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Subject: {ASSM} {REVIEW} Celestial Reviews 366 Sept 9
Date: Wed,  6 Sep 2000 23:10:03 -0400
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Celestial Reviews 366  -" Sept 9, 2000

Note: I'm back again!

 As many of you know, I took a "vacation" to publish my novel. I wish I could 
tell you that I have met with success, but that's not the case  -" not yet, 
anyway. It has been an interesting but frustrating experience. I contacted 
about ten agents, all of whom declined even to look at the manuscript. The 
two people (non-agents, unrelated to publishers) who looked at the entire 
novel liked it very much and gave me some extremely useful feedback. So my pre
sent status is that I have an even better, still unpublished novel.

Second note: I missed writing these reviews and am eager to resume. However, 
I am going to change my modus operandi just a little.

First, I am going to be a little more willing to toss out bad stories without 
reviewing them. In the past, my viewpoint was that I had a right to review 
whatever I wanted to review; and so I occasionally posted a review that an 
author viewed as a preemptive attack. I still think anyone has a right to 
review anything that is posted to this newsgroup, but I have never intended 
to offend anyone. I'll still give occasional unsolicited reviews  -" simply 
because the First Amendment says I can and because common sense says I 
should; but if you want your story reviewed, you'll increase your chances 
greatly by emailing me a copy and asking for a review.

In the past once I read a story, I would review it, even if I hated it. In 
the future, I intend to take that attitude only if the author or someone else 
asks me to review a story. In other words, if an author sends me a story or 
asks for a review, I'll write the review even if I dislike the story. In 
addition, if there's public debate about a topic or story, I may discuss it 
in Celestial Reviews. Otherwise, I am not inclined to give advice to people 
who don't want it.

The preceding paragraphs suggest that there will be a tendency for the 
stories that I review  to be ones that I like, and the result might tend to 
be too many high ratings. I'll try to counter this tendency by giving really 
high ratings more sparingly. What this means is that a story that might have 
received straight 10's a year ago might receive lower ratings now. This will 
make some of the new ratings non-comparable to the older ratings; but the 
alternative is to have way too many 10's, and that wouldn't be good.

I'm going to stick with the guest reviewers. I have enjoyed working with 
them, and I think I have provided a useful service by prodding them to write 
occasional reviews and posting them in one place. If a particular reviewer 
bothers you, you really oughta have the sophistication to skip or ignore that 
person's reviews. If you are a guest reviewer and want me to send you some 
stories again, please contact me. Even if you have never been a guest 
reviewer but would like to give it a try, please contact me.

I'm going to retain my introductory jokes. I know some people don't like 
these, but those people can exercise their freedom by screwing themselves 
instead of reading my jokes. When I post the jokes, people send me some good 
ones  -" many of which I don't publish; but at least I have a continuing source 
of things that make me laugh. 

Finally, I'm going to try to be more regular in my Celestial Grammar notes. I 
have a publisher who wants me to write an underground grammar book, and 
writing the grammar column in Celestial Reviews may prod me to finish that 
project. If you have grammar questions or suggestions, please send them to me.

Third note: I am trying to expand my computer literacy. One perk of using AOL 
is that they give me a free web site. I have set up my web site as simply as 
possible  -" using a package called 1-2-3 Publish. This limits me to three 
passages of limited length, plus some links. My plan right now is to post 
each new issue of my Celestial Reviews there, and to have a link to my older 
reviews in ASSTR. I'll also post a few other things there. Right now, the 
other two things are the first two chapters of my novel. So, if I manage to 
figure out the address, and if I manage to post everything there that I want 
to post at that site, you can go there and find these things. 

My web page address is http://hometown.aol.com/celeste801/myhomepage/index.htm
l

Meanwhile, I'll keep posting the reviews as usual to a.s.s.m. and a.s.s.d.

THIS WEEK'S JOKE: A little girl was leading her dog through the park when an 
old man stopped her, saying, "That's sure a pretty dress you're wearing."

The little girl smiled, "Thank you, Sir. My mama bought it for me. This is my 
dog Porky."

The old man chuckled, "I'll bet a nickel I can guess why you called him that."

She shook her head, "I'll bet you can't."

He laughed, "You called him Porky because he's so fat."

