics) Riiight. Sandalwood scent. Of course. It's only a
coincidence (or perhaps in parody) that I regularly see this fic meme in many a
romance fic.
Regardless of how long he had been doing it, he
guessed that it was pretty pathetic, too.
Suggest: pathetic too.
killed the Sailor Senshi? Where's the honour in that? If you ask me, I
say it's completely unfair that they got to come back from the dead. I
mean, we killed them fair and square!
Heh.
The farrier
(blinks) What's a farrier?
"I think if anyone can appreciate the value of a second chance, it
would be me." Jadeite smirked. "Now that we're done placating each other,
can we get down to real business, here? I've been on ice for a very long
Suggest: business here?
"Yes, Shale," the red youma said, curtseying obediantly
obediantly --> obediently
busy travelling over every inch of Jadeite. Her smile became less friendly
than it had been a moment before, and Jadeite began to feel a little bit
vulnerable. "Make sure to tell the cook that you'll be recieving
recieving --> receiving
Grammar Rule #63: I before E except after C or sounding like 'a' as in
'neighbor' and 'weigh'. Unless it's weird.
"Have another bottle sent to my tent," Shale added, almost as an
afterthought. "I'm sure that Lord Jadeite will be needing something to
Suggest: be needing --> need
were not completely tactical or military in nature. That made him a little
nervous: he was beginning to doubt exactly why he had been led here. Maybe
he should have stayed in the castle and met with Radanthus, instead.
Suggest: Randanthus instead.
"Well," Shale drawled, as she glided
Suggest: Shale drawled as she glided
"I have nothing against Radanthus," Jadeite said sternly, as he
Suggest: sternly as he
Senshi; it was my girls and I who killed them! I held Sailor Mars' broken
body in my arms - I crushed Sailor Mercury with my own hands!
(nods) And I do believe that little stunt you people pulled was, to say the
least, a turning point in the Sailor Moon series; a turning point to the droll,
monster-of-the-week formula of the anime, at least. Resolution of plot is a
_good_ thing.
"Strange," Jadeite commented idly, as he toyed with some of the
Suggest: idly as he toyed with some
Or: idly, toying with some
him to explore them once more. His armies had swept those plains for years
on end, and he had never slept in the same place twice.... They had been
harsh times, times of danger and adventure and camraderie.
camraderie --> camaraderie
that she was happy with the decision. Ryo's dad had warned him once that
girls liked to drag everything out for as long as possible, and he had
taken that warning to heart.
Heck, he watched all the Drag-on ball and Drag-on ball Z episodes just to
prepare for this moment.
"It's awesome," Ryo reassured her. "I mean, I'm wearing a purple
undershirt, and there's some orange on my sweater, so it's kind of like
we match!" He grinned widely, and tried not to wince. Kind of like they
matched? Where had he pulled a stupid line like that one from?
Fic: (whistles innocently)
tilted his head to one side. There was something different about her.
Was she wearing makeup, now?
Suggest: wearing makeup now?
was stuck in. She wasn't even sure she could call what she was standing
in a stream: it barely got the toes of her boots wet, and it was a very
nasty shade of flourescent yellow.
flourescent --> fluorescent
It felt like it had been years since she had been dragged into
this stupid dimension - she had emerged from the mists in the middle of a
Suggest: dimension; she had
In regards to your dash (over)use, I'm going to use the same speech I gave Raye
Johnsen on you: It's not wrong to use a lot of dashes, but for the sake of
adding variety and peppering up your prose, you should consider using
punctuation marks _other_ than dashes.
Grammar Rule #39: The dash � a sometimes useful punctuation mark � can often be
overused � even though it's a helpful tool some of the time.
vast battlefield littered with corpses. It had not been the warmest
welcome she had ever recieved,
recieved --> received
Typically, whatever they had been fighting about was apparently not
important enough to keep them all from ganging up on her. That was just
one of the many perks of being a Sailor Senshi: always bringing people
together.
LOL. Indeed, though I find prose that reads suspiciously like a standup
comedian's act suspect, I do believe this natural and humorous digression is
naturally segued into Makoto Kino's mind. Congrats on that.
Makoto had shaken off the last of her pursurers
'Pursurers'? What are they, pursuers that are very sure? ^_^;
pursurers --> pursuers
four of the bloated frog things; they were mostly walking mouths with
limbs attached, but despite their bulky appearance she had learned the
Suggest: appearance, she had learned the
At the moment, they were in a bit of a stalemate. If she went up
there, she would be turned into a pincushion before she even got a chance
to summon a single lightning bolt. If he came down after her, she gained
the tactical advatage
advatage --> advantage
I am astounded by the consistency of your spelling errors.
