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Post by RubberPiggy on Aug 29, 2005 20:38:39 GMT -5
*doo doo doooooo!*
Well, it's been almost a month, but CHAPTER NINETEEN IS NOW UP! Yaaaay! Dave was right- I do have much more free time in college, teehee. ;D So anyway, here's what you might call another "filler" chapter, as will the next one be prolly, but forget that! It's not important! WIPE IT FROM YOUR BRAAAAAINNNS! Please read and comment!
Pages: 48 Paragraphs: 741 Lines: 2198 Words: 16,015
Chapter Twenty coming soon! Really, this time!
~RP~
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Post by Winston on Aug 30, 2005 11:17:22 GMT -5
Maybe its from not reading in a month, but somehow I didnt get the 'ol Shelly vibe. Maybe its just me.
Plus I hate filler. I like plot plot plot and action action action.
I think Angel should have made an appearance.
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Post by RubberPiggy on Aug 30, 2005 14:29:41 GMT -5
Thanks, W!
As for not getting the Shelly vibe, I don't know what to tell you. *shrugs* I didn't really write it any differently from usual. What do other people think?
It's all plot. I should have never even called it filler, because I don't write filler. I write what happened to Shelly and the people around her, and while her life is more exciting and unusual that most people's, not every day is. It just what happened, and I wouldn't write it if it wasn't important in some small way. That's how I see it anyway.
And as for Angel, fret not, for he has not been forgotten. Shell's been busy lately...
~RP~
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Post by CrazyDave on Aug 30, 2005 18:21:58 GMT -5
Ok, Sara, here we go go go!
uh.........well, it was filler. Importent for Shelly, but not for the other characters..... so, that was kinda felt.
But, the chapy was still good where it counted. I can't wait to learn more....."Why did you......" Kill Us?, Abandon Us? Not Use Fed-ex? What could it be?
my only Grammerical......type problem is this... is a problem is the fact that Buffy had an older, handsome man overnight, in her room.
What's with that little thingy? Is it some kinda secret code or importent thingy? Or is it just a mistake? Hm? Hm?
Well, that's all I got. Now to try and be productive.....
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Post by RubberPiggy on Aug 30, 2005 18:26:13 GMT -5
Thanks, Dave.
It was a mistake. I think I fixed it while you were reading it, so you didn't see it right. But it's fixed now.
Next chapter will have more other people. Just needed this one for Shelly.
Next one up... I dunno, tomorrow, maybe!
~RP~
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Post by RubberPiggy on Sept 12, 2005 8:44:28 GMT -5
An update:
No, the new chapter is not up yet, sorry. Things are getting into full swing yet, and I'm still not quite sure when my regular free time really is, yet. But I'm getting to it, as soon as I can. But just now, as I TOTALLY should have been doing other things, I read some of my first few chapters and I realized something-- except for a bunch of little mistakes and that bad characterization of Angel (which, as I've said, wasn't completely my fault, but I definitely could have done better), I think the story was better-written then. So as I go on writing, I'm going to try to write with the same inspiration I had then, and try to make it just as good, or even better. So off I go to do homework and stuff, 'cause as you know, the sooner I get that stuff done, the sooner I can work on the story that I love to write. Just wanted to give you that little update. Off!
~RP~
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Post by Winston on Sept 12, 2005 8:53:58 GMT -5
The way I write, I dont do it unless I feel inspired or I want to do it. If I force myself to pump out chapters all the time the writing will get crappy, and eventually Ill tap all my ideas and run out of things to do with it.
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Post by RubberPiggy on Sept 12, 2005 9:26:43 GMT -5
Yeah. I didn't even realize it, tho. So I'm gonna make sure I start paying more attention, try harder. Use the good chapters as an inspiration to make the new ones better.