She shook her head. "No Sir, we call him that because he fucks pigs."


=====================
Celestial Reviews Index:
=====================

"Double Take" by Admiral Cartwright (twin incest) 8, 9, 8

"Trail Magic" by Wiseguy (outdoor sex) 9.5, 9.5, 9.5

"Seducing Tina" by Left Side Signals 8.5, 8, 8.5

"Missy, JD, and the Night" by The Mysterious Mr. Lee Organization (first time 
teen ff sex) 8, 8, 8

=====================
Here are the  Reviews:
=====================

"Double Take" by Admiral Cartwright (admcartwright@starfleet.hotmail.com).

The author says this story is a variation of Erich Kaestner's Das Doppelte 
Lottchen, but it is easier to recognize Walt Disney's hand than Kaestner's in 
this madcap adventure. Imagine this: twin twelve-year-old girls  -" one has 
lived only with the mother, and the other has known only the father. The 
twins meet at summer camp, notice their similarities, and realize that they 
are twins when they discover themselves having simultaneous orgasms 
accompanied by a sort of harmonic vibration during masturbation. 

The author is somewhat vague about the exact nature of what happens when the 
twins masturbate together. Even when they work out on different sides of the 
Pond, an orgasm in London leads to a sympathetic vibration in Texas. When 
they're together, the earth moves, so to speak. I interpret this as a special 
case of harmonic theory, which I learned about back in high school. Harmonics 
play an important role in everyday life. For example, harmonic vibrations 
sometimes cause cars to shimmy at high speeds. The harmonic series is a 
mathematical definition, generally used when talking about frequencies. The 
harmonic series is important in musical applications because most instruments 
(including guitar) produce sounds that contain harmonic frequencies. My 
theory is that the girls hit upon something here that the nuns managed to 
suppress back in high school physics. This sort of information explains why 
rocket scientists are so damned good at sex. But I digress.

As Disney would suggest, the two girls trade parents. That is, at the end of 
their vacation {i.e., holiday} at Camp Keweenaw, Sandi goes to London and 
Sarah goes to Texas to meet her pa {i.e., father}.

Sarah-as-Sandra, of course, discovers that her father loves his little girl 
more deeply than she had suspected. As in most Disney variations on this 
theme, the girl is eager to get to know her parent more biblically.

So you might suspect that Sandi-as-Sarah goes off to England and does the 
wild thing with Mum. Wrong! What kind of perverted story do you think this 
is? 'Tis her grandfather whom she shags.

And of course, the girls plot to bring Mum and Pa back together. Otherwise, 
one or the other would lose access to Daddy's cock, and grandpa doesn't taste 
near as good. To accomplish the reunifuckation, they have to enlist the 
assistance of the other woman who caused Mum and Pa to break up for some 
really bad reasons. As is always the case with Disney stories (which support 
family values), the parents are really meant for each other, and they realize 
this during the ensuing orgy. 

The harmonic vibrations were interesting, but distracting. I kept wondering 
what applications there might be of the Doppler effect to the undulations of 
sex.

The best accidental pun in the story was this one: "It wasn't long before he 
came." Well, it was longer before he came than after he came!

As usual, upon my return from a hiatus I am trying to start a new life and 
stop giving every fucking story I review a set of tens. Taken as a serious 
attempt at an interesting romance (as serious as " Das Doppelte Lottchen," 
that is), this story is weak. I mean, even given the suspension of huge 
amounts of disbelief, normal people don't act this way without screwing up 
one another's lives. Likewise, as a testimony to hedonism the story is 
simplistic compared to, say, the "Trinity Trilogy" or to the adventures of 
the Allen sisters. 

So I decided to treat the story as a parody of the vaguely serious identical 
twin motif in "Parent Trap." From this perspective, it's a fun story, but not 
a great parody in the tradition of Shelby Bush. I think maybe the story would 
be a little better if the sexcapades didn't appear to be piled on quite so 
heavily with sometimes inadequate logic.

I'm also trying to stiffen my requirements for the Venus (technical quality) 
rating. I'm going to dock this story a point not because there are egregious 
errors, but rather because the transitions are sometimes week. That is, 
although the story was generally clear, I sometimes felt that I was being 
jerked around in an uncomfortable manner.

