Copy-Pasted Disclaimer: I reserve the right to be totally wrong, and 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. ^_^
And my next victim is... someone I've victimized in the past. :P
On 9/7/05, hmelton@ameriwave.net <hmelton@ameriwave.net> wrote:
All forms of C&C are welcome.
(shrug) Well, you asked for it.
-------------------------------
The Secret Service are the first to formally request that Soun Tendo
fully train and certify a "Anything Goes" teacher. They send their
civilian Martial Arts adviser Frank Nash. The man already a grand
master in Lima Lama
The man, already a grand master in Lima Lama, (add a comma after 'man' and 'Lama' to improve the
flow of the sentence).
Frank
hoping to win his certificate immediately challenges the school's
master Soun Tendo to a match.
Punctuation Problems: Frank, hoping to win his certificate immediately, challenges the school's
master Soun Tendo to a match.
Grammar Rule # 21. Eliminate commas, that are, not necessary. Parenthetical words, however, should
be enclosed in commas.
Challengers and Masters
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Agent Dan Barr watched as Frank Nash paused at the gate slowly
gate, slowly
smirk that was creeping onto
I could be wrong, but I think it's supposed to be 'into' instead of 'onto'
the martial arts master's face
Every member of the Secret Service had been anticipating what Frank
would do when he saw the sign.
Open up his eyes?
Dan fought to keep the look of anticipation off his face as his
friend changed course and following the sign's instructions headed
and, following the sign's instructions, headed
for the rear of the Tendo compound.
extra space in between 'the' and 'rear'.
He was going to do it, fighting
the urge to float off the ground saying YES! Dan instead schooled his
features and followed a step behind.
Methinks the 'He was going to do it' part of the sentence is incongruous to the rest of the
sentence. Suggest: Separating that part and making it into a standalone sentence, i.e. He was
going to do it. Fighting the urge to float off..."
the agencies leadership and the idea of some beauracrat
bureaucrat
deciding he
needed more training to keep his job hadn't set well with him.
Shouldn't 'hadn't set well with him' supposed to be 'didn't sit well with him'?
certified a Qualified instructor
Extra space in between 'Qualified' and 'instructor'.
Still trailing along a step behind his former instructor and current
friend Dan
You're missing a comma in between 'friend' and 'Dan'.
mentally commiserated with Frank's plight, but he could
understand the reasons for Soun's refusal to train or certify any
instructor that was already enhanced. He hadn't understood at first,
at least not until he remembered a over heard
an overheard
Even understanding part of
Soun's reasoning Dan
I'm not sure what you're going for in this sentence, so I merely suggest:
Even after understanding part of Soun's reasoning, Dan
Even then Soun had made it clear that
permission was only being given on a trail basis
I believe that 'trail' basis should be 'trial' basis.
Dan was jerked from his thoughts by Frank's sudden stop and the
unexpected sound of him banging on a door.
Frank's sudden what? I can't exactly visualize what you're trying to write here.
Looking at his friend in
confusion Dan's hearing immediately started tracking the movement of
the Tendo's house keeper an eyebrow rose as he heard the sound of a
weapon's mechanism.
The above sentence is, without a doubt, a car-wreck sentence. It had so many thoughts and wanted
to convey so many visuals that it literally crashed into itself, resulting in a jumble of
nonsense. (sighs) Let's see what we can salvage in this wreck... Let's extricate the remains and
rebuild from there.
Suggest: As Dan looked at his friend in confusion, his hearing immediately started tracking the
movement of the Tendo's housekeeper. An eyebrow rose as he heard the sound of a weapon's
mechanism.
Taking a quick glance through the wall Dan
Glanced _through_ the wall? Man, I didn't realize that the enhancements included x-ray vision a la
Superman.
decided he didn't blame Ami, they were expected,
He didn't blame Ami for what? Who were expected? Who were 'they'?
A moment later he
heard a second click and saw the security agent's hand release the
Dragon Fifty back into it's
it's --> its
Turning from the house Dan automatically scanned the area pausing to
nod to Rising Sun who was hovering at 18,000 feet and nominally
watching the city, but actually paying more attention to her home and
dojo.