~RP~
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XAevinX
Full Pirate Monkey
~siro ookami~
Posts: 488
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Post by XAevinX on Sept 12, 2005 21:59:48 GMT -5
Guess what? I read this whole story just now, it took me awhile because I'm dyslexic and my roommate keeps calling me....but I read it I swear! And now I'm going to post my responce without reading any of the other responces on here. (So it's unbiased) So if I repeat something that someone else said you know why... Yes that is exactly how I started my response to "All That Remains" but it's true for tonight also. 1) Repetition of Terms Ok wow...I keep saying this over and over but everyone (including me) still does it sometimes. You did it a lot though. Some examples of what I mean include... 2) Stylistic Problems Yeah...well this is mostly my personal opinion but whatever... That makes the math book look like the cause of the smile. If you want the math book to be the source of the sign instead Ifd try gI smiled to myself, though as my gaze fell to my Math book I sighed and it quickly faded.h Designate thoughts and narration separately. Like maybec eGood,f part of me thought, ehefs a vampire.f (Later on in the story you actually did fix this by making thoughts italic so...good job ) gevenh or gany older thanh but not bothc Anywaycthose are just a few examples. What really bugs me are the constant short phrases or sentence fragments. When a person thinks in short phrases they are usually excited or scared. But you make Shelly communicate like this all the time. It makes her sound like shefs stupid and canft put together a full idea. You make a point that she went to a great school and aced her entrance exams though, so I know shefs not stupid. Besides no kid living through what she did could be stupid, so that makes me wonder whatfs with the chaotic thought process? That right there was enough to explain he had changed, and that story the zoo keeper told practically screams SOMETHING IS WRONG. You really didnft have to keep saying over and over and over and over that Xander is acting oddcit makes it seem like youfre calling the reader stupidc 3) Grammer and Spelling Not a big deal, just pointing out that some stuff was worded poorly. Try gI jumped off my bed and ran out of my room to the top of the stairs.h 4) Tenses Yeah...don't make this mistake anymore please. You make baby Jesus cry... gsighedh past ghaving to dealh present (or maybe even perfect or something stupid like that?) ghadnft meant toh past gItfsh present That's just bloody wrong... 5) Fighting Haha ok so you watched a lot of fight scenes in Angel and Buffy I'm sure, but you didn't really pay that much attention to them. Or maybe they just weren't very good...to be honest I can't tell you because I never watched them... Ok...so you have basicly two kinds of fights... 1) He punched her, she punched him ect... 2) He hit her, she hit him ect... I get the idea that Buffy gets into fights a lot and if you're gonna have a lot of fights in this story please dont make them so dull and repetitive... 6) Point of View I was excited when the story started in first person because...I love first person! Itfs hard to do because you have to try and explain an entire story from one characterfs perspective. Most people canft handle it but some...the few...the proud..then I realized you couldnft handle it either... You randomly throw bits of third person in and I donft really like that very much. But oh well, maybe thatfs just my opinion. It doesnft really fit well, itfs a completely different mood...I mean right when you start to feel like Shelly you get thrown somewhere else. (Looking back I think you only did this at the beginning and stopped doing it after that. So...congrats! Please dont start doing it again.) 7) Random Thoughts About Shelly He saved her life and she still feels he needs her approval? That just struck me as humorous, it says a lot about the character of Shelly. Aww...I miss Phys Ed...again this says a lot about the character. Now what really bugs me is like I said before...she is suppose to be a smart and independent girl. She lived through stuff some people couldnft and yet she does some really stupid things sometimes that just donft match at all... Now after losing lots of weight from not eating well in a long time she goes to the store and gets one type of food...Pop Tarts...Someone who is trying to save money does not buy poptarts. Someone who is trying to be healthy does not buy poptarts. Someone who is trying to be smart does not buy poptarts. I just donft see why she would get these, I understand Shelly reflects you a lot and you probably like poptarts, but someone who is supposed to be really smart and able to survive all by herself doesnft get poptarts...I realize Ifm making WAY to big a deal over poptarts, but my point is someone who makes small stupid mistakes like this also makes lots of other stupid mistakes. The kind of mistakes that get you killed if youfre living alone in a safe town, let alone a town filled with demons or vampires... Then there is the issue of her talking like...like...well like you I guess. Thunderstormy for example doesn't strike me as what a smart independant girl would say. She's suppose to be haunted by her past, hardened because of her life on the street. She should be tough, strong, dark, and she shouldn't say "thunderstormy" Now for the good stuff...the only thing people really want to hear anyway. I just put that other stuff up there because nothing good ever comes without working for it 1) Plot Of course plot is the most important thing there is in any story. I liked the prologue, but after that the introduction was a little weak. You really vary a lot in Shelly's personality. Now once you get past the opening and into the actual story I like the way it flows. It pretty much works the way I picture an episode of Buffy being, maybe that was the idea? Anyway I can tell a story like this could go on for a long time, just like Buffy having new adventures each week. I look forward to how it developes. 2) Point of View I know I yelled at you for this, but I have to compliment you also. Like I said...I love first person! The beginning is weak but the later parts are much better. 3) Still more to come I hope to see more in the future, keep up the good work.
