Various non-fanfic commitments have kept me mostly away from the FFML
recently, so here's an attempt to get back into the swing of things. As
always, be aware that these comments represent the biased opinions of
one particularly cranky reader, so take them for what they're worth. :)

Donald Lee Granberry <noharness@mac.com> wrote:

==============================
Divided I Stand: Part I Rev 0
==============================

Let's not forget to credit Rumiko Takahashi for the characters.

      "He went over that wall, Pop!" Onna-Ranma shouted at
the top of his lungs. Typhoon Akane was now officially
entering greater Tokyo. The wind driven rain stung Onna-
Ranma's skin as though an angry crowd were pelting him with
small stones. He turned his back to it, trying to shelter his
cursed form's breasts from the onslaught. He chalked it up to
the gods punishing him for having asked Akane if she had
plied a meteorologist with her cooking. Genma tried to hold
up a sign, but the wind snatched it away before Onna-Ranma
could read it.

While I agree with the use of "he" for female Ranma, since that's how he
would describe himself, I don't think you need the "Onna-" prefix every
time. Just the mention of "breasts" is enough to tell us that Ranma is
in female form, and at least to me, all the "Onna" read as though you're
constantly repeating the same bit of physical description over and
over -- and in gratuitous Japanese, to boot. :)

 
I hear and understand about the repetition. OTOH, we are never going to
agree on what constitutes  "gratuitous" use of Japanese. I despair of ever
reconciling that issue with you. We'll just hafta agree to disagree on that
point.

     Genma tried holding up another sign which might have
read something like "Sorry about this!", but no one would

Don't need the comma if the quoted line ends in an exclamation point.

 
Okay, will fix.

have been able to tell because it was quickly carried away by
the wind. Onna-Ranma never got a glimpse of it, having turned
his back on his father. He had to lean into the wind while
keeping his eyes on the pavement. Looking forward was out of
the question. The wind driven rain, made of drops the size of

wind-driven
(hypenate two-or-more-word phrases that are used as adjectives)

 
Igor! Fetch me another hyphen!

number three tins, would have done terrible damage to his

How big is a number three tin?

RANMA: One size larger than a number two tin, of course. Duhhh.

 
It's the standard size found on store shelves--or was when I was a kid.
Think, green beans.

     Without warning, Panda-Genma seized his son from behind
and threw him straight up into the air. Onna-Ranma sailed
upward three or four meters. The wind seized him and he

May want to use another word for one of the "seized" to avoid the
repetition.

 
Gack! Will fix.

disappeared over the wall. Genma had just enough time to feel
a sharp twinge of guilt before the wind tumbled him over
backwards and slammed him head first into the wall. He slid
down into an inert pile of black and white fur at the base of
the wall. The wall was trapping the speeding rain and sheets

rain, and
(since each side of the "and" contains an independent clause; as
written, it looks like the wall was trapping both the rain and the
sheets, until you get to the next line)

 
Will fix.

      Onna-Ranma quickly realized that hitting the ground was
going to be a painful experience, but a far less painful
experience than if he allowed the wind to carry him along for
any distance. The longer he stayed in the air, the faster he
would be going when he finally ran into something, like the
rapidly approaching mansion just ahead. He tucked into as

Suggest some sort of visual description of the mansion here. Just
mentioning it as an "oh, by the way" seems a bit odd.

 
Well, this is the second gripe I've gotten about the paucity of descriptive
prose in Part I. I'll try to squeeze some in without ruining the pace.

      Onna-Ranma found himself at the bottom of a black abyss.
He hurt horribly, and was conscious of some terrible,
irrecoverable loss, but of what he could not determine. He
also felt a strange sense of elation, as though things would
now change for the better, but he knew he was not going to
like the price.

This part strikes me as a bit of too-obvious author foreshadowing....

 
Let's see if I get any more flags on this one. If I do, I may well strike
it.

A sudden spell of vertigo nauseated him
without warning. The room was not just spinning; it was
dipping one corner as it turned, making him want to vomit in
time with its spin.

...but I liked this description here; really gives me a good sense of
what Ranma's experiencing.

 
Thanks.

     Onna-Ranma felt a pair of large hands fumbling at his
right side. The pain they caused him was excruciating. The
wind, Onna-Ranma vaguely noted, was still howling, but seemed
distant, and the stone-hard drops of fast moving rain were no
longer pelting him.

    "Quickly, man, quickly! She's choking!"

HIROSHI: I'll volunteer to do mouth-to-mouth!

DAISUKE: Me too!

 
Git back in line, boys.

    "Careful, Lilly!" the authoritative voice said. "Move her
as little as possible."

KODACHI: Is this my dear. hated childhood rival? OHOHOHOHO!

(Shouldn't that name be spelled "Lily?")

 
I literally don't know. I've seen it spelled both ways.

