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Using MS Word, I typed, "As Roblin and Adelaide are reading the reviews, Roblin thinks that women may get the vote and their rights after all.
MS Word puts a green squiggle under "reviews," and it asks me to change the comma to a semi colon. If I do, however, my entire sentence is wrong. What can I change to make it correct?
You don't need to change the sentence at all. There is nothing wrong with it. MS Word is incorrect in suggesting that it should be changed. The automatic correction rules do make a lot of mistakes.
As Roblin and Adelaide are reading the reviews, Roblin thinks that women may get the vote and their rights after all.
Semicolon wouldn’t make any sense in this case. It would break apart the sentence needlessly. After re-reading it a few times I think that keeping the comma there is the best thing you can do without rewording the sentence or the tense you are working in.