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Post by RubberPiggy on Sept 12, 2005 23:07:20 GMT -5
Okay, wow, how much thought is this response gonna take... lots, lol. I'll see what I can do...
First of all, thanks for the feedback, Matt. We know I always appreciate it.
I feel all proud that I have more... um, we'll call it "constructive criticism" than anyone else. I feel all special now. And to go on to adress the issues...
Repitition of Terms Now, as I read some of my early chapters yesterday (see comment I posted yesterday about it) I did actually notice this a lot. I think it got a bit better as the story went on, but yeah, I know that was pretty bad. It is hard sometimes, as I'm sure you know, since you've said that you do it, too, so it does happen a lot. Especially with the way I write, as I told you before, that I'm basically just writing it to get it out of my head, and I don't exactly sit here with a thesaurus or anything, you know what I mean? So yeah, I know I mess that up, and of course I'll try not to, but hey, it happens. *shrugs*
Stylistic Problems Um, I'll try to adress these individually... *The Math Book thing: Yeah, I know, that was bad. So many things wrong, so many ways I could have written that better. Oh well. *Seperating thoughts and narration: That time when it wasn't italisized must have been a mistake, 'cause that was something I knew I was doing from the beginning. Problem is, I write it in Word, so when I go to post it here I have to scan through the chapter quick for anything bold/italicized/etc, so I suppose it makes sense that I would miss something every so often. I'll go back and fix it if I remember... *Short sentence fragments: And this goes for all the different things you said about the way Shelly talks like she's an idiot or whatever. Here's how I see it. She may be a smart teenager, but she's still a teenager. Since when do sixteen-year-olds really talk all smart or whatever? I mean, maybe you did, but only about one percent of high school students have a Matt Pape-sized vocabulary, lol. I would think of her as the type of person who can be pretty smart when she needs to- to get homework done, do things that she needs to do- but she doesn't so much embrace it in her daily life. She was average at her old school, a good student, but nothing really special. But at Sunnydale, a school that (not that anyone's said anything about it in the story, but considering Buffyverse information) isn't exactly one of the best around with the Hellmouth underneith and all the mysterious deaths and happenings in town, she ranks up near the top. But she was still never used to being a "smart kid" before, so she wouldn't really act like one. Plus, just 'cause a person may have a lot of book smarts, that doesn't mean that they talk with a great vocabulary or whatever. Willow, as you'll learn, is one of the smartest kids at school, but you wouldn't really know it to talk to her. She talks pretty strange, makes up words, phrases, just like the rest of them do. All Buffy characters have a bit of an odd way of talking- Joss Whedon created a dialect for them, really- so while I did originally think about having her be the one who talked differently, since she came from a different place, but it just wouldn't have fit. Plus, she didn't come to Sunnydale from much farther away than Buffy did, so for that reasoning, it wouldn't make sense for her to talk differently and for Buffy not to. So it works for me, sorry if it doesn't for you, but don't expect it to change a whole lot. Not yet, anyway... *shify eyes* *Something's Wrong with Xander: Okay, first, to be fair, this WAS an episode, so I couldn't magically change what was going on there, 'cause that wouldn't agree with the way I'm writing my story. But, as is seen in the episode, Buffy and co. do know something's wrong with Xander, and then what that something is, way before Shelly does. Shelly really didn't know Xander ver well yet, so she was still trying to figure out what was going on with him, and then when she knew something was wrong, it still took her a while to have any idea what to do about it. And then to defend, not really my story-telling, but the show's, just because Xander comes out of the Hyena House and says something out of character and acts a little weird, that isn't really means to suddenly assume, "Something happened to him! HE'S POSSESSED!" Shelly not really up on possession and such couldn't really figure it out before the Slayer and her gang. And really, that's my main problem in writing this stuff during Season One-- Season One is my least favorite season, because basically, most of the writing- plotwise, not random hilarious conversation-wise- completely sucked compared to even Season Two (biiig improvement in the second season, one of my favorites). So it's hard to write when I can see the flaws. That was my problem with writing for Angel- the writers really didn't seem to have his character down in the early eps, so it made it very hard for me to write for a character that was so poorly defined. All I can say is that it should get better.
