The young girl, who was only eight years old, was very shy, but she loved to read. She was especially fond of fairy tales, and she would spend hours lost in the magical worlds of princesses and dragons. Her favorite story was about a princess who was trapped in a tower by a wicked witch, but who was eventually rescued by a brave knight. The princess, whose hair was as black as night, was very beautiful. She was kind and compassionate, and she always treated others with respect.
Which choice best corrects the punctuation error in the passage?
A. The young girl, who was only eight years old, was very shy but she loved to read. She was especially fond of fairy tales, and she would spend hours lost in the magical worlds of princesses and dragons. Her favorite story was about a princess who was trapped in a tower by a wicked witch, but who was eventually rescued by a brave knight. The princess, whose hair was as black as night, was very beautiful. She was kind and compassionate, and she always treated others with respect.
B. The young girl, who was only eight years old, was very shy, but she loved to read. She was especially fond of fairy tales, and she would spend hours lost in the magical worlds of princesses and dragons. Her favorite story was about a princess who was trapped in a tower by a wicked witch, but who was eventually rescued by a brave knight. The princess whose hair was as black as night, was very beautiful. She was kind and compassionate, and she always treated others with respect.
C. The young girl, who was only eight years old, was very shy, but she loved to read. She was especially fond of fairy tales, and she would spend hours lost in the magical worlds of princesses and dragons. Her favorite story was about a princess who was trapped in a tower by a wicked witch, but who was eventually rescued by a brave knight. The princess, whose hair was as black as night, was very beautiful. She was kind and compassionate and she always treated others with respect.
D. The young girl, who was only eight years old, was very shy, but she loved to read. She was especially fond of fairy tales, and she would spend hours lost in the magical worlds of princesses and dragons. Her favorite story was about a princess who was trapped in a tower by a wicked witch, but who was eventually rescued by a brave knight. The princess, whose hair was as black as night, was very beautiful, she was kind and compassionate, and she always treated others with respect.
The sentence "The princess, whose hair was as black as night, was very beautiful. She was kind and compassionate, and she always treated others with respect." has a comma splice error, meaning it has two independent clauses joined together with only a comma. The correct way to fix this error is to replace the comma before "and" with a conjunction like "and" or a semicolon.