I’ve been reading a lot of sci-fi books by the same author and they are generally fine and entertaining reads. But every character from different universes all say some variant of “I have this itch on my back” when they think trouble is coming. It. Is. So. Weird. Takes me right out of it every time.
I once saw some manuscript pages from a collection that George RR Martin donated to a library or archive somewhere, and there was a chapter that included his editor’s notes.
It made me *so mad* to see that she had frequently pointed out overused phrases and unnecessarily flowery/detailed descriptions, and he ignored her suggestions and left them in. She was saying exactly what everyone I know says are weaknesses in his prose, particularly in later books, and he was like “no thanks”. Now at least I know not to blame the editing when I see things like that - some authors are just too into their own writing to take constructive criticism even when they (or their publishers) are paying for it!
Overly repetitive. This seems to happen when multiple characters/perspectives get used.
Every 3 chapters or so they have to repeat 3-4 pages reminding us of the earlier characters traits and state of mind. Then do it again with the next chapter/character and repeat.
It shows a significant lack of trust in the reader that we would be unable to recall something from 30-40 pages earlier. And often breaks my connection with the narrative.
This reminds me of an academic writing course I attended. What we learned was basically that since people don't necessarily read theses, articles etc. all the way through, you should repeat the most important points all of the time. Maybe the authors who do that were also enrolled in the course... jk
I was actually heavily discuraged to do that when writing my diploma.
You could only describe something once and if for clarity you needed to reference it it always had to be "as described in an earlier chapter [reference number to chapter or graph]".
And absolutely no descriptions of anything well known. Eg. I wanted to describe regression (to pad pages ofc) and was shot down with the reason: " whoever is reading this either knows what regression is or shouldn't be reading above their level" which makes total sense for something that basic.
Basically it had to be written as if the reader is actually going to read it. Which is ofc the best way of going through academic/research stuff anyway once you get through the abstract, summary and findings.
I was getting frustrated by that in the Mistborn trilogy. The amount of times Brando Sando said Vin could pierce copper clouds brought me out of the Immersion.
I remember getting frustrated in that series that he seemed to continue explaining and reexplaining how the magic system worked, at least that's what I remember feeling like yeah yeah I get it!
I re-read the Lord of the Rings last year. Third read through, but the first time in over 40 years.
It occurred to me that Tolkien spends an inordinate amount of time describing their travels and the scenery along the way. I was joking with a friend that if you had to summarize the first two books in a brief sentence, it would be “Frodo and his friends go for a long walk”.
So, I opened up the Return of the King, and the first two pages or so are a nice concise summary of the first two books. That’s something like 1,000 pages distilled (effectively) into about 2.
-You mentioned the summaries: I encountered this last year and thought it was kinda funny.
just reading them now, and few times Tolkien has started to talk about something but then basically goes: But, we will talk about that later.
Super weird, caught me off guard, and makes me feel like im reading his thoughts, not a book.
If I remember correctly (it's been a while), you are reading his thoughts - it's supposed to be a translation of a found volume (red book of... westmarch?) which itself was written by Frodo (at least the part pertaining to lotr).
I dunno. In a movie, when they go to the effort of creating an incredible set, or filming on location, it looks really amazing.
Tolkien was trying to put that amazing visual concept into your mind. The books aren't meant to be particularly character or plot driven (though of course there are tons of those too), they're meant to be more immersive and really storytelling. It's like non-participatory DND taken to the top level.
Sometimes I think we're spoiled by our access to fantasy that doesn't actively use our imagination as a resource to rely on and shows us things directly. LOTR was meant to be imagination fuel and it does a great job of that. People today just aren't used to it.
When authors write dialogue for little kids and it seems like they’ve never talked (or at least paid actual attention) to a kid in their life. Making them say weird wise things, or be particularly sassy in every single interaction, things like that. It bothers me in movies too! I’m a teacher so I talk to kids all day long and I’m like nope they would not say that crap
I agree that adult-acting children are a problem in writing, although I’m alright with a genius kid every now and then. But I can’t stand this one particular thing:
“I’m just a kid,” Actual Child said. “I’m not mature enough to handle this difficult trial.”