Spelling and Grammer Meh, most of that was early and there's not too much of it. I try to be very careful about that, and I don't think it's too bad.
Tenses Yeah, I'm sure I prolly have some mistakes, I won't deny it, but I think most of them make sense with what Winston was saying in his story- that things that still apply aren't going to be written in past tense, because that just doesn't make sense to me. You may read it as a mistake, but the way I write it, the way I read it, it does make sense to me. So sorry if it annoys you, and I'll work on only using it where it's appropriate, but it's how I like to write.
Fighting I said back when I first posted the fighting chapters how much I was worried about it and that I thought it sounded stupid, and whatnot. I don't really know much about how to write a fight scene, and I try really hard, but that's one of the most difficult things for me. I think it'll prolly get better with practice, but until it becomes acceptable for you (which I'm sure it never will ), just know I'm trying my very pathetic best.
Points of View In my opinion, you can't understand the whole story I want to convey without slipping away from Shelly from time to time. Yeah, I stopped the third person, but I'm sure you'll see it again, sorry to disappoint. I think it'll often be much easier and flow much better to see something happen somewhere else than to just have Shelly be told every single time. It's why TV shows don't just follow one character. Even if the show is narrated by one character, you still see the other characters without them (ex. JD narrates Scrubs, but you still see scenes of Dr. Cox and Jordan at home, which JD couldn't possibly know about at the time, but is still part of the story of the episode). Hopefully that makes sense, and hopefully it starts to flow better.
Angel saved her life and still needs approval This was more about Angel and the horrible way he was characterized (or wasn't) in the beginning of the series. He would still need her approval and would be feeling very uncomfortable around her, and I really should have made him moreso and less sharey.
Poptarts And here lies another example of how it's hard to turn a TV show into a story, but still keep it feeling like the TV show. On TV, you'd never know details about Poptarts, or about Shell losing weight or anything like that. Such details would be conveniently left out in order to fit the more important information into forty-three minutes. But for some stupid reason, I put myself in a situation where I needed those details. But I don't know anything about that. I base my knowlege of all situations that I've never myself experienced on what I've seen on TV, but TV doesn't show details like that. So I had to make it up and I did a horrible job. I know it. Oh well. I try. I think once the story really gets going and there's more focus all around on what's happening rather than what things are like, stuff like that should (hopefully) get better.
Wow... and now on to the good stuff...
1. Yeah, I had/have a lot of trouble with introduction-type stuff, and I totally understand me having some consistancy problems during that. But I'm glad you like it more once the story gets going, 'cause that's what I feel I can write better. You're spot on with the idea being for it to be just like an episode of Buffy, in fact a lot of what we see will be stuff that goes on during an episode, but not where the episode actually is at the time, which is some of my favorite stuff to write. It will go on for a long time, because I think of it as a TV series. Buffy had 144 episodes, and I came in on number 5. So we've got a ways to go... more than you may think... (*more shify eyes*)
2. Glad you think it's getting better, and I hope it continues to do so!
3. Lol, I can see you were trying to come up with another good thing to balance out all the bad. Nice attempt.
So yeah, I know there's lots of problems, but whatever. I really hope that all of my flaws will just continue to improve over time, with practice, and I always think about anything anyone'll ever comment with.
