I was shocked. "She still can't be alive?!" She was supposed to be dead by now. Is this proper?

BKurtuz · Dec 6, 2017

*I was shocked. "She still can't be alive?!" She was supposed to be dead by now.* Is this proper?

I was shocked. "She still can't be alive?!" She was supposed to be dead by now.

Is this proper punctuation?

BethS · Dec 6, 2017

The punctuation is fine (even the interrobang is being accepted more and more now, though I personally don't like it). I won't comment further because we're not supposed to critique outside of Share Your Work folders.

cornflake · Dec 6, 2017

BKurtuz said:
I was shocked. "She still can't be alive?!" She was supposed to be dead by now.

Is this proper punctuation?

I don't know -- is that meant to be the same person both thinking and speaking aloud?

BKurtuz · Dec 6, 2017

Its supposed to be the same person.. but I trying to fix another work that i didn't write... so I have to guess at the intention. the intention seems to me that the author was shocked, had the general sense of 'she can't still be alive', and the recognition that the other person was supposed to be dead by now. In the paragraphs introing into this... there is no other direct quotes... it is all her actions and general sense rather than what she directly thought or said..

Toothpaste · Dec 6, 2017

In that case I think it should read:

I was shocked. She still couldn't be alive, she was supposed to be dead by now!

Otherwise it kind of looks like the thing that is shocking is the statement "She still can't be alive?!", not that that in and of itself is shocking.

I was shocked. "She still can't be alive?!" She was supposed to be dead by now. Is this proper?

BKurtuz

BethS

cornflake

practical experience, FTW

BKurtuz

Toothpaste

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