There was a loud crack, and one of the demons staggered blindly
around the corner with its eyes pinwheeling
Suggest: pin-wheeling
One of the demons (stealing Kenshin Himura's shtick, its eyes 'pinwheeling'):
Oro?!?
"Hey! Get back here, you-" Rounding the corner with his fists
clenched and his jaw was set in a look of determined fury,
Get rid of 'was' in between 'jaw' and 'set', coz it looks weird on the clause
'with his fists clenched...' Read it aloud, and you'll see.
"Uh, Makoto? I'm having a little trouble breathing, down here."
Suggest: breathing down here." (comma muyo)
"What? Oh, right! Sorry!" Blushing furiously, Makoto released the
boy and scuttled back to a safe distance as she let him sit up and catch
his breath. That had been a little embarassing.
embarassing --> embarrassing
Makoto: The narrative prose can't spell 'embarassed'! It's so 'embarassing'!
She hadn't meant to lunge
at him like that, but it was just such a relief to see a friendly face
(especially such a smart, cute, handsome face) after so many days that
she had acted without thinking.
...As opposed to her latest actions, where she was the paragon of forethought?
"Well," a strange man in a straw hat said as he walked around the
corner to join them, "that seems to be the last of... oh! Sorry, didn't
Suggest: of... Oh!
mean to interrupt your little tea party, over here.
Suggest: tea party over here.
Ryo was right - it had gotten a bit chilly once evening hit the
Suggest: Ryo was right; it
Or: Ryo was right. It
Also: Ryo was right... It
The sun had been down for hours, and the entire city had
transformed into a shifting panorama of flickering neon lights and massive
glowing billboards that constantly moved from one advertisement to another
as the headlights of cars whirred by too quickly to make out the vehicles
themselves.
Uh-oh. Danger! Danger Will Robinson! It's the "Too many thoughts in your
sentence" type of sentence (also called the run-on sentence) all over again. It
would do for easier reading to just limit one thought per sentence. For
example, that one sentence was saying:
-The sun had been down for hours.
-The entire city had transformed (into a panorama of lights and billboards).
-The panorama constantly moved from one advertisement to another.
-The car headlights whirred quickly.
-The vehicles (cars) moved so fast that they can't be made out.
...All at the same time. And readers can get easily tired trying to get your
meaning with such a complicated monster of a sentence. In any case, we can
easily cut the sentence into two, maybe even three sentences for easier
reading.
Suggest: The sun had been down for hours. As such, the entire city had
transformed into a shifting panorama of flickering neon lights and massive
glowing billboards that constantly moved from one advertisement to another.
Meanwhile, the headlights of cars whirred by so quickly that it was difficult
to make out the vehicles themselves.
Or something like that. ^^; Just don't overwork each individual sentence.
Simplify and all that jazz. :)
Grammar Rule #71: Avoid making run-on sentences that go on and on such that
each and every dependent and independent clause is connected by conjunctions,
prepositions, redundancy, and over-punctuation; it's simply not kosher to see
so many thoughts in one sentence when you can simply separate them into
standalone ones--after all, it's better to make a paragraph from several
sentences than make a paragraph out of a single sentence, even though said
sentence may seem grammatically correct to you... Keep in mind, overworking a
sentence with so many thoughts stuffed into it can lessen the impact of its
meaning, and can thoroughly confuse your reader to boot.
Ryo ducked slightly to avoid bumping his head on a paper lantern
that bobbed from the corner of a shopkeeper's awning and nimbly leapt out
of the way as a boy on a bicycle pedalled past furiously.
Suggest: bicycle furiously pedalled past.
The lingering
aroma of ramen and the jangling of his bell trailed after the boy as the
crowd parted to make way for him and he veered around the corner, still
pedalling as fast as he could.
(shakes head) Is it me, or are your favorite words 'pedal' and 'barrel'? Since
chapter one, I've been seeing these words used in all your fics over and over.
"I know what you mean," Ami admitted sadly as they continued
walking. She guessed that her house was pretty vacant at the moment - her
mother was off at another symposium in Chicago about caring for children
with learning disabilities. Before that, it had been the medical
convention in Antwerp, and before that it had been an exciting new
research lab in Buenos Aires.
It would be a nice touch of irony if her mother actually went as a guest
speaker in a "Busy Parents and their 'Latch-Key' Children" convention.
exactly what we needed to do. We're just grasping at straws, here."
Suggest: Here, we're just grasping at straws."
"Really? I'd never noticed," Ryo joked, his eyes twinkling. "It's
a good idea, Ami, but I don't think it's going to work for me: patience
isn't really my thing. Hey... come here! I think I found a short-cut!"
short-cut --> shortcut (d-v-w, no need for the hyphen)
The skin on his palm was rough and calloused; he had the strong and limber
hands of a swordsman. It was fascinating, how his fingers could feel so
Suggest: fascinating how his (comma muyo)
What was going on,
here?