Next chapter out soon (I hope)!
~RP~
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XAevinX
Full Pirate Monkey
~siro ookami~
Posts: 488
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Post by XAevinX on Sept 13, 2005 0:57:18 GMT -5
Ok 4 things...
1) Tenses (Still) I understand what you wrote may sound right to you but it's just not. Plain and simple. English has rules about these things and you are breaking them. Take it from someone who spends a lot of time reading, that really doesn't sound right to the rest of us even if something about it is right to you. Take the two examples I used.
You are telling the story in past tense! It doesn't matter if it's still true you should say "Mom sighed. She hated having to deal with..."
You are refering to what you did in the past so..."I hadn't meant to. It was just my nature."
That is the right way to do it plain and simple. That not only sounds better but it's grammatically correct. Of course you are the author so feel free to write it wrong if you really want to. (Remind me to go read what Winston said and yell at him too)
2) Pop Tarts Ok I really made a huge deal out of Pop Tarts lol. Again I'm sorry...I just freaked out because being a college kid with virtually no money and little resources I feel kind of like her. Personally I eat Ramen because it's 12 cents per pack instead of whatever it is Pop Tarts come out to per pack. Anyway your explanation for it makes sense, I totaly agree...a tv show just wouldn't explain something like that.
3) Fight Scenes You are right I'm really an ass about this stuff. If you ever want help for any reason feel free to ask me any stupid questions you might have. (Seriously that's what Dave does. "If I'm falling towards someone from above and we're facing each other, what would be more effective? A palm heel or a punch?" Just ask if you ever want to.)
4) The whole "More to Come" Ok bastard, I tried to be nice and you called me out. Damn it. Honestly this is a legitimate category though if you think about it. The point I was trying to make is that you have the kind of story that could keep going for a long time and still take off in any direction it wanted. I'm sorry if there were more numbers in the bad section than the good section. The important thing is that the numbers in the good section were about more important things. (ie Plot being in the good section makes up for all the stupid things in the bad section combined)
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Post by Winston on Sept 13, 2005 8:43:51 GMT -5
The way I saw the fight scene is that she was writing it from Shelly's perspective, who doesnt exactly know as much about fighting styles, strikes, and etc, as you would Pape. Its kind of a character specific thing.
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XAevinX
Full Pirate Monkey
~siro ookami~
Posts: 488
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Post by XAevinX on Sept 13, 2005 9:37:08 GMT -5
That does make sense to a certain extent I suppose...
I guess I just think the fights are boring, even if that is the way she would see them. I suppose I'm hoping Shelly will learn to observe fights in a different way.
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Post by RubberPiggy on Sept 13, 2005 9:52:11 GMT -5
1. Okay, okay, I believe you, I know, I have some bad tenses in there. I'll work on that, be much more careful.
4. Heh, sorry if that sounded bitter or whatever. It was supposed to be... ironic humor... or something. But really, thanks. I am glad you like the idea and really, thanks for all the good things you said.
And thanks, Winston, that is a good point that I didn't think to mention. She doesn't know anything about fighting. I know that doesn't excuse the just bad description of what she was seeing, but just remember that to Shelly, there's not as much distinction between different moves and stuff, 'cause at this point, she knows basically nothing about fighting. ... And here marks the part where I stop arguing about fight scenes, lol.
Thanks, guys, I appreciate everything!
~RP~
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XAevinX
Full Pirate Monkey
~siro ookami~
Posts: 488
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Post by XAevinX on Sept 13, 2005 12:20:38 GMT -5
... And here marks the part where I stop arguing about fight scenes, lol. I just wanted to make sure you're understanding what I said. I'm not arguing at all, what Winston said makes perfect sense. Obviously Shelly doesn't know what a jump turning back kick is so she's not gonna think to herself "Hey Angel just did a nice hook and spiral palm combination." So yes I think the fight scenes do make sense. I'm just hoping <hint> maybe Shelly could learn a little bit about fighting as time goes on?
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