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 next victim is... an old victim of mine who
apparently likes July very much 'coz that's about the only time he ever posts.
:P Seriously though, I'm glad you're still writing for the Ranma Fan Fiction
Mailing List. Oh right, it's now the Harry Potter/Ranma and Occasional Sailor
Moon Crossover Fan Fiction Mailing List! (Say that five times fast with rocks
in your mouth... that turn into people.) ^_^

On 7/1/06, Andr�s Lou <chinolou@hotmail.com> wrote:

I don't own the Legend of Zelda and/or related  stuff.

Extra space in between 'related' and 'stuff'.

A. N. As some might notice, I was in the process of
learning how to dismantle an atomic bomb at the time
I wrote this. Yeah, a little, harmless plug, so what;).

O_o I, er, didn't notice.

Oh yeah, revise: Yeah, a little, harmless plug; so what? ;)

Or: Yeah, a little, harmless plug; so what?

"Little sister, don't you worry about a thing today."

"But you're telling me that you'll be away for some days,
and you won't even tell me why that is."

Suggest: some days --> a few days

"Of course I believe you."

"Then why have you asked me three times in the last few
hours when would I return?"

"Can't a friend ask another friend about his doings?"

"Of course she can. It's just that it might seem strange
to do it so many times in such a short while."

On the surface, I'm expecting Zelda and Link: after all, the rumors aren't
true. Those two are just friends (at least for the time being) in canon. Then
again, with such ambiguous, dialogue-only prose, the mystery of who's speaking
what is part of the technique. We'll see if it pays off.

"You know I always worry when you leave. Well, that, and
that I always get bored with the same things to do about
the ranch."

Suggest: getting rid of 'that' after 'and' and before 'I always'
 

"That's as good as saying that you like it when I come
round to lend a hand."

Suggest: round --> around

"No. Why?"

"I'm not sure. I've been noticing lately that you seem
somewhat sad about something."

"I've noticed that myself; and that's as good as saying
that I don't know myself as well as I'd like."

"You know that I love you."

"Perhaps I do."

Hmmm. I should have been paying attention to my Gameboy, or gotten a Legend of
Zelda cartridge back in the day. That's as good as saying I wish I knew who had
the speech pattern of 'that's as good as saying...'
 

"Then perhaps it's got nothing to do with it."

"Perhaps it does."

"You also know that I'm not good at riddle-talk."

"Yet you have sometimes quite deep thoughts about things."

Suggest: Yet you sometimes have quite the deep thought about things."

Or: Yet you sometimes have deep thoughts about things."

"Of course you have, along all of your words concerning
my growing a beard."

So much for Link being the guy talking.
 

"It makes you look like an old man."

"That's not true."

"Well it does make you look older."

Suggest: Well, it does make you look older."

"I think my fair lady forgets to remember that I'm no
longer twenty years old."

"I do, and sometimes I miss those times. I think I was
prettier then."

"Yea, perhaps you were."

"You were not supposed to agree with me on that!"

Heh.

"But what can I do? You were pretty then. Of course, you're
beautiful now, and being pretty and being beautiful are two
very different things."

Awwww... We're pushing WAFF territory.

Another pause.

"What about her?"

"Who?"

"The Queen. Is she beautiful?"

...Aaaand so much for the Zelda theory.
 

"Why are you asking this?"

"The need to know as the jealous lass I am."

A sigh.

Me (feeling deja vu): Day-mn. I've _used_ this writing style in my fics! ^_^

"But I love her as the true friend she is. You are much more than
that. Nay, perhaps not mucho more, but wholly different"

Er, so this is _Mario_ Mario speaking?

If it's not Mario, suggest: turning 'mucho' into 'much'.
 

"But you do love her, and though I know that you care for me,
I can't help but to wonder about how much she loves you in turn."

So does the fans, really.

"What chance?"

"Of losing your love to find a bit of romance with another."

I'm getting diabetes here. ;)

"It wouldn't be the first time I think about this.

Suggest: I think --> I thought

"You can run from love, but if it's really love it'll find you."

Suggest: love, it'll find you (add comma)
 

"Red haired girl across the square, on Hyrule Castle Town."

Red-haired girl (compound descriptors should be hyphenated)

(shrugs) Beats me who the heck the girl is. But I may be coming 'round and
rethinking my 'Link is the boy' theory from before...

But then I woke up and everything vanished just as the
blessed dream it was. I would never be sure I did rue my

Methinks you need 'if' in between 'sure' and 'I'.

having those dreams, when I knew it was quite impossible
to see her again. Perhaps anger and bliss are as different
as the sun and the moon. 

And that's not saying much.
 

Little sister, I been sleeping in the streets again, like a

I take this that he loves his little sister in a brotherly sort of way. 'Coz
thinking of it any other way is like taking the red herring/misdirection ploy a
bit too seriously, and it'd be sick and wrong to boot.