Grammar Rule #44. Avoid going out on tangents unrelated to your subject -- not the subject of a
sentence -- that's another story (like the stories written by Ernest Hemingway, who by the way
wrote the great fisherman story The Old Man and the Sea).
Simply put, concentrate the focus of your sentence on Dan. If you _really_ want to include Rising
Sun there, then she must have at least some relevance to the story, to Dan (the focus of the
story) in particular. Dan incidentally seeing her while he's 'scanning' the room is irrelevant to
the story, really.
Lowering his eyes from the sky Dan glanced through the dojo
sky, Dan
entrance rearrangeing
rearranging
themselves to watch the coming challenge.
Moving his focus to the surrounding residential structures Dan easily
structures, Dan easily
picked out several hidden presidential class agents. Most were on
the nearby roofs and were accompanied by a couple of unenhanced
Suggest: un-enhanced
A smiled crossed Dan's face changing quickly to a frown.
Your sentence structure sounds awkward.
Suggest: The smile that crossed Dan's face changed quickly to a frown.
Or: A smile crossed Dan's face, quickly changing to a frown.
The smile
had come at the thought of Arnold or one of the other agents having
to spend his weekend lifting a supertanker into orbit and had
vanished as he remembered what several reporters were calling Agent
Waldeker.
Suggest: cutting off the sentence at "...a supertanker into orbit" and start a new sentence with
the remaining sentence fragment like so:
It had vanished once he remembered what several reporters were calling Agent Waldeker.
Also, suggest: The smile vanished once he remembered what names several reporters called Agent
Waldeker.
project. No question about it stock market speculators were a
No question about it, stock market speculators were a
flighty airheaded
flighty, air-headed (add a comma after 'flighty' and compound descriptors should be hyphenated,
_not_ combined into a word that's not commonly used)
of Waldeker pushing on the huge hull with almost no descernable
discernable
dry." Dan's hands tightened into fist
You're missing the 'a' article in between 'into' and 'fist'.
saying Dan couldn't shake the feeling that Agent Waldekers brainstorm
and self created
self-created (compound descriptors should be hyphenated)
Forcing his mind off Waldeker Dan
Forcing his mind off Waldeker, Dan
agents. His training methods invariable
invariably
left his students humbled,
bruised, battered and improved.
bruised, battered, and improved.
(When listing more than two items, put a comma after each one except the last.)
Despite his ego and habit of demonstrating just how good he was Frank
he was, Frank
that was a match for an olympic
Olympic
Y'know, though there are words that have dual forms in small case and in title case (For example,
'master' and 'Master' or 'lieutenant' and 'Lieutenant'), this isn't the case here. Words like
'Olympic', 'Olympian', 'American', 'Japanese', 'English', 'Kryptonian', etc., even when used as
descriptors, don't have a lower case equivalent. Just a head's up.
It had been common knowledge that Frank was a Grand master in Lima
Lama and that he also held high level black belts in several other
empty hand forms, but no one suspected he had an interest in weapons.
Yeah, we get it. The fact that he's using weapons is supposed to be surprising.
Frank had regularly demonstrated how to disarm or disable people
brandishing everything from an Axes to Whips,
_an_ Axes to Whips? How about, oh, getting rid of the 'an' and just go with 'from axes to whips'
coz you didn't really need to capitalize those items in the first place?
but he was never seen
to actually use the weapons himself.
WE GET IT.
crossed Dan's, Arnold's or anyone elses
else's
perfect. She had won a bronze metal
I believe 'metal' should be 'medal'.
fencing in a previous Olympic
Game and she could do things with a sword that Dan hadn't seen, even
in the special effects of a Zarro movie.
Zorro movie.
was about twenty well trained dummys
dummies
Soun fought down his own
irritation as he saw yet another master who was completely ignorant
of his bodies
body's
than six forms of martial arts and yet his chi control and focus was
worse than a ten year olds, specifically Akane's.
ten year old's,
Soun, unaware a smile had graced his face, at the memory of time
spent training his youngest daughter,
It bears repeating. Grammar Rule # 21. Eliminate commas, that are, not necessary. Parenthetical
words, however, should be enclosed in commas.
