I Just Realised Why I Don't Like Ozzalos' Fanfics

[Epsilon]

And it isn't that he is obsessed with making Ranma a girl. That's just a symptom.

I will demonstrate my problem with this paragraph from his latest story:

Setsuna Meiou walked into the Fuchu branch of The Bank of Tokyo like she owned the place. Lavender high heels clicked as she walked through
the lobby and found herself a teller, their sound effectively drawing the attention of any male within earshot while her figure did the rest. While the cut
of her business jacket and skirt would be considered modest, they hugged her body in a way that enticed. The package not only failed miserably to hide her
curves, but her ample bosom seemed to strain against the white blouse.

After reading this paragraph I realised something. This paragraph appears in every single Ozzalos story. Or something very much like it. Ozzalos
writes about all his female character this way. All of them. They are all hyper-feminine to the point of ridiculousness. Inevitably every description contains
a loving or five about their clothes, which is inevitable about how sexy they are. These inevitable comments about how sexy the character looks inevitably
include sentences pointing out how all the men in the area turn into drooling idiots (inevitably).

It's like reading a paragraph long description of the Gainix Breast Jiggle. Its sexualized, just short of softcore pornography fanservice of the worst
kind. Maybe prose just exacerbates the problem, because I know fanservice occurs in anime and manga often but a single picture of a sexy woman just doesn't
interupt the flow of the story as much as taking two or three paragraphs to describe a character's sexy butt waggle as she walks through a room.

And its all the same. I also wouldn't mind it if he varieated the manner he describes his women. But I swear the next time I read "miserably fail to
hide her curves" I'm going to shot someone. Doesn't he realise that woman can be beautiful and attractive and arousing in ways that have nothing
to do with walkign around in high heels, flashing their cleavage and wearing tight skirts that show off too much thigh? I've seen pictures of women that
were smoking hot that showed almost nothing in the way of lfesh or curves. I've read descriptions of women that made them feel sexually attractive that
never once mentioned curves or drooling guys.

The fact that he then proceeds to do this to every female in the series, regardless of whether it makes sense or not just makes me groan. This, I have
discovered, is why he has so many Ranma Is Girly stories. He can't have a woman in the story who doesn't do the Sexy Strut at least once, if not
multiple times. It doesn't matter if that woman is actually a guy. Sexy Struts for everyone!

Ugh.

Oh well, I think I've wasted too much time on this already.

-----------------

Epsilon

[CattyNebulart]

Eh, I feel it's just a way to get part of the feel of a harem-comedy-anime, like Ranma 1/2, into prose form, and that is just a bit of adaptation decay.
Maybe it's a little over the top, and he could use some alteration in wording every so often, but he's hardly unique with that problem. Mark MacKinnon
for example can't seem to mention hair except with the adjective silky attached to it, and often smooth and long too.

The story is generally good enough that little details like this get ignored, all the same some more variety in the descriptions would be refreshing. And to be
honest it's cannon for Ranma to do the sexy strut from time to time (free food, get the Hadoken-variant from Ryouga, magic sword from Kuno, etc etc)

Also if you call that softcore porn that you apply the same label to everything out of hollywood/(the anime equivalent) that is not hardcore porn?
E: "Did they... did they just endorse the combination of the JSDF and US Army by showing them as two lesbian lolicons moving in together and holding hands and talking about how 'intimate' they were?"
B: "Have you forgotten so soon? They're phasing out Don't Ask, Don't Tell."

[Epsilon]

I don't have a problem with sexiness in my stories. I used to, but I grew up.

And I dind't call it softcore, I called it borderline softcore. It doens't have any actual nudity, so its not actually softcore porn.

My problem is that every single woman in every single one of Ozzalos's stories is the kind fo woman who does the sexy strut and it is always decsribed
the same way. It stopped being a story quirk and became a fetish. If every single story he wrote contained BDSM I would say that annoyed me. It's like when
i was reading The Wheel of Time and realised that every single woman got a spanking at some point (no matter how little this made sense). I don't
mind spanking, I don't mind BDSM, I don't mind the Sexy Strut. I just don't want to see it over and over and over again.

Go ahead and write a story where Ranma does the Sexy Strut. I've actually read (and enjoyed) quite a few stories about that kind of stuff. But it just
comes across as so forced and blatent in Ozzalos' work. Like I said, it really is beginning to feel like I'm reading Ozzalos' fetishes. not his
stories. And just like with the Wheel of Time, once I felt that way I can't really go back.

