To be honest, I think this thread is a good place for Promises of a Wondering Hero. It is enjoyable to read, but not quite up to par for the library. It is easily at least a 3/5 due to its story and flow, but I just can't bring myself to give it a 4 due to it having so many grammar problems. If the author would only get himself a beta to polish his writing a bit I would give the story a 4.5/5. It actually makes me a bit sad to see such a nice story brought down a level or two because of something so easy to fix as grammar. Hell, I think if the author would just proofread his chapters a time or two more the majority of the errors could be fixed.

 

Actually, he does have a beta to make up for English not being his native language. I can't recall if the beta is busy or not tho.

 

If this is what the story looks like after the beta has had a look over it, then that is pretty sad. While a sub-par beta is better than no beta, the author really should look into either getting a second or replace the first with someone better. It's as if the author merely picked another non native English speaker, who is only a little better with the language, to be his beta.

 

I didn't really notice anything overtly wrong with the grammar but I wasn't really looking for any. Could you give an example or two of what you mean?

Edit: His beta (RavingScholar) seems to be busy irl so he's not exactly do the best job but eh.

http://forums.spacebattles.com/thre...iscussion-thread.247230/page-39#post-10002755

 

Didn't notice anything terrible regarding grammar.

Just thought at this stage, with the plot where it is at, not quite library material. Nothing huge has happened apart from the Motoko arc, so plot wise still a bit lacking so far. But depending on how it progresses from here, it might go up to library material.

 

...Are you guys being serious about not noticing the numerous mistakes? Really?

I'll go ahead and give a few examples from the first scene of the first chapter, starting with the very first sentence, not counting the stuff in italics. Some of this stuff may seem incredibly minor, but after a while it adds up.

should be "an"

should be "year" because it is being used as a title.

not really a grammar mistake, but more of a bad word choice. They are not prisoners. I would have gone with "roommates".

same issue as above

should have an "a" between the two words. feature should be "features" followed by a comma.

once again, not really a grammar mistake, but a poor word choice. Just doesn't sound right.

"ended up"

Doesn't sound right. Maybe "she'd have liked to have herself"?

First word should be "Even". Get rid of the second group of underlined words

should be "Kaolla's"

"molesters"

"at its"

"It bounced"

"saw"?

insert "a" between the two words

"anybody"?

insert "of" between the two words

get rid of

Now let me remind you that this was only the first scene of the first chapter. There are numerous mistakes in the following scenes and chapters as well.

Actually, looking back on all these errors, maybe I was too harsh on the beta. There are a shit ton of things to fix in this story and I wouldn't be surprised if he simply got tired of correcting things. Maybe he just focused his attention on the biggest mistakes to at least make the story readable?

Also, let me be clear. I do actually like this story. I am just trying to point out that there is much that could be improved on with a healthy dose of editing.

 

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/7506926/1/The-First-Shifting-Grain

The First Shifting Grain
Author: Cadel
Sabaku no Gaara lands in the past to a time where everyone feared him and his father was still alive. He realises this will force him to regain everyones trust when they still think he's a blood-thirsty psychopath. Time-Travel.No pairing.
Rated: Fiction T - English - Family/Friendship - Gaara - Chapters: 11 - Words: 60,853 - Reviews: 366 - Favs: 668 - Follows: 757 - Updated: 03-10-13 - Published: 10-30-11 - id: 7506926

This is an interesting little fic I happened upon. Normally I don't read anything that isn't Naruto centric, Gaara is one of my favorite characters and I love time travel fics. Starts off pretty simply with Gaara waking up in his 11 year old body with no memories of how he travelled to the past.

So far most of the fic is interactions wtih various villagers and his famility members who think he's still batshit while he acclimates to his new situation. Gaara has no plan, and no huge drive, and he has his typical serene approach to everything. There is only a hint of actual plot as of the latest chapters, but I found the story to be very interesting.

 

Link the first chapter next time dude. Confused as fuck until things clicked.

 

I'm not denying there's probably a lot of errors, but I never really notice them. Like, if it's just minor grammar, typo or wording issues, I'll usually miss them (since I have a bad habit of skim reading), or if I do notice them, it doesn't really effect the quality of the story to me. Seems very minor and for a fanfic, I can forgive most mistakes like that.

Writing issues that do affect it would be bad paragraphing structure, poor sentence structure, awkward phrasing, bad flow, inconsistent writing style, etc.

 

Argh, oh my god, why

This is one of the best Naruto fanfictions I've read, period. And I've read a lot of them. Goddammit, I want to be mad at you for not mentioning it hasn't updated in a year, but I was so pleased to read it. D: Merrrrrrr...

 

Now you know how we feel about Ectomancer! Rawwwr!~

But she's right, Divinity is Awesome, no doubts about it.

 

I did say they were abandoned. More-or-less anyway since it was never official, they just haven't been updated in a fairly long time. I'm tempted to PM the dude to ask what the status is on it.

 

DOOO EEET.

 

Baha, so you did :b I just get too excited when there are Naruto recs I haven't read I guess.

 

Just that last line gets me pumped:

Spoiler

“Once, Kumogakure took my brother from me. It shall not keep my daughter.”

Give me MOAR.

 

PM'd him. Price of Honor will never be continued or rewritten. He really doesn't like it.

Divinity, on the other hand, was given an ambiguous "you never know" so it's possible we'll see a continuation in the future. Though most wouldn't be able to see it unless it's put in the TFF archive or on FF.net. If it ever continues, I'll let people know.

 

Isn't Fosfor/Case13 notorious for hating people asking him about his fics?

Nevermind. Author confusion.

 

For the record, yeah, he is. He usually says something along the lines "I have my own update schedule so I update what I want when I please and no fic is abandoned unless I say it is."

Personally, I just treat all his fics as abandoned. No expectations that way. And he's been updating less and less over the years.

 

I have never raged so hard than when I got to the last posted chapter of Divinity.

 

I did that for all fosfor's fics.