Revise: Soun, unaware of the smile that had graced his face at the memory of the time spent
training his youngest daughter,
swordswoman with nothing more than very large knives. He had used
unknown style that was admittedly rather rough, but looked to hold
great promise.
Add the article 'a' in between 'He had used' and 'unknown style' (or, considering the formatting
of this fic, _before_ 'unknown style')
Grammar Rule #38: Proofread carefully to see if you any words out.
Soun had been warned that Frank might challenge the dojo, not that he
needed such a warning he had already decided it was a likely after
seeing the echoes of his style in Dan and the other agents.
Car-wreck sentence. Please revise.
Suggest: Soun had been warned that Frank might challenge the dojo, not that he need such a warning
since he already decided it was likely after seeing the echoes of his style in Dan and the other
agents.
Or: Though he didn't need such a warning, Soun had been warned that Frank might challenge the
dojo. The Tendo patriarch already expected the challenge after seeing the echoes of his opponent's
style in Dan and the other agents.
Etc, etc.
That
belief had firmed
firmed --> formed
into certainty after viewing the fencing video and
had prepared for this day accordingly.
What prepared who for this day accordingly? The structure of this sentence is suspect. Please
revise, particularly in the hastily added 'and had prepared for this day accordingly' part.
but looking at him now and the poorly focused aura that surrounded
him Soun's determination to make him a student increased.
him, Soun's
He hadn't
thought it was possible to reach the levels this man had with a Chi
that unfocused. Silently studying his new students aura
student's aura
for several
seconds he decided it
seconds, he decided it
His decision made, Soun focused and the wistful smile turned
sinister, his hair started to flutter in an nonexistant
nonexistent
breeze as his
facial features along with the rest of his body seemed to slowly
distort into something horrifying. After a moment observing his
After a moment of observing... (add 'of' in between 'moment' and 'observing'
Remember Grammar Rule #38.
challengers body
challenger's body
and Chi Soun stepped inside the man's stance and
and Chi, Soun
effortless flipped the frozen man's body.
effortlessly
Frank climbed to his feet for the sixth time swaying slightly as he
time, swaying slightly
slowly wiped the blood from his cut lip, careful to keep his eyes
focused on Master Tendo's feet his gaze never climbing above the
knees.
(winces) Hoo boy, where do I start?
You were doing well right until the 'careful to keep his eyes...' part. It went downhill from
there. The above sentence was so needlessly long, it's practically a run-on. Hmmm. My professor
has a name for this sort of sentence. It's the "Too many thoughts in your sentence" type of
sentence. It would do for easier reading to just limit one thought per sentence. For example, that
one sentence was saying:
-Frank climbed to his feet for the sixth time.
-Frank swayed slightly as he slowly wiped the blood from his cut lip.
-Frank was careful to keep his eyes focused on Master Tendo's feet.
-Frank's gaze never climbing above the knees.
...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
three sentences for easier reading. Actually, like I said earlier on, your sentence was doing well
until the 'careful to keep his eyes' part. Let's work with that.
Suggest: Frank climbed to his feet for the sixth time, swaying slightly as he slowly wiped the
blood from his cut lip. He carefully kept his eyes focused on Master Tendo's feet, his gaze never
climbing above the knees.
He had found out the hard way looking at a larger portion of
Soun's body invariably pulled his eyes to the face and to him being
frozen.
The above sentence is yet again a car-wreck sentence. Please revise.
Suggest: He had found out the hard way that by looking at a larger portion of Soun's body, his
eyes were pulled invariably to his opponent's face, leaving him paralyzed with irrational fear.
Soun watched his student wipe away blood and frowned he hadn't
meant to hit him that hard.
Er... right. Please revise the above run-on sentence.
Suggest: Soun frowned as he watched Frank wipe away the blood from his lips. He didn't mean to hit
him that hard.
His challenger was good enough that when
he moved Soun was finding it hard not to react like he was one of his
current batch of embassy students with the beginnings of a three
percent kryptonian enhancements.
