Weeeew, just came across this gem today; aside from some grammatical/spelling issues (they can plague even the best of stories, and they are fairly few and unobtrusive to the casual observer, I should think), this work is pretty darn good! I'd seen one of the others in this series on FF, but I don't think I had realized it was a series (it was "Pity From a Dumb Clown"? is that right? in case you were curious, hoogh) when I found it...
I'm a little sad that you won't be able to update this regularly for a good while, especially as there's already so little here, but that goes to show what an interesting concept that this is! I hadn't really thought TOO hard about the plot weirdness of some of the series' stories, tbh (I mean, aside from being obviously over the top in some ways, and Shinichi/Conan being kinda OP in the deduction department- though he can be wrong sometimes, with spectacularly bad results, if temporary- but I kind of enjoy him being some kind of genius, well above his grade level even in his "adult" form- at least in some areas, if not in most, in series' canon- and since he's, well, small, he needs to have SOMETHING). And I also thought that the series was plenty dark, as it was- any darker, and there might well be problems. Hm. But I kind of like how you seem to be handling things; if he solves most of his future cases like this (and if people who he saved or whatever in the canon story can get saved, one way or another, here- I don't like it much whenever people kill off the little rich girl, as realistic as it may be), then maybe the cases won't drag on forever, either. (Honestly, why am I even in this fandom; I don't care much for death or mystery genres, and generally follow for the main story- that is to say, Conan, his shrinking, and his fight against the Black Org.; and the various interesting characters and arcs he encounters as a result thereof.)
... I'm not even sure that my responses are readable anymore; I get so distracted by my own sudden turns in trains of thought... BUT. YEAH. I'm looking forward to more of this! I have to ask, will there be comedic elements in this story? It seems terribly unlikely, considering; but it's a part of the original story, and even if it's not the same, it'd be good that have good things that happen and more carefree moments to lighten things up; the original story is actually pretty depressing as it is, if you read deeper beneath the surface than what is usually shown.
Spelling errors? Point them out so I can fix them! It always seems that a few manage to get by me.
Yeah, this is part of a trilogy exploring similar themes and trying to see if I can write some cliches in a way that deconstructs them, or at least, looks at them more honestly, and what their implications are. "Pity from a Dumb Clown" and "A Guest in the Night" are part of this series. "Afterlife" deals with the "what if Shinichi didn't end up with the Mouri's" story that I've seen tried a few times before, but never truly explored. People always want things to return to the status quo, but realistically, they wouldn't. And that can be interesting too.
The book will be released in about a week. Depending on how these last few rounds of edits go. We're putting the finishing touches on it! I'll update sporadically, when I can.
Humor and horror are a great mix, I think. The humor I work in isn't slapstick like it often is in DC. This is from Shinichi's POV, so a lot of the humor is Shinichi making observations and being a smartass in his head. When he is feeling less paranoid and anxious all the time, we'll see more of his carefree side.
I didn't explicitly kill off the rich girl - she might just be badly injured. Either way, the police are trying to protect Conan from this information, so he won't be told. If he finds out, he will find out on his own.
Hoogh, AO3 did a spectacular job of failing to notify me that you replied to this. GJ AO3. Anyways, it's been long enough now that I can't really remember the typos? I'm sorry.
One thing I recall bugging me: he vomits up blood in this chapter, right? Depending on where the blood came from, from my understanding, blood in vomit usually looks like black coffee grounds. If his throat was still bleeding, I'm not sure that it would be doing it so much that it would produce such an effect, and have them not notice something was seriously wrong- blood loss makes you dizzy, right? Or so they say, I think... And, I figure that a lot of that blood would have wound up in his stomach, anyway- and that his stomach might well be bleeding, also.
Note about competent adults: they don't show up very early on in the series, but as the story progresses, they seem to get a lot better at it, with the more time passes. Except for Mouri, bless his soul. They all still have their peculiarities, though (Takagi sometimes comes off as a straight-up doormat, the poor man; and Sato has that ability to drive freakishly fast, freakishly well- where did she even acquire such a skill...? Wouldn't something like that take practice? Actually, come to think of it, a disturbing number of characters seem to possess such a skill: Sato, Agent Camel, Shinichi's own mom...).
I'm curious as to how Conan's situation is going to end up. Writing about him not going to the Mouris' is fine, I guess, but I don't really want to see him get screwed over in an orphanage, either. Trouble is, they know he's bullshitting; and anything about his life would be hard to prove, given as he shouldn't even exist... I'm also worried about how he is going to function without Agasa's handy tech; he's very much defenseless and virtually useless without it. (Curiously, I'm over 500 files into the manga, and yet I've only seen the skateboard used once; a bit of a non sequitur, I know, but I just thought that was tragic. Does he ever use it again in manga canon at all? I seem to recall reading something about that was the reason why he uses it so much in the anime... Really, though...)
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Toffee_Fox on Chapter 3 Fri 12 May 2017 07:08AM UTC
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dreamingfifi on Chapter 3 Wed 24 May 2017 08:42PM UTC
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Toffee_Fox on Chapter 3 Sun 11 Jun 2017 09:16PM UTC
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