Suggest: What was going on here? (comma muyo)
Unless maybe he had, in fact, been asking her out. In which case,
that would mean this was, indeed, a date. From which one could reasonably
conclude that she and Ryo were, at the moment, 'dating'. But only if you
wanted to go by the most technical description of the word, of course. Ami
was sure that this was just Ryo trying to be friendly and keep her company
for a little while.
Hehehe. At this point, she's Mojo-Jojo-ing her thoughts. This is one of the few
instances where redundancy is acceptable and doesn't muffle the sentence's
impact or detract from the story.
same time and walked in the same direction) and visiting a museum for a
few hours, then that did not necessarily mean anything. She had been very
careful not to embarass
embarass --> embarrass
herself by giving away how she felt around him.
There was no way that he could possibly know what he was doing to her.
She hadn't given him the tiniest sign.
LOL.
The first sign that Nise Suiko had arrived was when the minotaur
went flying across the campsite. Bellowing at the top of his lungs,
Takenoko was able to clear the flagpole and land just a few feet shy of
the treeline
Suggest: tree-line
The Terra Twins were the first to rise from the table, their slim
forms blurring as they dove into the earth as if entering a swimming
pool. The large sawblades
Suggest: saw-blades
Also: bladed saws
Nise Suiko laughed madly, and swung his trident as though the
massive polearm weighed nothing at all. Spinning the weapon in a complex
and intricate series of loops, he created a sheild
Suggest: polearm --> pole-arm
Revise: sheild --> shield
"Ooh, nice attack!" Oniwabandana said, appearing behind Nise Suiko
without warning. "Would you mind doing that again, for posterity?"
Onibanwanshu: (goes Bakumatsu on Oniwabandana's ass)
"Can I quote you on that?" the ninja chirped, as she somersaulted
Suggest: chirped as she somersaulted (comma muyo)
"What kind of tactic do you call this?" Nise Suiko yelled, as
Suggest: yelled as he
"Doesn't matter," the ninja mumbled in his ear as she slumped
forward onto him. "Still... got my exclusive. Doom and Gloom Girls
slaughter intruder... film at eleven..."
Suggest intruder.... Film at eleven..."
Or: intruder... Film at eleven..."
"What?" Nise Suiko threw the dying youma off of his claws and
spun around just in time to see Quartzie hurtling towards him with her
arm outstretched. With a fierce cry, she slammed her wrist into his throat
and sent him to the ground.
Makes sense, since the girls did kill the senshi and all.
He was barely able to get back onto his feet
before Garnet pounced on him. Leaping over his head, the red youma wrapped
her arms around his waist and used her weight to send him flipping into
the ground head-first.
Wow. Garnet used the Canadian Destroyer on him.
The impact was enough to blur his vision, and he
blinked his eyes to clear it as he struggled to free himself from the
girl's deathgrip
Suggest: deathgrip --> death-grip
"Oh, really?" the armoured warrior chuckled and looked at the
Suggest: "Oh really?"
Quartzie walked up behind her purple partner. "All right! Great
job, Anthracite! Let me play, too." Her hands flexed, and split into two
thick clusters of wriggling pseudopods that hummed and crackled with
Suggest: pseudo-pods
Thrusting his hands out of Quartzie's grasp, he grabbed both
girls by their faces and steadily began to tighten his grip.
"YOU bunch..."
The electricty
electricty --> electricity
"What in the nine hells is going on out here?" Jadeite asked,
throwing back the tent flap and storming out into the open air. His short
blone hair was mussed,
blone --> blond
and he was dressed only in the grey trousers and
purple undershirt of his uniform.
(smirk) Talk about catching you with your pants down.
Upon seeing Nise Suiko, he snarled and
extended one hand in the armoured youma's direction.
Nise Suiko gasped as he felt his own armour beginning to buckle
inwards on him.
Wow. Nifty trick, that.
"Radanthus?" Jadeite laughed. "Why in the world would I oppose
Radanthus? As a surprisingly perceptive woman just helped me realise, I
don't really give a damn who runs this place. If he wants the throne, I
will be more than happy to help him get it: Lord knows I don't want the
cursed thing. But you have come into MY camp, and you have attacked MY
people, and for that you must be destroyed. Good-bye."
Aw. Please don't, Jadeite. Nise Suiko's the best thing going on in this fic. As
'badass' as Carrot from 'Insertion' is, with none of the annoying,
'astonishingly powerful SI that bends reality itself so that his plot points
can happen', I daresay.