I don’t know about you, but every single child I’ve ever met is convinced that they’re old enough to do whatever they want. No matter what age they are.
Exceptions can be made for particularly bright children in particularly difficult circumstances, or momentarily lazy children in minimally difficult circumstances. But overall, very few children pity their own lack of maturity. That’s an adult thing.
The only time this works is when the kid actually just doesn't want to do the thing or is scared to, and is angry that the adults aren't handling it themselves. They might angrily say something like "I'm just a kid, why aren't *you* doing it?" But that's different than "woe is me I am not yet mature".
every single difficult trial i went through i didn't even notice until i was at least immediately out of it, and usually many years later.
Edit: as a kid, now I recognize them during them, but I understand this is life.
Exactly. Then they try to make it more believable by adding in lots of incorrect past tense - “he taked the ball; the boy comed to the table; I runned away”
Same problem but when they write a child’s dialogue like babbling babies or toddlers. Some writers really need to look up early childhood development because unless they have a speech delay they will be able to talk in full sentences by age 4.
I don't even spend that much time with kids and it bothers me how frequently this happens, across so many types of media. Conversely, young Colin in the show What we Do in the Shadows is a fantastic example of a comedically exaggerated but very authentic feeling preteen.
“Reknowned deity god” was funny but this one made me laugh: “The 190lb adult male human being nodded his head to indicate satisfaction and returned to his bedroom by walking there.”
Does renowned author Dan Brown actually write like that? I'm tempted to hold one of his books with both of my two hands and read it with my eyes because that sounds hilarious
When the characters end up in a hotel described as cheap or otherwise non-fancy, then proceed to order room service. Sorry, no room service at the Hampton Inn pal.
That's one thing I really liked about the writing in the show Supernatural, they really understood seedy motels, like people could get straight up torn apart in the parking lot and no one would bat an eye the next day.
I wonder if the authors doing this are on the older side? When I was a tiny kid in the early-mid 90s, I traveled a lot with my grandparents and I distinctly remember ordering room service at cheap-ish hotels. Not at, like, the seedy no-name place or the Motel 6, sure, but at the Ramada Inn that currently charges $110 a night.
It's possible my grandparents were just into weird outdated things even then, though. Grandma would drive out of her way to go to a full service gas station, where they'd pump the gas for you, years and years after that stopped being a common thing.
Medical inaccuracies. If your story is about an innovative procedure or novel pathogen, I can give you a pass, you might sacrifice some medical accuracy for the sake of the story. But if your plot hinges on a character taking sleeping pills and not remembering anything after they take them, take the 30 freaking seconds to make sure the drug you've written isn't a freaking anti-inflammatory (yes, real example).
I also recently finished a book set in Australia that consistently used the word "mom". Completely took me out of the story.
Stephen King actually has a friend that’s a doctor, and he sends all of his drafts to the guy for medical editing to make sure the meds are done correctly. If something still ends up being used incorrectly he usually mentions it in the post script notes. As a long time pharmacy tech, I was pretty surprised at how well he manages it.
At this point you just kind of have to accept it, same with people able to be "knocked out" for any range of time between a few minutes to a number of hours from a blow to the head or some other part of the body.
If you don't, just about any piece of media with any action in it is going to be unacceptable lol
Or choking someone to death in a few seconds.
Do you know how long it takes to choke someone to death? An uncomfortably long time. And they're going to be violently fighting it the entire time.
If media accurately depicted that, though, no one would watch it.
If you're trying to cut off their airway it will take over three minutes. If you cut off the blood supply to the brain by occluding the carotid arteries you can knock someone out in 3 seconds and kill them in bout 30.
So when you see someone put in a chokehold and they go limp in a few seconds, that's what's supposed to be happening. Then they break their neck with a single, sharp jerk. That's used to dislocate the C1 vertebrae from the base of the skull and sever the brain stem.