     Ranma Saotome drifted upwards, ever so slowly, emerging
from the abyss by on tiny degree at a time until his hearing
began to work again. He was in large room. He could tell that

in a large

 
Yeah, I'm bad about dropping articles.

It looks like the POV has shifted somewhere from female Ranma (in the
"she's choking" scene, which seems to be after the split) to male Ranma
here. Unless this is deliberate (showing us something about how his
consciousness is moving from one to the other, or whatever else) you
might want to put in a scene break marker or some extra vertical space
to indicate the change.

 
I'll see if I can't come up with a better transition sentence.

    She was just a blur at first, but the color of her hair
got his attention. He forced himself to keep looking at her
until he could bring her into some semblance of focus. Let's
see, red hair, blue eyes, big boobs and a well defined
muscles, yep, it's my cursed form all right.

and well-defined
(or)
and a well-defined set of
(wasn't sure about the hyphenation for this one, but the dictionary has
hyphens on all the well-xxx compounds)

 
Arrgh! Igor! Fetch me another hyphen!

RANMA: Let's see... hair color that nobody else in the series nobody
else has. Check. Now the acid test. Put this pair of glasses on, and if
nobody notices the hair, then you're me.

(As demonstrated in a whole host of scenes, some of which are even in
the anime as well, female Ranma's hair color is not in fact
recognizable, any more than the huge eyeballs are. Suggest you find
another clue for him to notice, like perhaps the pigtail, which *does*
get noticed and recognized.)

 
So, does Ranma normally wear a uniform to school? I know he does that at
least once in the manga. I understand your gripe here, but Ranma's cursed
form is frequently depicted with red hair on the manga covers, among other
colors, and his cursed form is always depicted with red hair in the video
episodes that I have seen. Now, given that anything less than pitch black
hair drives the authorities in Japan right up a wall, or did back in the
eighties, what color suit's the girl type Ranma's character best? I'm going
to vote for the red hair and blue eyes. Ranma, either phase of him, is
nothing if not an iconoclast.

     "Copy?" Otoko-Ranma managed to croak out.

     "Nope," the red headed girl answered with a very slow

In accordance with the hyphenation rule mentioned above, the proper
punctuation of that phrase would be "black-haired". :-D

 
Arrgh! Igor, never mind bringing hyphens one at a time. Fetch me a sack
full!

     "You gotta bad headache, dontcha?" The redhead asked.

Since it's a direct attribution, no caps on "the girl with invisibly
colored hair." :-)

 
Oops.

     "Try sittin' up, but do it slow," the redhead told him,
"You'll get sick if you sit up all of a sudden. I done found
that out the hard way."

While I think you generally handle Ranma's rough speech well, the "done"
here is overdoing it, IMO; it makes him sound like a Clampett. :)

 
Agreed, I will modify accordingly.
 

     Otoko-Ranma slowly worked his way up onto his elbows.
The girl had not been kidding. His head swam sickeningly even
as the pain worsened rapidly. He gritted his teeth and slowly
forced himself to sit completely upright.

Quite a lot of "-ly" adverbs here. Maybe you could reword some of them.

 
Agreed, will fix.

     Otoko-Ranma accepted them gratefully. He gulped down all
four tablets at the same time, washing them down with a long
drink from the glass. The water was cold and sweet, like the
water from a mountain stream.

Suggest: sweet, as if from a mountain stream.
(we already know that it's water)

 
Agreed. Will change accordingly.

    "It's hard to explain," the girl said. "I mean, it's not
like I remember it like it happened to someone else, or
nothin'. I remember it all happenin' to me, but it...it don't
feel the same."

    Ranma found himself once again blinking in confusion as
he stared at his female counterpart. The girl, who at first
seemed so strong and self-possessed when Ranma first woke up,
began to wilt before his very eyes. She started crying.

    "Hey! What's wrong?"

    "Oh, Ranma!" the girl wailed, "I'm so scared!"

This is something that tends to bug me about most
Ranma-stuck-as-a-female stories. The intent is clear: Ranma (or in this
case, Ranma part B) is now a "real" girl, so he's disposed to start
acting like one. But much, if not all, of what we attribute to gender is
culturally ingrained rather than innate. Even though Ranma may be
physically female, moreso than he was in the manga, he was still raised
as a boy; he still went through boys' school where he'd have had it
drilled into him that crying wasn't acceptable behavior. Part of him at
this point might want to throw all that away, but there should at least
be another part that's struggling against it, maybe even making him act
*more* "butch" in an attempt to hang onto his self-image.

Of course, the girl's claim of being Ranma's female side might just be a
lie, in which case all bets are off. More about this below.

 
Let's hold off on the final call concerning this point until you have
reviewed Part II. Judging from the manga, Ranma's mannerisms change
significantly while he is in his girl form and under stress. Of course, what
stresses him would not be likely to bother you or me and what he thinks of
as fun would give either one of us a case of the blazing blue jitters.