"You try that trick again," he vowed, "and I'll carve out your
brain like a bloody canteloupe. Do you understand me?"
canteloupe --> cantaloupe
off guard, but somehow Nise Suiko had managed to disappear right before
Suggest: off-guard
On the seventh floor Ryo had disappeared again, but this time it
Suggest: seventh floor, Ryo
Everything after that had been a whirlwind of fried won tons,
Methinks it's 'wontons' (though I could be wrong).
like the darkest, quietest place on Earth. Smiling softly, she let her
eyes close for a moment. She wasn't going to go to sleep, she promised
herself, she was just relaxing after that exhilirating
exhilirating --> exhilarating
"Oh, Ryo," Ami sighed, covering her mouth with her fingers as she
stood up shakily and walked down the hill to him. That had been what she
seen hiding in those eyes - the poor boy was haunted. How sad, to lose
somebody like that. "How did they... was it an accident?"
Suggest: they... Was
To Be Continued...
Here we go.
Grammar Rule #0: Watch out for speling erors and typoes.
Grammar Rule #21: Eliminate commas, that are, not necessary. Parenthetical
words however should be enclosed in commas.
Grammar Rule #39: The dash � a sometimes useful punctuation mark � can often
be overused � even though it's a helpful tool some of the time.
Grammar Rule #57: Hyphenate words that should be hyphenated (usually
compound-descriptors) and unhyphenate words that shouldn't be hyphenated, even
though it'd seem that either form is correct (Don't leave those words hanging
in mid-air!).
Grammar Rule #63: I before E except after C or sounding like 'a' as in
'neighbor' and 'weigh'. Unless it's weird.
Grammar Rule #71: Avoid making run-on sentences that go on and on such that
each and every dependent and independent clause is connected by conjunctions,
prepositions, redundancy, and over-punctuation; it's simply not kosher to see
so many thoughts in one sentence when you can simply separate them into
standalone ones--after all, it's better to make a paragraph from several
sentences than make a paragraph out of a single sentence, even though said
sentence may seem grammatically correct to you... Keep in mind, overworking a
sentence with so many thoughts stuffed into it can lessen the impact of its
meaning, and can thoroughly confuse your reader to boot.
Hmmm. Six grammar rules broken. Not bad, considering your worst record is eight
and your best record is five.
As for the story itself: As per usual, it was a barrel of laughs. I
particularly liked your kind of humor, and I especially loved the way it was
incorporated in the story such that it didn't at all read extraneously. But
jeez Louise, there are a lot of people here in this fic. It's like a Ranma
1/2/Urasei Yatsura Summer OAV with all sorts of characters popping up left and
right. I guess the increase in baddies is there to balance out the small group
of vigilante good guys running on the loose in the last chapter. No biggie,
since they _do_ present a lot of potential in making this story quite, well,
exquisitely fleshed-out and fairly epic, and you're generally in the right
track in getting to that 'epic' goal. Hell, Nise Suiko's cementing himself in
becoming the resident badass that's not overpowered; he was able to face
Jadeite in a respectable, no-god-moding, non-eye-rolling-inducing match, even.
Very good.
What else can I comment--Oh yes. Your penchant for long, dragging fight scenes
isn't seen here, because the 'Nise Suiko vs. Everybody that loves Jadeite plus
Jadeite himself' fight had wonderful pacing and was genuinely exciting (as
opposed to the IMO slightly lethargic and dragging first encounter Nise Suiko
had with Sailor Mars and his good twin Shin). I salute you, dear sir, for
balancing out good comedy with (this time around) good action scenes. My
understatement of the day is: Improvement is a good thing.
All in all, like I said before, though I had a lot of contentions when it comes
to the spelling and grammar used in this fic, I have little to no problems with
the fic's well-thought and fascinating plot. If you were to push me into
finding a plot hole or criticism, the most I would come up with is the 'cloying
romantic subplot between Ryo and Ami.' Though there were a lot of genuinely
heartwarming scenes, I guess it's unavoidable to have a few sappy and
saccharine-sweet snags along the way. At times, Ami can get so... cliche'd with
her swooning that it makes my teeth hurt (but only sometimes; most of the time,
I find myself charmed by her girly infatuation). Cloyingness is truly the bane
of the non-angsty, chick-flick-like, teeny-bopper romance scene. On that note,
let me congratulate you on _not_ making Ryo into a ball of crying, whimpering
angst during the time he mentioned Luna's death in passing; indeed, he has
earned my newfound respect for him. He may seem like the stereotypical
protagonist at times, but he's nevertheless a well-rounded and
three-dimensional protagonist. Keep on writing and churning out these
high-quality fics.
Hindi mo naiintindihan itong pangungusap na ito,
Abdiel
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"English: A language that lurks in dark alleys, beats up other languages, and
rifles through their pockets for spare vocabulary."
"Japanese: Tried to do the same mugging technique that English did, with
disastrous results."
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