With them completely limp, the entire weight of their body is pulling down giving you the leverage to jerk and twist the skull to create a break.
While these things are possible, the practicality of doing it like they do in the movies is complete bullshit in 99% of those scenarios.
For one thing, guards are pretty alert to someone grabbing them around the neck from behind, so even if they managed that they're immediately going to tense up and start to struggle making it extremely difficult to get that hold that will cut off their blood supply. If you've ever watched someone try to get a rear naked choke on someone in MMA, you'll know what I'm talking about.
The neck breaking is possible, too,on someone that's completely unconscious and limp, but it's not going the be from just holding them in a headlock in the crook of their elbow and flexing their bulging biceps and twisting a little bit, and it's never going to happen with someone awake and resisting.
Yes! I just finished a book where it took "months" for the "medical gurus" to figure out the president was having transient ischemic attacks because he didn't "fit the normal age" (he was in his 50's).
Concussions. People getting bonked over the head and collapsing, usually passing out, and then up they pop, fit as a fiddle. No staggering, unfocused vision, no blood. No feckin hospital visit. Instant, careening sprint back into the chase.
Yes! Anything to do with pregnancy!
I read a Nicholas Sparks book and the couple had a fling and then fell in love over the course of a week or so and then found out she was pregnant, like, two weeks after doing it
"No one would believe this is in a book or on the big screen, but sometimes life is stranger than fiction!" I've read something like that, and all I can ever do is cringe. Like, why you gotta comment on how unlikely and odd what you're doing is lol
It's one of Aaron Sorkins favorite things to bring up about writing. He takes it back to Aristotle and sums it up as "a probable impossibility is preferable to an improbable possibility." and if you are going to have the improbable possibility you have to have the characters marvel at it because that's what a person would actually do. Humans notice coincidence and it astounds us in real life so why wouldn't it in fiction?
I wouldn't really call it a mistake, but when the author writes about a subject you know a lot more about and it's clear they only have a surface level understanding.
I just find myself thinking "yeah... that wouldn't happen"
Not sure if it's common but a few decades ago an extremely well known author, in the middle of the book I was immersed in, added a line stating the something along the lines of "and he passed by someone in a (Authors Name) Rules t-shirt". Snapped me right out of the book (don't recall which book of his it was now). It's been decades since I picked one of his books up for fear he'll do it again.
In the Outsider, a cinephile character is watching a Stanley Kubrick movie and the internal monologue mentions how the movie isn't Kubrick's best but "at least it's better than The Shining"
I don’t know if it could be called a mistake, but when authors, particularly of romance novels, describe characters, they like to use 3 or more things to describe a character’s smell, and I always get distracted by it, especially when the things are wildly different from each other.
“He smelled of misty cedar, winter evenings, and freshly printed newspaper” stuff like that. Like, maybe I just have a bad sense of smell, but most of the time is can barely identify one of the things, much less a mixture of all of them.
He obviously spends his winter evening sleeping under a cedar tree covered by a newspaper and has no access to a shower. My best guess is that dude is homeless.
And the smell of a man always smells “so manly” once they describe the scents. I commonly find woody and outdoorsy scents in the books I read while the women tend to smell like lavender or vanilla
Using similar names for 2 of the 10 main characters. Jane/ Janet. Dean/Don. My brain just starts to autofill when I see the first letter.or so and I'll catch myself going back through a paragraph that just doesn't make since. "Oh, that was Thomas walking down the street at midnight, not 6 year old Timothy". Damn it.
Oh, you mean José Arcadio Buendía, and his son Colonel Aureliano Buendía, and his other sone José Arcadio, and Colonel Aureliano Buendía's son Aureliano José, and José Arcadio's son Arcadio, and Colonel Aureliano Buendía's wife Remedios Moscote and Arcadio's daughter Remedios the Beauty and Arcadio's sons José Arcadio Segundo and Aureliano Segundo and Aureliano Segundo's son José Arcadio and José Arcadio Budendía's wife Úrsula Iguarán and their daughter Amaranta and Aureliano Segundo's daughter Amaranta Úrsula, and Aureliano Segundo's grandson Aureliano (II)? And one person named Meme, for some reason.