Though I suppose its my fault. I shoud go to the library more instead of looking for free fanfic on the internet all the time,

-------------------

Epsilon

[Sirrocco]

Sadly, going to the library will not save you. There are a number of solid, published authors for whom this is also the case. It's actually been
interesting - my time with fanfic has made it painfully obvious when a published author is just running another episode of Wish Fulfillment Theater (and
between that and their gender, It's also often obvious what at least a few of their kinks are.)

[jpub]

Once you point it out, I notice it in a lot of authors. Great example, LE Modesit Jr.

His reluctant hero, dominant women, and understated romance fetishes aside, the man *always* spends a lot of time on food. *Every* meal that anyone eats sounds
absolutely delicious.

[CattyNebulart]

Overall I have been disappointed with professional authors over the last few years, since they usually barely pass my minimum quality standard for fanfic, and
if I am expected to pay for it I expect something better. They are professionals and so they should be better. In fact I would put Ozzallos and David Weber on
about the same level of skill.
E: "Did they... did they just endorse the combination of the JSDF and US Army by showing them as two lesbian lolicons moving in together and holding hands and talking about how 'intimate' they were?"
B: "Have you forgotten so soon? They're phasing out Don't Ask, Don't Tell."

[WengFook]

Epsilon wrote:

---

And it isn't that he is obsessed with making Ranma a girl. That's just a symptom.




I will demonstrate my problem with this paragraph from his latest story:

I think the phrase "your mileage may vary" tends to apply to most books and authorsand especially fanfiction writers. Since what one person
finds absolutely intolerable, is another person's most relished parts. For example some authors can't write exposition of any sort but dry material to
save their lives, but some people find that same exposition to be the best thing since sliced bread.

In fanfiction it boils down to this for me, These people are doing it for free. With nothing but occasional reviews and helpful flames or criticism to keep
them on the road to better writing. They've probably got little to no training or lessons on how to make it better except for the examples of other
fanfiction writers/rolemodels who they think writes pretty good story. Which by the way may not be that good in the eyes of other readers.

With that all said. Yes some people do re-use literary themes over and over again. Yes it might be irritating. No its probably not going to go away unless you
send several politically worded criticisms in emails to the writer.

Otherwise theres nothing to be done about it except sit back and enjoy the ride, or find something else to read
_________________________________
Take Your Candle, Go Light Your World.

[Bob Schroeck]

Oddly enough, I think it may be that some professional writers never get the chance to polish and perfect their craft before they get that first sale that sets
them on the road to regular publishing. Pros who started out as fic authors -- like Mercedes Lackey -- I think get a lot more practice in, and end up with more
finely-honed writing skills than the ones who jump directly into published sales. I won't say that's universal -- in fact, I can imagine worse-case
scenarios to counter this quite easily -- but I think it's true nonetheless.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

[s3yang]

I'm not so sure that it's because professional writers are really getting any worse. I think it's more that editor/publishers are getting more than
a little lax. Baen especially seems to be suffering from this. I mean... just take a look at some of Travis S. Taylor's books, hell just look at the
description. (The Quantum Connection). If that isn't a self-insert fanfic (a badly done one) I'll eat a boot.

As for Ozzalos, he's not so bad, sure his descriptions are pretty tedious, but by now, when reading a lot of stuff with overdone prose, what amounts to a
giant wall of text about someone's sexiness or badassedness just translates to 'Setsuna's hot' or 'Ranma's badass' in my head. I
won't say that he's an awesome writer or anything, but he certainly offends my sensibilities a lot less than a lot of other fanfic writers out there.

[ECSNorway]

Mmm-hm.

Travis Taylor. Oh gods. The man went from a decent SI (Warp Speed) to an utterly horrible sequel (The above-shuddered-at Quantum Connection, a story that was
so horrible it almost made me hurl my PDA across the room... the first Baen book I've actually deleted from my collection, it was so bad.)

Authors also have a tendency to slip out of editorial control as they become successful. I give you three examples: David Weber, Tom Clancy, Steven King. All
three went from tight little paperbacks to mega-brick mega-seller hardcovers. Nowadays you can't pick up any of them for under 600 pages.

Personally, I enjoy Ozzallos' stories.
--
Sucrose Octanitrate.
Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.

