h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: Pants - Chapter One - A76183031
Author: benjaminpmoore - U3508889

God, I haven't submitted work for review in ages. What's this community request forum thingy? Oh well, here y'go, it's been a while, so pleas be patient with my rudimentary guideml issues.

No guide ml required, but please break it up into paragraphs (just hit return for that).

I'll be back later for a read.

I got about halfway down before residual astigmatism made me quit. I'll read the rest when you have inserted some paragraphs.

What I've read is promising. It's dry, understated, and funny. I wasn't sure where you were going, but will enjoy seeing you get there.

You see? First attempt in ages and I forgot to put paragraphs in. Rookie error. And I can't even remember how to justify the text. It's wonder I can remember my own password...

To put paragraphs in in GuideML, just put on one side, and on the other.

I'd recommend breaking these up even further - in particular, putting any conversation in a new paragraph.

The reason? The humour here depends on seducing the reader into patiently reading a rambling story. Which is a clever idea.

But you need to make that easier to do.

Use shorter paragraphs.

Yeah, I did know about paragraphs in a former lifetime, so that is what I've now done. I take your point about breaking it up though Dmitri, thanks, I'll work on that.

I like this.

It takes a long time it get anywhere but it covers a good deal of (mainly male) experience on the way.

I usually complain about long, complicated sentences but here they are a key part of the long, rambling yarn style. I particularly liked the one that starts "To be fair, Karen hadn't deserted Kevin because she was being attacked all over Europe by various tribes of Germans".

I agree with Dmitri that it would be best to put each piece of dialogue in its own paragraph.

You could also correct the typo of 'burgulars' for 'burglars'

I like Kevin, too. Come to think of it, I expect I've known a few Kevins in my time.

Thanks for the further comments guys. I am keeping up with your input as best as I can and will get on to it as soon as possible.

I thought the Germans were the kings of long, convoluted sentences. I erred. :D

I couldn't help it, but the following sentence had me

>>that no burglar would wish to rummage through my underwear to find my valuables.<<

Mind in the gutter, I know.

This has a lot of promise, are Kevin and John going on a road-trip?

The long sentences are, well, long and there's no problem with that, they just need some punctuation.

Polish this up as Dmitri and mvp have suggested and bring on Chapter 2.

Okay, so I've put the dialogue in seperate lines and I've put one of the sets of brackets down as a footnote to thin the dense text out a little. What do people think now?

I like it. I love the conceit and the dry humour.

Readability continues to be marred by the fact that you are at war with double consonants.

I recommend that you copy the text and subject it to the spell-check feature of a Word program. If argued with sufficiently, this program will even cough up UK English. (I know, I have fought mine to a standstill, with the result that I have to ignore it when writing US English.)

'Readability continues to be marred by the fact that you are at war with double consonants'

That may be the finest single piece of criticism I have ever read. Do you mean that I am putting two t's in, for example, where one would do?

Yes. There are some double consonants where they shouldn't be, and I think a few missing.

We all do something like that - my problem is typos caused by reversing letters - but I find that spellcheck helps. At least, it makes you stop and look.

My spell check's main contribution to writing is to
a) refuse to ackowledge some words that I know are real
b) refuse to allow me to write setences in a way that is artistically convenient
c) insist that there is no 'u' in colour.

I have a very old laptop.

Okay, I don't know which Word program you have, so I'm not sure exactly where it is. But you can find a setting to change the language. Try for English (UK). Uncheck to keep it from making changes automatically. Or let it make them, but backspace and type over the ones you want to keep.

Then it makes dumb suggestions, but you tell it who's boss with the words 'ignore all'.

A bit of free proof reading.

Para 1
line 4 should end 'They are not much dryer than they were...'

line 5 should begin 'started ironing them, but this is an improvement.'

line 8 should start 'probably bolstered by a misapprehension.'

line 18 should start 'reasoning, doubtlessly incorrectly, that no burglar'

line 19, see above.

Para 3
line 9 should start 'flooded him out of his house once when he remembered only at the last minute.'

Para 4

line 5 should end 'the effects of knocking on John's door'

line 6 see above.

line 10 should end 'was attached to a more'

line 11 should begin 'traditional structure', and continue 'Since he acquired the camper van'

Para 5
line 2 should end 'The general consensus is that he somehow acquired it'

Penultimate para
line 2 should end 'used by people whose thoughts are'

last para
second line should begin 'that's how easy it is but in reality served'