Ratings for "Double Take"
Athena (plot & character): 8
Venus (technical quality): 9
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 8

"Trail Magic" by Wiseguy (wiseguy35@hotmail.com).

Leo and Bridget are taking a 50-mile hike along the Appalachian Trail, during 
which Leo hopes to get some nookie, while deciding whether he wants to 
initiate cohabitation with Bridget. His plans are interrupted by an 
interloper named Gretel.

The story is simple, pleasant, and sexy  -" first a twosome, then a threesome, 
then  -" well, you read it and find out.

Sex in the outdoors is a real turn-on for me. Sex in the RAINY outdoors is a 
bonus. The author does a real nice job.

Ratings for "Trail Magic"
Athena (plot & character): 9.5
Venus (technical quality): 9.5
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 9.5

"Seducing Tina" by Left Side Signals.

Dr. Barstow has long admired Tina, his administrative assistant. One day  -" a 
day on which the poor young lady is just plain hot to trot - she gets stood 
up by her husband. That's the bad news. The good news is that one day when 
the poor young lady is just plain hot to trot, she gets stood up by her 
husband. So Dr. Barstow fills in <wink>. It's really pretty hot stuff.

As part of my policy of discussing grammar and style, I have selected some 
examples from this story. I'll discuss these below, under CELESTIAL GRAMMAR. 
At this point, I'll simply note that these flaws do distract from the flow of 
the story, but not so much as to put a serious damper on matters at hand. 
Once Dr. Barstow gets Tina into the sack, the sex is quite nice.

Ratings for "Seducing Tina"
Athena (plot & character): 8.5
Venus (technical quality): 8
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 8.5

"Missy, JD, and the Night" by The Mysterious Mr. Lee Organization 
(TheMrLee@hotmail.com).

What we have here is a teenage lesbian seduction with a strong dose of 
romance. The girls get together to watch Thelma and Louise on video. One of 
them has some prurient interest in the other, and the other is not all that 
hard to convince. The sex is dreamlike and, well, sexy.

Ratings for "Missy, JD, and the Night"
Athena (plot & character): 8
Venus (technical quality): 8
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 8

CELESTIAL GRAMMAR:

Effective parallelism and subordination can contribute to a good story. The 
author of "Seducing Tina" made some mistakes that can be instructive.

One tool for showing parallelism is by joining two independent sentences 
together. You can do this in two ways:

(1) Use a semicolon to join the sentences.

     We made love for an hour; then we had lunch and came back 
     for more.

(2) Use a comma plus a coordinating conjunction to join the sentences. 
{Coordinating conjunctions include, AND, OR, BUT, and FOR.}

     We made love for an hour, and then we had lunch and came 
     back for more.

It's almost that simple, but there's one final detail. If either of the 
independent clauses (the originally separate sentences) contains internal 
punctuation, then the comma in rule (2) becomes a semicolon.

     We made love for an hour; and then we had lunch and came 
     back for more, while her husband watched us through 
     binoculars from the balcony where I had stationed him.

Here's an example of where the author of "Seducing Tina" missed the mark:

     It was usually a mixed-gender group, some married but 
     mostly not, and Matt often behaved like one of the single 
     people, sitting in the center of the group batting ideas around 
     and leaving Tina isolated on the periphery, serving the drinks 
     and snacks.

The above sentence clearly needs a semicolon to separate the two main 
clauses. In addition, the second clause needs some commas to separate the 
items in the list of "sitting, batting, and leaving." Finally, I would revise 
the second clause to get rid of the final participle (serving). The problem 
with "serving" is that it (1) gives the appearance of being parallel to the 
other participles, when in fact it is not and (2) it gives the impression 
that the writer is just chaining ideas together, without any concern for 
subordinating one idea to another. Here's how I would rewrite the sentence:

     It was usually a mixed-gender group, some married but
     mostly not; and Matt often behaved like one of the single
     people, sitting in the center of the group, batting ideas around,
     and leaving Tina isolated on the periphery, where she served 
     the drinks and snacks.

There's little seriously wrong with the author's way of stating this 
sentence, and I could be coming across as a snob by suggesting that my way is 
better. The advantage of my way is that it gives the reader a little more help
 in seeing which ideas belong together. It would certainly be possible to 
"improve" this passage by stating the ideas in completely different ways, but 
I have no urge to go there right now.