[Necratoid]

I think part of the problem is that they write the brick books and only one major person tries to stop them... A.K.A. they write i one go rather than serial
chapters. I remember hearing that in the 1800s they wrote one chapter a month and it was put in a monthly publication with single chapters from other stories.
Each month people could mentally chew on the chapter and write in telling writers what did and didn't work. This is what happens with JUMP magazine,
fanfiction, and to some extent weekly TV fiction shows. They get step by step feedback.

Now we have writers who are writing fiction in brick books that only their editors and maybe a few friends and family get to see before it pops onto shelves as
a whole. Then when something bad stupid happens in chapter 9, the rest of the book moves on and the speed bump on whatever annoyed people is a permanent part
of the story and they can't take it back easily.... its not like they can release a new edition and get most people to pay 20-30 bucks for it every time.
At best the thing is addressed in the next book... or less useful in an interview somewhere. Its like taking a wrong turn 3 miles into a 100 mile trip and
only doing something about it after you have traveled the full 100 miles and haven't gotten there yet.

If you had addressed the problem earlier it wouldn't have gotten so bad... and since people pay to read your work they are usually insulted when you ask
them to pay for something they already bought. That or they have Apple level fanboy/fangirls and they will pay for each step in the process. Gleefully. If
it was a game it'd be like buying the beta, then four other drafts at full price.

With Ozzallos my largest problem is that he taunts the readers when he can.... like posting random story chapters in his profile rather than in a plot bunnies
thread. Repetitive description paragraphs are also summed up for me, if the rest of the story is good I'm happy. If I'm reading and these kind of
things stand out I can tell I'm getting bored with the story.

[Soutern Cross]

So that's why Ozzalos can't stand Akane! Takahashi clearly intended her to be a tomboy who,if anything,tries to play down her sexuality.(And thanks to
Kuno,she clearly has good reason to do so).

But this is the exact opposite of the only type of woman Ozzalos can write about!

No wonder I don't read Ozzalo's Ranma fanfics!"There's only one kind of monster that uses bullets"-Colonel VanHeusen , from "It! The Terror From Beyond Space"

[Black Aeronaut]

*blinks* That's a rather interesting insight there. If this is the case, then I shall avoid his fics myself... Though I figure that even if I had picked up
one in the first place, I would have put it down soon enough.

[Bob Schroeck]

No, actually, he's pretty good -- not a master, but a decent journeyman when it comes to writing. And he has some really good ideas to spin stories on -- http://www.fanfiction.net/s/2797728/1/H ... the_Empire]Heir to the Empire is an example of taking a mined-out subgenre, the fukufic, and creating something no one's ever thought of with it -- and not wimping out on the implications. If only he had a better technical skill with the language -- his work is riddled with spelling/eggcorn and punctuation errors that make it difficult to read at times.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

[CattyNebulart]

Glad I'm not the only one who likes Ozzallos. As for me being disappointed over the last couple of years with professionals it's because my standards
have improved while the world hasn't. when I first read UF core about 10 years ago I thought it was pretty good. When I tried to re-read it a year ago I
couldn't because it was so bad. the story hasn't changed but I have.
E: "Did they... did they just endorse the combination of the JSDF and US Army by showing them as two lesbian lolicons moving in together and holding hands and talking about how 'intimate' they were?"
B: "Have you forgotten so soon? They're phasing out Don't Ask, Don't Tell."

[Norgarth]

yeah, but at least Gryphon admits that his early stuff was badly written.
___________________________
"I've always wanted to be somebody, but I should have been more specific." - George Carlin

[WengFook]

Well G certainly has grown and matured as an author. Very few writers actually scrap their earlier works to redo them because said earlier works are crap by
their current standards.
_________________________________
Take Your Candle, Go Light Your World.

[K sai]

At the risk of being irritating I must admit I like ozzie too...

...mostly because he comes up with such interesting twists to standard concepts...

Yes, grammar and corn and overlovingly descriptive babe scenes, but they are still inside well written detail universes and plots - I skim through the
irritating parts like I do Weber's technobabble or Heinlein's oversexed heros and heroines.... or Ringo's BSDM and Ultra USA Jingoism and
anti-environmental rants (although those have gotten so bad lately that I've stopped reading his latest offerings)

...So really, ozzie aint that bad really, esp. considering what some people are being paid to write nowadays

K