(shrugs) I dunno, but shouldn't ' kryptonian' be capitalized the same way 'Japanese' or 'American'
is capitalized? Even if they _are_ a fictitious race, grammar rules still apply to that word,
methinks.
Oh, and the sentence above has awkward phrasing. Several times I kept wondering just who the
pronouns were referring to. 'His challenger was good enough that when he moved...' was 'he' and
'his' referring to Soun or to Frank? And on the later pronouns, '...react like he was one of his
current batch of embassy students', which were they referring to this time? Soun or Frank?
After a moment's thought Soun
After a moment's thought, Soun
Taking a deep breath and a moment
to focus his Chi Soun leaped easily clearing Franks head as his body
Chi, Soun leaped, easily
Soun frowned when he
had to take a half step back to maintain his balance almost missing
balance, almost missing
one of the pressure points as he forced his chi into selected nerve
junctures on his students back.
student's back
Frank's mind raced as he watched every twitch in the Anything Goes
Master's feet and lower legs. He had to come up with some way around
this so called Demon Head attack, how could he fight someone when he
Suggest: ...attack. How could he... (separate the two thoughts into two different sentences)
Or: ...attack; how could he... (replace the comma with a semicolon)
couldn't look at them. It's
Its --> It's
Frank had never even imagined such an
attack and wouldn't even have known the name if he hadn't heard one
of the marines blurt it out before being silenced
You're missing either a period or a comma after 'silenced'
Not that knowing the name was helping and finding out it had stood
off a Kryptonian was disheartening in the extreme.
Grammar Rule #25: Understatement is always the absolute best way to put forth earth-shaking ideas.
Grammar Rule #28: If you've heard it once, you've heard it a billion times: Resist hyperbole; not
one writer in a million can use it correctly. Besides, hyperbole is always overdone, anyway.
Grammar Rule #33: Exaggeration is a billion times worse than understatement.
Japanese Sensia
Revise: 'Sensia' to 'Sensei'
and find out why they had told him the Anything Goes
School was nothing more than perverts, thieves, conmen, flimflam
artist and fakers using tricks more appropriate to a carnival side
show.
Er... He's telling the truth. ^_^; Though it's not really the Anything Goes School that have
'fakers using tricks more appropriate to a carnival side show'. It's their enemies that do that.
But, oh well, rumors _are_ rumors. It's only partly true.
Frank blinked as Soun's legs suddenly vanished followed a moment
vanished, followed a moment
later by gasps from several students. He had just started to spin
around in his search when he heard a soft thump and felt a almost
an almost
simultaneous series of sharp burning stings across his shoulders and
lower back. He tried to react with a spinning kick and a combo to his
attackers chest
attacker's chest
and head, but instead collapsed when only his torso
moved his legs frozen and his arms flopping numbly.
his torso moved, his legs frozen, and his arms flopping numbly.
(When listing more than two items, put a comma after each one except the last.)
He seemed to fall
slowly as his unbalanced body tipped over hitting the mats on his
left shoulder.
over, hitting the mats on his left shoulder.
(applauds) Go Soun!
Dan watched Frank fall yet again and looked down at his half empty
bag of popcorn
I think you're missing a period after 'popcorn'. If it's intentional, I nonetheless suggest
terminating the sentence after 'popcorn'... otherwise, the flow of prose will be disrupted.
he didn't see his friend twitch several times, but he
heard him say "I yield Master Soun."
"I yield, Master Soun."
Leaving his bag of popcorn Dan
Leaving his bag of popcorn, Dan
jumped to his feet and hurried over to his friend as Soun rolled him
over and pressed several spots on his back. He nervously bowed to
Soun as Frank let out a hiss and clumsily came to his feet and
staggard
staggard --> staggered (I think... Is this what you meant to type?)
a slow circle shaking his arms and feet. Finally the man
seemed to feel confident enough in the control of his limbs to give
Soun a deep bow and say "Master Soun I humbly request permission to
Master Soun, I humbly request permission to
Formally accepting his new student Soun
student, Soun
studied his Chi and felt
vindicated. The respect he could see in Frank's aura wouldn't have
been present and more importantly this hatchling instructor would be
convincing himself that it was the almost mythical power of a
kryptonian enhancement that had beaten him.
