All Comments on 'What Sandy Was Not Told Ch. 01'

Just wished more authors would attend grade school and actually pay attention and learn. First off "..." and "-" don't take the place of a coma nor mean a pause, shows total lack of education.

Let's have fun with this.

“Just wished ...”: apparently subjunctive, contrary to fact, since anyone writing in English as his mother tongue must have already attended grade school.

“... would have attended grade school ...”: it's too late to wish that he “would” have.

“First off” should be followed by a comma.

The author did and does take the liberty of using “...” and “-” to suggest pauses in direct discourse, but Anonymous understood exactly how the punctuation was meant. What more could the author wish?

“... don't take … nor mean ...”

This is tricky. The correct parallel construction would be: “... neither take the place of a comma nor mean a pause ...”. Anon's use of the helping verb “don't” leads the reader to see it also applying to “mean”, but “mean is preceded by “nor”, suggesting a double negative. Clearer would be: “... don't take … or mean ...”.

If one cannot spell “comma” correctly, perhaps comments about others' use of punctuation should be avoided.

I hope Anon enjoyed the story, also that many others do. Things get wilder in the following chapters.

after about the tenth 'snicker'. It's a very juvenile word in the first place, and its repeated use is tedious. Roget's is your friend. Learn to use it. One star for bad writing.

laughing at mockingly:

Synonyms: chortle, chuckle, giggle, guffaw, hee-haw, smirk, sneer, teehee, titter

Yes, my characters do chuckle and snicker more than most in Literotica, mainly because I prefer to - enjoy - letting them express themselves, only getting in the head of the first person character to tell what he or she is thinking. Dialogue about sex includes lots of chuckles and snickers, and characters often smirk, perhaps understood as a silent snicker. I think most readers recognize the intended differences.

Chortle, "laugh gleefully," is something else to my way of thinking; e.g., how a person would respond to others' appreciating a humorous comment he or she just made.

Younger women in my stories giggle occasionally, usually in response to something that is or should be embarrassing for them. (In the course of the story, they outgrow being embarrassed. or trying to appear to be, and seldom giggle.)

No one in my stories sneers, and the situations don't give rise to belly laughs or someone's sounding like a donkey. I suppose younger girls could "teehee" and "titter," but Literotica won't allow stories about girls that young.

Comments by others would be interesting to see.

And found the repetitive use of chuckle, snicker, snort and "um-hmmm" (or however you spelled it) distracting, and the whole device of it being a letter to Sandy (who we do not know nor care about) to be rather off-putting. Otherwise, fairly enjoyable - thanks for sharing!

ReiDeBastos,

I am glad you enjoyed the story so far and hope you read the subsequent chapters.

As you have read, I enjoy trying to make dialogue sound realistic. I hope you and others get accustomed to that, maybe "hear" the person speaking.

A little glossary, in case it isn't obvious:

"Hmm" is just that, the hum one makes prior to saying something or in a statement while seeking further words: a questioning hum with a question mark; a surprised one, with an exclamation point. In text, "snort" expresses the same.

"Um-hmm" expresses agreement.

"Hm-umm" expresses disagreement.

A longer "Hmmm!" sometimes "Mmmm!" usually expresses appreciation or delight at what someone said or did, but that should be apparent.

"Hm-hmm" is a chuckle.

"Hm-hm-hmm" is a better one, almost a laugh.

That should cover any variations that I forgot.

Thank you for your comment.

leBonhomme - For the sake of sanity will you please stop trying to deny and correct the comments made about your work. They are made by people who want to help you make your work more readable and if you can't accept even the slightest criticism - then don't allow comments. For fuck's sake don't be so bloody pedantic - all you'll do is piss your readers off, as you have me!

... the grammar trolls are attacking! Circle the sentence structure elements!!

[barely suppressed belly-laugh]

leBonhomme:

RE: "Let's have fun with this.". Thank you; your teasing apart of the 'wishing' comment was educational -- it explains not only how, but indicates why language works. It shows a mastery of craft.

RE: "Snickering". Well... if 'tenth snicker' is true, Anon might have a point. Your rejoinder that explains the limits of using Roget's was noteworthy. Could this be another area to explore to raise the level of your art? Then all the over-usage-nazis will have to complain about will be your constant use of "he said" and "she said".

RE: "Hmmm?". Sound effects, in an 'ink-on-a-page' presentation, is ...tricky... at best. ReiDeBastos may have a point; to me, sound effects in a story can be a spoiler. It can indicate an author's inability to elicit understanding or emotion by solely using words; the sound effect is a shorthand that the author expects the reader to use his imagination to fill in the gaps [e.g. "'I will spank you now.' Thwack. Thwack! THWACK!!" -- it's up to the reader to fill in the mental/emotional/physical states of both parties. To me, that's a fail.]

RE: "For the sake of sanity!". Don't listen to this guy. He's just telling you NOT TO FEED THE TROLLS. Normally, I would agree with him; but your responses to the comments are intelligent, reasoned, and masterful. They're entertaining, informative, and educational. (No, I'm not using a thesaurus to pad my comment) They give all of us a glimpse into your mind, and an idea of your skills.

I not only read the stories, I read the comments. Sometimes the comments are better than the stories. On rare occasions, both story and comments are praiseworthy. This story and comments is one of those occasions; voted 5.

When I sign up as a member, I'll add your submissions page to my favorites.

p.s. [snicker] Looking forward to your response to my comment.

You all know how this started. Maybe I got carried away with my first rebuttal. Someone once said (not here) that anonymous comments don't deserved a response, but it is hard to let some stand unanswered. I appreciated the opportunity to explain something about my style and hope that is understood by not just the person who posted the comment before this one. (Thank you! And stop snickering!)