Snippage throughout.
It seems odd to me that Happy just decided to sit down and have an extended
mostly-friendly conversation with Ranma and Akane, and that Ranma and Akane
just
decided to listen. I know you want to introduce the idea that Happy could be
Akane's real father, but you might want to either shorten his speech and just
have him hint at it, or introduce this idea in a different way.
I don't think it would be unusual for Happy to want to talk to
Ranma and Akane. As least, if he's had his panty fix, and his
collection has been ironed and catalogued...
Although I do agree that it would be odd for Akane and Ranma to
actually sit down in and listen. Perhaps I'll bribe them in with
the promise of a fan or glasses of iced tea. ^_^
She was finally able to calm her fears when she recognized that it
was just P-Chan's nose-bleed problem. Whenever she held him close to
her chest, he...
AKANE: P-chan's a *pervert!* This must mean--
HAPPOSAI: Yes, it's true. It all started during my brief but torrid affair
with
Miss Piggy....
HAPPOSAI: It all began when Kermit was seduced away from
her by a WAFFy fanfic writer...
RANMA: Before this conversation takes a bad turn, I'd like
to state for the record that I don't even *like* dogs.
"B- But the schools! We were supposed to join them. If Akane
isn't... If she..." His intense eyes turned to his son. "Who's the
father, Boy?"
Boy probably shouldn't be capitalized. It's not a name, it's a description.
He's
saying that Ranma is *a* boy.
Only he's *not* saying that Ranma is a boy, that's the name he's
addressing him by. In this context, "Boy" is a proper noun, referring
to a *specifc* person, place or thing. As such, it's capitalized.
In my opinion, anyway.
"She's not a monster, either!"
monster either!" [...]
I know I'm pretty gratuitous with commas, and maybe don't have the best
judgement about when to use them, :j but I think this one belongs here.
If for nothing else, than to indicate a pause.
For the n'th time that afternoon, she tugged at her shirt, trying to
nth (not a contraction, so no apostrophe)
Apostrophies are used for possessives, contractions, AND to pluralize
compound nouns, numbers mentioned as numbers, numbers mentioned as
letters, words mentioned as words, and abbreviations.
I'm extending those last cases to handle ordinals, as well as plurals.
After all, nth and Nth don't look like complete words (where's the
vowel?) and n-th looks even weirder.
(I did think this out before using the apostrophe. ^_^)
There was something about the tone of her voice that caught Ukyo's
attention. She must have been really out of it to have run into her
without noticing. "You okay, Sugar?" She offered her hand to help
Again, things like "sugar" and "honey" are descriptions, not names, and IMO
shouldn't be capitalized.
As used, Sugar and Honey *are* names. You could replace them with
"Akane," with no change in meaning.
What was this? Ukyo found herself slightly excited. Had Akane done
something to screw up her engagement to Ranma? She licked her lips,
trying to get more information. If they really were headed towards
spiltsville... "What makes you say that?"
splitsville....
Okay, here's a question. Should "splitsville" be capitalized?
Ukyo lifted her baseball cap up just enough to scratch her head,
without letting any of the hair fall out. "How's that a problem? What,
are you doing to turn into a sex fiend or something?" She giggled.
Ukyo gets to the real truth a little too quickly here, I think. You could get
some good comedy out of it if she jumped to a wrong conclusion first.
I'd tend to agree. Unfortunately, nothing leapt to mind.
"It doesn't seem possible, does it?" He gave a half-hearted laugh,
laced with hysteria. "I can't imagine what was going through Mother's
head..."
Isn't Akane surprised that this stranger knows who Happosai is, not to mention
Shampoo's association with him?
She would be, yes, if she were thinking straight. These characters
can only be insightful if that insight leads them to incorrect
assumptions. ^_^
This scene should probably be filled out a little better in a
subsequent rewrite.
"Wait! Don't go! You must avoid her! What if she forces hot,
passionate sex on you? What if you get her pregnant?!" Panic edged
At first glance I read the last line as "What if you get pregnant?!" :)
Stop reading so many Ranma-Gets-Pregnant fics! ^_^;
"He thinks he's beaten me, but he's fallen prey to Anything Goes
Martial Arts Reverse Psychology! Foolish boy!"
Heh. Very Genma-ish plan. And of course, it goes wrong. :)
Yes, well not even all of Genma's plans can succeed. ;)
"Mmm," he moaned, still unconscious. "Why, Dear? Why did it have
dear (see previous)
See my previous. ;)
Unless, maybe she'd WANTED to be fooled? She'd let herself think of
Ukyo as a boy, because if he grabbed the chest of a man, it wouldn't be
perverted.
It wouldn't? :)
RANMA: So if I grabbed your chest, Akane....
AKANE: Don't even think about it!
Ranma's called Akane unfeminine, but I don't think
he's ever called her a man, before. ^_^;;;
"Wh- What?" He nervously pushed Ukyo back, keeping his hands on her
shoulders.
"Akane! She's Happosai's daughter! She grabbed my boob!" She
KONATSU: It's true! I was standing there, and Akane reached at me, and....
AKANE: [sigh] Oh, Konatsu, you're so sexually ambiguous...
RANMA: I wonder if I should consider this a good thing.
(I can't believe you passed up the opportunity for another Rhea joke...)
She gazed up into his eyes with glistening eyes. "O- Okay."
Can you reword this so that you don't repeat "eyes?"
Ugh, yes. Will do.
Oops. She blushed. Tomorrow she'd have to make sure to let out a
little more energy. Humming a little song to herself, she hoped the
people of Nerima appreciated the contributions she was giving them.
This probably isn't the best way to introduce this little quirk of Kasumi. We
get told about it, rather than shown it in action. IMO, you could write a
scene
of about the same length where she actually *uses* her energy on someone, and
we
get to see the effects, and it probably wouldn't have to be much longer than
this.
How would I show such a scene *after* she's already come back home?
I want Soun's comment and Ranma and Akane's actions to lead to Kasumi's
thread of thought.
The idea is that she's "bleeding off" her energy to all the citizens of
Nerima, not her family. I'd have to show her doing it, and then come
home, which would spoil the joke.
I'm not too happy about the last paragraph, but I do believe this was
the right way to go about it.
All in all, a definite improvement on the descriptions from the last chapter.
Still dialog-heavy in some parts, but not so much that it causes any huge
problem for me. Looking forward to seeing more of your stuff whenever you get
the chance to write more.
I like dialogue heavy (as long as it goes somewhere). I've got my writing
quirks, and you've got yours. (Which I'll leave unsaid. ;)
Thanks again for the comments!
Doug
----
Douglas MacDougall "You were nicer when you were evil.
http://www.dougmacd.net Cuter, too. Definitely more sexy!"