Kryptonian
Also... huh? The structure of the above sentence has left me scratching my head. I don't get your
meaning there. The respect Soun sees in Frank's aura wouldn't have been present without what?
Also, the 'more importantly...' parts seemed tagged on... it would have been better if they [the
'more importantly' parts] were put in a separate sentence. Remember, keep it one thought/main idea
per sentence. Don't meander.
Turning down a enhancement and ignoring his oldest daughter's
attempts to convince him otherwise had been the hardest thing he had
done in years. Sighing Soun watched as Frank was almost mobbed by
agents each trying
agents, each trying
desires ahead of the future of the school. He wasn't his best friend
friend,
a prodigy in the art almost hamstrung by his own lazyness.
laziness
Also, I agree. Genma really is a prodigy in the art. His Hell's Cradle, though used by
Takahashi-sensei as mostly a punchline to a gag, makes use of psychological tactics and Genma's
innate creativity. Bash him as the fandom would, the art truly is Genma's forte. It's unfortunate
he's a lazy lug.
Fighting back the tears Soun
Fighting back the tears, Soun
Ah. Old school Soun. :)
looked toward his wife's shrine and
remembered the vow she had require
required
of him the day she agreed to marry
him. A vow he had forgotten the day she died. Silently he remembered
that vow and renewed it again. Promising his wife that he would have
something respected
Suggest: respected --> respectable/decent/honorable
to leave her children, something that would cover
the secret shame of her family.
Wow. Nice cap off to a great shortfic.
howard melton
God bless
General comments: You're good at making these brief but very effective fics. In comparison to the
Zatanna shortfic I've C&Ced six months ago (wow... long time), the same problems from before have
popped up here. Since this fic is about, what? Six pages longer than the Zatanna ficlet, the
grammar mistakes are, shall we say, 'highlighted' more. You have the same ol' punctuation problems
(incorrect comma use, in particular). Other problems that have popped up are incorrect spellings
that can only be spotted via proofread. So, yeah, please proofread your fic before sending it to
the mail. To elaborate...
Commas: I told you in the Zatanna ficlet C&C that you should learn to use commas properly. I now
realize that _that's_ just one part of the problem. The main problem is, of course, learning to
punctuate properly. As a general rule, sentences that use digressive but related thoughts (the
'feeling regret' part of "She said this, feeling regret") should have proper punctuation 'coz
otherwise they'd look weird. ("She said this feeling regret.") The same goes for 'reversed'
versions of the above example. ("Feeling regret, she said this" as opposed to "Feeling regret she
said this.")
Sentences that don't make sense/car-wreck sentences: A good tip to avoid this... Read and reread
your fic aloud (when you're alone, preferably), editing it as you go. What you write and what you
thought you wrote are two distinctly different things that are mutually exclusive to each other.
One technique I use so that I won't look like an idiot when proofreading my works is using the
'Speech' capability of my computer (found in the Control panel, available only for XP and Win 2000
users only, methinks). I copy-paste parts of my fic into the 'Speech' tab and let Microsoft Mike
or Microsoft Mary read the fic for me. Useful, especially if you have laryngitis.
The difference between a plural word and a word ending with apostrophe-'s': I won't patronize you.
You probably made these mistakes simply because you didn't proofread well enough. As such, the
only suggestion I could give you here is to, well, proofread.
Missing Words: You miss putting in words like articles in your fic. Again, a good proofread (and
not just a good spellcheck) will fix this problem in a jiffy.
Content: Well, that's the good news. :) This little snippet involving the match between Soun Tendo
and... some guy was interesting in and of itself. Even the various grammar mistakes didn't detract
from the main story. You've got nice concept... it's the execution that I have problems with. I
was really looking forward to seeing Soun hand Frank's ass to him since the beginning of the fic.
In any case, I think your handle of the language is competent enough that with proper proofreading
and further practice you'll avoid these preventable mistakes in the future; your story will shine
through all the brighter if you do so, IMO.
Again, good luck with your story. Continue working to become better and better, and I'm sure
you'll succeed. As always, keep on writing.
Abdiel
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