Editing Rant below
Been told several times now that I've made parts of Ai no Koto rather confusing. But sadly, I can't fix it if you don't
tell me what’s wrong...'cause, well...I wrote it. I know what I mean.
What I want to tell you here, is: Help
me, please, and be specific. Otherwise I'll be staring at the computer going, "uh...ok..." and writing these weird notes.
General statements are always appreciated, like, “I’m confused,” and these things are good to know.
But, this makes me think that you’re confused about the entire section, not about specifics. This makes it very hard
for me to go back and reword a section.
So, my suggestions to you? When you're reading, jot down notes to what's long
and boring, what's not wanted, and what was confusing. You don’t have to write down line numbers (like we do in class),
just try to recall a certain action. Or if it’s just one sentence that has you confused, quoting it is nice.
If
you have a WHY it's confusing, that's even better, but I don't expect that much from you.
If one brave soul tells
me, "dude, that part about Itachi? That was weird. I didn't get it." I'll go back and look at it, and bug Meghan about it.
Or if someone says, "your weird syntax (the 5-dolar word for "how words are placed in a sentence." This includes “weird
italics” in the middle of a word) is confusing. wha do ya mean?" I'll go back and look at that, too. [This in particular
is hard for me to par down; I know what I’m trying to say, I know how I want it said.]
If imagery, poetic license,
over descriptiveness, or a character's actions confuse you, te~ll me. I’ll try and fix it, and hopefully you’ll
be happier with my stories as a whole.
I realize that I’m asking you a lot, but it might make the story easier
to understand if you help. I spend days working on this story, and every section I post has at least three hours of concentrated
editing behind it.
I posted a section without editing it once, Meghan reviewed, and I fixed it by the end of the day.
Iceheart (kindly reviews every single, silly post) told me my word choice for Chpt. 4e was offensive; I changed it
after reading his or her comment.
Pai was confused about whether Lee was hit or not in Chpt. 4c, so I clarified. She
was also confused about 4e, the guy wearing glasses or not, so, that was clarified, too.
Silver requested more of
a transition—that was put in. (She was also confused about what Sasuke meant by his odd comment, “You’re
just like everyone else,” but…I tried to explain that. I hope that this statement will become more apparent as
the entire story progresses. If it doesn’t, someone remind me, please? Oh, and she wanted to know if Itachi was holding
Sasuke’s hand—he was—but I can’t explain that yet. Wait about six chapters, and the "why" will be
more clear.)
I know there are other suggestions…I just can’t remember them at four in the morning. My neck
hurts. I’m going to bed now.
Thank you, kind people who review my story. Thank you again for all of you who point
out flaws. I'll try to go over 愛の事 over the summer, too, and cut out stuff I don't need, but I might
not get around to it that soon. If you help by pointing things out, it'll get done much, much faster.
End Rant.
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