So then we have this sequence:

     Picking up the new lecture notes, I pulled my swivel chair over
     to the outside door. With my feet planted on either side of the
     jamb, I leaned back to check them over, but, paging through, I 
     gave them little more than a cursory review; I was still thinking 
     about Tina.

I personally would have said, "I leaned back to check the notes"; but maybe I 
would be showing paranoia over the possibility that my reader might think it 
was my feet that I was checking. I also think there should be a object to the 
preposition "through"; but in an age when we "come with"  -" and possibly even 
"cum with"  -" sans object of the preposition, maybe this usage is OK.  
However, the main problem is that the second sentence needs better use of 
semicolons. I would rewrite it as follows:

     With my feet planted on either side of the jamb, I leaned back to 
     check the notes; but, paging through them, I gave them little 
     more than a cursory review. I was still thinking about Tina.

Finally, I think this author overuses the present ( -"ing) participle. It would 
sometimes be better to say something more specific. In the previous example I 
changed "serving" to "where she served"; and I think this led to more precise 
expression. In this case, I would get rid of one more participle:

     With my feet planted on either side of the jamb, I leaned back to 
     check the notes; but as I paged through them, I gave them little 
     more than a cursory review. I was still thinking about Tina.

Authors should not sweat this sort of thing while writing the first draft  -" 
or even the second, third, or twentieth draft. But sometime before or during 
the FINAL draft these imperfections and mannerisms need to be considered. 
Focusing on them may seem burdensome; and if it's a real pain in the ass, get 
a proofreader to do it for you. But many authors discover that by focusing on 
these details they are able to say more precisely exactly what they wanted to 
say. That sort of thing leads to real improvements in the final product.

The following two sentences (already corrected) demonstrate when you need a 
semicolon and when you don't:

      I could feel her nipples like little stones pushing into my chest 
     through our clothing, and her pubic bone was just above my 
     own.  Then she pulled her face away from my shoulder, her 
     expression serious but her eyes twinkling at me from a distance 
     of only a few inches; and she reached up to put her hands on my 
     shoulders.

The first setence contains two clauses with no interior punctuation. 
Therefore, all we need is a common plus "and" to join them. The second 
contains two clauses, but with interior punctuation. Hence, it needs a 
semicolon.

Finally there's this sentence:

     Her nipples were a dusky brownish-pink, prominent against her 
     pale skin, and I was startled to see a tattoo, a delicate rose, on 
     the upper slope of her firm left breast.

Actually, all the preceding sentence needs is a semicolon. I'd also throw in 
a pair of dashes around "a delicate rose." However, the main reason I cited 
this sentence was to put an interesting picture into your dirty little mind.

     Her nipples were a dusky brownish-pink, prominent against her 
     pale skin; and I was startled to see a tattoo - a delicate rose - on 
     the upper slope of her firm left breast.

As the Bard said, "A rose by any other firm left breast would still be a 
rose."

Note that "so" is not a coordinating conjunction. Therefore, when it joins 
two sentences, it goes by rule (1), not rule (2). That is, if you join two 
sentences with "so," then you need a semicolon.

     He was almost ready to come; so he pulled his cock out of 
     her and squirted his jism all over her body.

But note that "so" can serve purposes other than joining two sentences. In 
such cases, it is normally preceded by a simple comma.

     He pulled his cock out of her, so that he could squirt his cum 
     all over her body.

Final exam. Is this sentence OK?

     Before I could say I didn't think that was possible, Tina lowered 
     her mouth over the head of my cock and proceeded to lave it 
     with her flashing tongue, cleansing it of the remains of her 
     exquisite blow-job and stimulating it to a freshened stiffness.

Answer: It's fine as-is. However, if the author inserted the word "she" 
before "proceeded," then he would need a semicolon:

     Before I could say I didn't think that was possible, Tina lowered 
     her mouth over the head of my cock; and she proceeded to lave 
     it with her flashing tongue, cleansing it of the remains of her 
     exquisite blow-job and stimulating it to a freshened stiffness.>>

Either way is fine with me.

<end>

-- 
Pursuant to the Berne Convention, this work is copyright with all rights
reserved by its author unless explicitly indicated.
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