Then again, I may have misread this and his transliteration of the Japanesey
'little sister' is akin to, say, calling the girl 'kiddo' or something, and he
may _have_ romantic feelings for her (though, for my money, I feel kind of sick
having romantic feelings for a girl I call 'little sister'). But I have no
idea, and I curse my ignorance of Zelda canon because of it.

it catches you by the heel. Wherever I am I feel its grip.

Suggest: Wherever I am, I feel its grip. 

And there are no words, and I can find no cursed words to say
it out loud. Keep your love under your will, for that is the
only thing one can do when it crashes above you. Do you still
love me? Perhaps you keep my memory yet you have moved on with

Suggest: Perhaps you keep my memory, yet you

Grammar Rule #21: Eliminate commas, that are, not necessary. Parenthetical
words however should be enclosed in commas.

Little sister, I've been trying to feel complete again, but you're
gone and so is all my hope. I miss you and that's like saying
that you're pretty, perhaps as foolish as that. 

Wow. What a sweet yet profound understatement.

But I can't help

but to ask myself if my hope really is as far away as you are. I
read it once, in an old book of poetry:

The soul needs beauty for a soul mate
When the soul wants, the soul waits

If the soul waits, perhaps it has not lost all hope. Perhaps I
still hope to find you again. For love, faith, fear and desire,
and all the things that keep us within our hearts, I believe
we will meet again, perhaps never before each other, but who
knows? There is always much unknown in the mysterious distance
between a man and a woman.

You'll see.

The foundations of this fic is so unstable that the gravitational pull of the
fic's cliche-filled mass will overcome the quantum boundary, and then the
entire plot-less drivel will eventually collapse in on itself in a humongous
vortex of a plot hole before vanishing into a singularity.

...I'm kidding, of course. ;) You really are the multi-talented fanfic writer.
^_^ Last time, I was treated with a fic that was quite different in a general,
in-comparison-to-the-formulaic-'Ranma'-FFML sense and also different in a
specific,
wow-you-don't-only-make-use-of-archaic-nineteenth-century-prose-but-you-write-ambiguous-first-person-fics-as-well
sense.

With that said, I might as well offer my two cents on the whole thing.

Pros: I thoroughly enjoyed the style of the fic, and even though I have little
to no idea of the back story behind the content, I liked that part too. Those
are big 'pros' for me! ^_^ The grammar was also sound, and aside from a few
missing commas here and there that could make the prose flow better, it's
mostly flawless. Heck, I particularly loved the fact that you can write _both_
conversational and purple prose. :P As for the plot (and I'm telling you I
might be biased when it comes to judging it), I loved the ambiguity. Granted, I
haven't the faintest who's talking and aside from the obvious Princess Zelda
reference, I basically have little to no clue as to what 'he' and his ghostly
'little sister' are talking about. Nevertheless, I liked the execution for the
simple fact that it's exactly what _I_ would have done in my fic Shonen...
i.e., using dialogue without narrative prose and then using a first person
narrative in the end to explain what just happened in the conversation as a
cap-off. So... yeah. Loved your style.

Cons: Even though I liked it, I'd say this 'dialogue-exclusive fic bordering on
being script-formatted' is a niche story. As such, it can only have a niche
(read: limited and specific) audience, so not everybody can appreciate its
style. While we're at it, the thing I liked about it may be the very thing
that'll alienate all the rest of the readers. Ambiguity, I mean. Ambiguity, for
others, is simply that... too unclear, too fuzzy, and not clear cut. For people
who'd rather experience a story instead of, say, feel like they're
'overhearing' one or, say, feel like they're reading a boring, academic puzzle
where they have to read between the lines and figure stuff out, they'll be
turned off by this vague fic. Furthermore, you're limiting your audience by
concentrating on 'Zelda' as a fic genre. I'm sure I'm not alone when I say that
I still have no idea who the man and the woman are. Even if that were the point
of your story, it can still be off-putting for people who want resolution and
understanding in their story; they don't want a story open to interpretation,
they want a story that they can experience and relate to. Couple that with your
indistinct writing style, and we may have a fic with little to no audience.
Then again, that's not really _my_ opinion on the story, just a possible
scenario for other readers.

Summary: I liked it. I personally like the writing style. For once, instead of
spoon-feeding the readers, let the readers think for themselves and figure out
what the heck is going on. Don't be so passive, readers; then again, I'm a big
fan of nearly-mystifying stream-of-consciousness novels by authors like James
Joyce (where you need a bit of analyzing to decipher and appreciate the story
fully), so your mileage may vary. Some people may outright hate it for the same
reason I like it.

But for my money, write what you want to write. Since you're not making any
money for this and you're not doing it for the sake of other people, then you
owe nothing to anybody except yourself and perhaps the companies/people from
whom you borrowed these characters and plot points from. Bottom line is, as
cheesy at it may sound, be true to yourself and your heart. Keep on writing.

Paalam!
Abdiel


-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"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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