CAA: Christian Anime Alliance

Relative Ways is a sort of novel-esque thing I've been working on for years, but for a few reasons, I've never finished. The main reason is that it's constantly changing. As I get influenced by different things; people, books, video games, television, music, or whatever else; I find myself wanting to change it.

I believe that my expectations for this, being my first and only work, are too high, but this holds a special place with me, and I want it to be 'just right'.

As a rookie author (and possibly even an aspiring journalist), questions, comments, and suggestions are welcome. You can post them here, PM them to me, or contact me via my webpage. I haven't had anyone to proofread this story in the past, save for Anna Mae, who has helped me greatly (for one reason or another) practically since I started this thread.

From now on, I don't think I'm going to be posting Word formatted documents on CAA. I've created a webpage (if you can really call it that) to house this story. The address is:
http://www.relativeways.tk
Or you can click on the 'Times like these make me wish I could use real justice.' link in my signature.

And I'd like to thank everyone who takes the time to read this. It's a good feeling to know that I'm writing something that people are actually reading.

I tried to read your story, but I'm on a Mac right now (I'm not very familiar with those) and I can't seem to open the attachment. I will have to return when I have access to a non-Mac computer.

Ooh. Sorry. Is there a file extension that I can upload it as that'll work on Mac and Windows? I don't have a lot of experience with Macs, sorry... If I knew a way to get it out there, then I would.

Either way, I've made some changes to this story since I posted this. Things started to get bland as I went, so I decided to change some things. I'm still working on the new first chapter, but I hope to have it done sometime soon. That is, if I can get off my butt and work on it. In the meantime, I suppose I can post the first four pages I have written of this new thing. And yes, for the record, I am a slacker. But I don't have a whole lot of experience with writing, so don't be too harsh with commentary... ^_^ Any ciriticism is welcome, and I hope you guys will like it...

EDIT: I'm working on a crappy free website right now to host this thing. It'll actually end up working out better for the whole story thing (IMO) because then I'll have more room to work with it and to explain the nuances behind some things. When I'm done working on it, I'll post a link and add a link to my sig.

Whoo! Rocking with the crazy editing flurry today! The new thing I wrote can be found at http://www.freewebs.com/everdred12a
This link is also in my sig. I formatted this into an htm file, so hopefully it can be displayed on Mac and Windows.

The beginning feels a bit too narrative, if that makes any sense. The way it's written, it feels like it's a character talking.

When you include someone's thoughts, put them in italics.

[B]“You shouldn’t have come with me, Kazumi. I’m not going back.â€

Thanks. I appreciate the input. Like I said, I'm still sort of sub-amateur. I'll get to re-writing and start updating more often. I'm not too good a writer (and an even worse editor) and I'm well aware of it, so it really helps to have someone look over it and give me some feedback.

Even since I posted that I've been making changes to things that don't seem right. Upon looking over the document a second time, I also thought that Tara's introduction was far too friendly for such an altercation, so that was also subject to a re-write as well. I'll post back here once I've made some more progress.

EDIT: Did some re-writing and finished chapter one. The last part seems a little dry, though, but I couldn't think of a way to fix it. If you think I should add more to the end, I will, but I really didn't have anything else to add. As far as my goals for the chapter go, I'm finished, so anything else would just be filler.

On a side note, the thing about the blue jeans really didn't seem so bad when I first wrote it, but I see where that would be a problem upon looking back on it.

Hey, it's a story now! Awesome. I haven't read this newest update, but if you haven't already, I'd suggest moving into past tense as opposed to present. But I'm glad you're posting this, and I'll be glad to see more.

Oh. And it takes time to get good. Many to most of my long stories (chap-longs) have been revamped; it's a process. But God gave you a gift, and with time, I'm sure it'll grow. Later!

Actually, it was originally a story. But I had some problems with writing and I decided to try it as an RPG. Of course, I didn't really understand the differences between forum-based RPG's and pen-and-paper RPG's, so it inevitably failed, and I returned to the original concept. Of course I still suffer from some indecision problems with this story, and I'll probably keep changing for a good amount of time to come.

I have tried using the past tense in the past, but things didn't always end up looking the way I wanted them to, so I experimented with present tense, and things looked more like the way I wanted them to. If people really think that changing back to the past tense would be better for the general execution of the story, then I'll definitely try to change back.

Ah. I liked the RPG. But that's your decision. ^_^

*shrugs* I like past tense better, but you're the author, and if present tense fits better for you, that's also your decision. What are you going to do with this story? If you plan to go professional, you might check to see which is more commonly accepted, and if you still don't care, you can try your way, and it may work anyway. Very sorry if I sound rude; I'm not trying to be.

I liked the RPG, too. It wasn't really my decision to end it, but moreso the players' decision. Save for myself, there were only two people willing to play (including you). I've considered trying it as an RPG again, but I don't think I'll end up doing that anytime soon.

I didn't think you sounded rude. I'll probably do some re-writing and then look over both copies and see which I like better. The main reason I posted this here was so people could tell me what they thought of it and point out any mistakes or awkward parts in the story. This is exactly the sort of thing I need people to tell me.

I hate to double post, but I feel like if I don't post here, people won't know to look at updates.

