there's the large number of 
dialogue/thought indicators: asterisk, tildes, etc... 

Personally, I can't 

think of a single novel I've read that does so. 

Sometimes, it works better.  In a published novel, there are 
cases where 
one would use italics or boldface, but for those of us with text only 
browsers can't read this.  Thus, it's easier in e-mailed 
fanfics to use 
the *, ~, etc. 

Exactly, that's why fanfics use special characters (I use angle brackets
<> myself) to indicate thoughts. You can't use italics in text only
stories. 

Of course, using too many special characters for different kinds of
speech/thought can get VERY distracting. I was going to use different
characters to indicate spoken Mandarin and English starting with CMD
chapter 7, but my pre-readers talked me out of it. Instead I stayed with
double quotes and just indicated in the descriptions when the language
changes. Looking back it looks a lot better without all the different
characters for different languages. 

    (The one convention that I actually do like is the 

"...".  I don't 

know why.  It's just cute.) 

The ellipsis isn't a convention.  It's part of English. 

He might mean using: 
"..." 
by itself to indicate a shocked silence/astonishment like many Japanese
mangas do. Personally I don't use the ellipsis like that. Usually I only
use them to indicate trailing off at the end of a spoken sentence or
stumbling for/over words by the characters. For the "..." reaction I
usually describe their reaction directly like: 

Ranma sat in shocked silence as Akane malleted his balls flat. 

After a pause he screamed very loudly. "Akane! Those were my favorite
ping pong balls!" 


Instead of:

Akane malleted Ranma's balls flat.

"...."

"Akane! Those were my favorite ping pong balls!" Ranma screamed.




-=-
Jim Lazar

E-Mail - mailto:jimlazar@earthlink.net
Home - http://home.earthlink.net/~jimlazar
FanFiction - http://home.earthlink.net/~jimlazar/anime
-=-
     Kasumi found her father cradling her mother in his arms. He
had run out of tears to shed long ago, but the expression on his face
told the story. Kasumi calmly slid the door closed and knelt down
facing her father and mother, tears started flowing from her eyes.

     After several minutes of silence, Soun asked with a scratchy
voice, "Kasumi dear. Will you please say goodbye to your mother and
then go get Mr. Saotome?" He didn't look up at his daughter once.

     "Of course, Father," Kasumi said. She stood up, took one of her
mother's hands in hers, and said a soft, "Goodbye, Mother. I'll keep
my promise."

Ranma-ototo: Please Save My Family - Part 2
3rd place, Aug 1998 Mini-Series, Best of Ranma Fanfiction Awards