    "Hey, take it easy!" Ranma said. "We've been through
worse."

     The girl sat down on the bed and buried her face in
Ranma's shoulder. He cuddled her without even thinking about
it.

This is a very reasonable response from (male) Ranma. (But why don't any
bystanders walk in at this point and misinterpret the scene? This is the
Ranmaverse, fer gods' sake. :-D)

 
Well, comedy did not seem to fit the story at this point. Just the threat of
it seemed reasonable enough.

    "If we can find a way," Ranma whispered, "I want you
back."

    "You don't mean that!" the girl cried.

    "Yes I do!" Ranma said, not believing that he had said it
and meant it. "Ya think I wanna give up ice cream and layin'
in the sun?"

I don't understand. Why would he have to give up those things without
his curse? (I know he does use girl form to go to the beach, but surely
that's just the simple practicality of not wanting to be caught female
in a boy's swimming suit.)

 
As I recall, Ranma won't eat ice cream unless he is in his girl form. I
assume, possibly only by taking license, that he would not sunbathe unless
he were in his girl form. Either way, the ice cream bit is in canon. He
doesn't seem to mind doing "girlish" things while in his female form, but is
loathe to be caught indulging in them while male.

    The girl began sobbing again. Ranma suddenly became aware
of her tears as they trickled down the bare skin of his chest.
They were hot and the girl in his arms was soft and cuddly,
like a real girl. Holding her was nothing like holding that
copy of his cursed form. That girl had been so incredibly
echi he hated the very memory of her.

GARY: What's "echi?"

RANMA: Go read Mad magazine.

 
Oh, very well! I'll replace it with "horny".

    Ranma blinked. What the girl had just said was true. She
was wearing a sheet arranged into a makeshift toga. He was
completely naked beneath the bedcovers. She turned her head
an looked up into his face. He looked down into her eyes. It
was unnerving. Ranma realized that they were staring into one
another's souls and both of them liked what they saw.

Urrrrk. :)  That last line strikes me as rather cliched. Suggest you try
for a more concrete imagery that gives us a more definite idea of what
Ranma's feeling.

 
Okay, I will give this serious consideration. I think you have a valid
point. Whether I am up to it as writer and can effect such an end without
spoiling the pace is another issue. We'll see.

     Ranma breathed a sigh of relief. The truth was, he had
enjoyed the experience, but did not like the thought of where
that might lead. Besides, this situation might not last and
he did not want the memories of any truly girl type behavior

truly girl-type

 
Thank God I had Igor bring a full bag of hyphens the last time.
 

    "As far as our bodies and all go, we're probably?brother

Remove erroneous "?"

 
That's what happens when you do corrective editing in a rush.

     "Saotome, look at who yer talkin' too."

to."
(typo)

     "Haabu maybe."

"Ha Bu" or "Habu" would be the Chinese romanization. The extended vowels
are a Japanese thing.

 
Yes, they are and "Haabu" is how Herb's name is written in the manga. What
can I say? It's one of them things we'll just hafta agree to disagree about.
Takahashi gives his name in the Chinese characters with Japanese furigana
for the purposes of pronunciation. From what I can see, the Japanese still
call Beijing, Peking. I grew up with the older form of romanization and its
easier for me to handle.

     "So I guess it'll hafta be just you, me and Akane then,

you, me, and
(when listing more than two items, comma after each except the last)

 
Will fix.

     "What are you gonna call yourself? I mean, I won't
complain if you keep callin' yourself Ranma, but people are
gonna get confused."

      "I kinda like Ranko," she murmured into Ranma's
shoulder. "It fits."

No points for originality there. :p

I'll hold off on most of the general comments until I read the other two
parts, but... one thing that bugged me a bit about this was the
reactions of the Ranmas. IMO, they handled the whole split thing way too
easily. I'm not asking for an angst-fest, but I think at the very least
a little stunned disbelief wouldn't be inappropriate. Ranky in
particular (and like an awful lot of fanfic characters with that name)
comes across as something of an ANC (Annoying New Character), always the
voice of wisdom, etc. etc. I hope that in future chapters we'll see
character flaws, especially ones that derive from Ranma's, causing
trouble for Ranko.

 
Oh, I think you'll find that she still acts a lot like our hero. I'll see if
I can flesh out their reactions a wee bit without spoiling the pace. You
know me, I HATE angst, unless it is so well done I can't skip over it. I
can't write angst that well and avoid it if I can sneak past the readers
without it.

Looking forward to reading more. Maybe for once I'll be able to keep up
with one of your series. :)

 
Well, let me say that I was both surprised and pleased that you chose to C&C
this one. I do not always agree with you on every point, but have always
considered your efforts at C&C to be honest, well thought out and more right
about things than you are wrong. I could do worse in choosing a helpmeet,
Gary.
 
Thanks going to the trouble,
 
Don Granberry.

Gary Kleppe
http://www.akane.org/gary/comics.html

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