Anyway, I added a snippet to the end of Inception (ch1). I might end up doing stuff like this a little more often. I recently read The Broker (not sure if I italicize or underline, sorry) and I'm reading Onslaught, from the Magic: The Gathering book series, and both of these books use this neat thing where the author will be doing one character's scenario, then use...



... and start a scenario with another character. I think this is kind of cool, so I think I might do it to add in snippets from another character's point of view and parts of other character's stories. It'll probably start off with just Minoru and Hitomi's point of views for the first two or three chapters, but it'll expand out to others as I introduce them. But if you guys don't think it fits with the story or if you think it doesn't work properly, I'll take it out. Just something to experiment with. Like I said, opinions are welcome! Please tell me what you think! It's the only way I'll get to be a better author. You guys are my editors, in a way. BTW, I still haven't gotten around to re-writing in the past tense yet, but I'm going on a 4 hour car trip on Saturday, so I'll have some time to look things over. I promise

On a side note, I've been working on chapter 2. Chapter 2 (which I believe I'll call 'Bodyguards') will have more action in it than Inception did, and will, in all probability, be longer. I've made a little progress, but I'm not sure I'll end up keeping all of it. I did do an outline for the chapters, so I'm not winging it, but sometimes the execution seems better in theory than it does when you really start to work on it (which is why I changed the first part from the RPG to what it is now). I've posted what I have done on Bodyguards as an attachment here, and it's also up on the site.

Another note, this story is also up on this uber craptastic website I made a few weeks ago. The website pretty much exists to host the story, but I put some other stuff there, too, in case anyone actually cares about what I think. Anyway, there's a link to the site in my sig. Just click where it says 'Relative Ways.' I know it's a little more difficult to read on the site, but I don't know enough about creating websites to change it. Sorry. If I knew how to fix it, I would totally do it in a heartbeat.

And, finally, I'd like to give a thanks to everyone who reads this, even if you don't reply to this thread. Although, I'd also really appreciate it if everyone who reads this gave me some kind of feedback. You don't have to give a huge post, but just a '(part of story) has a spelling/grammatical' or '(part of story) sounds awkward' and such. Again, thanks to everyone. It makes it a whole lot easier and enjoyable to write when you know people are actually reading it.

As per Kanerou's suggestion, I tried to cut down on the number of characters (I had too many), and I was pretty shocked to learn how many weren't really necessary to the story.

So... I removed the little bit I added to the end of chapter one (the part about Hitomi; funny note about that later on ^_^). I'm reposting Inception here along with a (probably) completed version of Bodyguards. I'm working on chapter three right now, which I am thinking about calling 'Dark Ambitions', though this is not final at this moment because I'm not sure if the execution of things will work the way I'm doing them now.

Also, I know I promised that I'd have all this done a LONG time ago, but I just... I don't know. I don't have an excuse ^_^

Anyway, that funny note I was talking about... It's been tough on me to have to take Hitomi out of the story. She was my favorite character (and the former main character), but I never really realized exactly how unimportant she was to the story unless she was the main character. Funny how that works out, right?

I figured out how to do it on a Mac. Hurrah.

Unfortunately, I am in a hurry, so I do not have time to read all of Chapter 2. So far I just have one grammar note:
"Everyday" should be two words ("every day")

Heh. I feel kinda bad for missing that one. Actually, I sometimes re-read what I've already written and I find all sorts of things like that. And, of course, MS Word doesn't have 'Intention Check' (like, "Is this what you meant to write?")...

As promised, here are comments on the rest.

When you are describing Tara's hair, you say "dirty blonde hair." It is unclear if her hair is dark blonde, or hasn't been washed in a while.

In this sentence: Down in the parking lot, Tara vaults over the door of her car, an electric blue sports car, and lands in the driver’s seat. Repeating the word car is redundant. I would consider rephrasing that.

Immediately following that you begin three sentences in a row with the word "She." You might want to change that.

Describe the government building more.

At the beginning of the fourth page you begin two sentences in a row with "they."

Near the beginning of the fifth page you describe their home as new. So far I had gotten the impression that they had lived there for a little bit.

[i]“I’m sure it’ll be okay,â€

I don't know if you would necessarily call this gravedigging or not... so yeah.

Anyway, I know I've not been making progress on this much. There's a problem, though. As Anna Mae is repeatedly showing me, there are major issues with the way I have things going, so I'm having to go back and do some re-writes. Besides that, there are some lesser characters I'm thinking about dropping, other characters that I want to flesh out, and even more characters that I'm just flat out rewriting. So, basically, I'm going to end up rewriting everything.

This is always what happens when I try to write this! I go back and find something that bothers me, then I have to change it, then I decide to change a few other things while I'm at it, and then I eventually become disgusted as a whole with what I've got done.

Anna Mae, your continued support is greatly appreciated. While my writing is slowly evolving through all of the RPG's I've been participating in, your comments and suggestions have helped me a lot.

So, hopefully I'll have something new for all of the people who are reading (that's right - I'm talking to all three of you!), and hopefully I'll have it soon.

Just to say, I'm going to go back and re-edit the first post and make it the hub for this thread on CAA. Looking back, it makes more sense for it to be there than it does for the hub to be at the *end* of the thread.

I am glad that you feel your writing is improving! Keep up the good work.