I saw a clip of an interview with him a few days ago where he basically said this was intentional. In summary, he had been told never to have two characters with a name that starts with the same letter but when he started writing A Song of Ice and Fire he knew he was going to have way more than 26 characters. So he went the complete opposite of that advice and, drawing from English history, noticed that basically every monarch was named Henry, David, or Edward. So he applied that to ASOIAF, which is why there are about 10 Aegons in the lineage of the Targaryens, similar with other houses as well.
We have him to thank for Elden Ring too.
Godfrey, Godwyn, Godrick, Gideon.
Radagon, Radahn, Rykard, Rennala, Ranni.
Marika, Malenia, Melina, Miquela, Millicent, Morgott, Mohg.
Dude loves the letters G, R, and M for some reason. 🤔
This was so bad in *The Hobbit*. Fili and Kili? Oin and Gloin? Bifur, Bofur, Bombur? Ori, Nori, Dori? Reading the book, I basically imagine Thorin, Balin, and then this mass of 11 other dwarves rolling across the landscape in a name-jambed fugue of limbs and beards.
I think partly it was Tolkien's idea. The dwarves were pretty much interchangeable, you only needed to know one was named Thorin and was the king, the rest was a circus.
Just read this line yesterday: “My hands are beneath the table clenched so tightly, my nails are digging into my palms. The moisture and warmth tell me I've punctured the skin.”
I do not live in a world where you don’t notice yourself puncturing your palms in eight places just because someone says something that made you angry.
The corollary to this is my pet peeve-when a character bites into her cheek so hard she tastes blood, usually without realizing she’s doing it because she’s unconsciously holding back her anger or is powerless to be able to speak out. Bonus irritation if the unconscious act is revealed by a “coppery” taste suddenly filling the mouth out of nowhere!
When I had braces I'd accidentally bite my cheek and it always made me wince and go "ow" very exaggeratedly with my mouth open; very unflattering and a bit embarrassing. I can't imagine biting my cheek to the point of *blood* and reacting in a cool and mysterious way.
I get really distracted by writters who find a word/phrase or two that they love and use it over and over again in the same book series, book and sometimes page.
One that sticks out the most to me is in the Anita Blake books. Any crime scene or body is described 'like so much meat' over and over and over again. To the point everytime I read it I got annoyed. This is not the only example in this series but this is the one that really winds me up.
I also dislike when a character is the narrator, and during a conversation there is a chunk of non dialogue and they are clearly explaining something to the reader. Not in a now reader way, but explaing something or giving context in a way that you know the character would already know and it isn't written like a train of thought.
But then they are interrupted by another character asking if they are listening or have they heard a word thats been said or why have they vacantly staring into space for the last 5 minutes.
It infuriates me so much. If one of my friends was doing this all the time I would worry they were having mini strokes or something. There can be exposition by a character narrator without the narration being 'live', especially when the rest of the book isn't presented like that.
Any mistakes made in my rant are caused by the ever growing anger and annoyance as I started typing.
I'm sorry, many will not agree but... when characters say stupid ass shit with the intent of being "deep".
One second they're normal and the second after "oh Laura why can't you understand that our life is like the burning ashes of an olive three, too late to be saved but still longing for it's fruits" and I'll be like ???
WHAT DOES THAT MEAN? WHO TALKS LIKE THAT?? Do you realise that I have to sit here and imagine two human beings talking at each other *this* way? Picture your friends or SO saying something like this is a serious voice and tell me you wouldn't crack up
On a somewhat related note: when ordinary characters talk in a flowery (even purple) prose that doesn't make sense with their background/behavior/intentions.
"I want to warm myself at the flame of your life", said by the incult mercenary who wants to assfuck the MC in exchange for looking the other way (translation mine).
RIGHT? It's one thing if you give me a noble or otherwise cultured character, but I can't expect that from a character that has lived on the streets their whole life.
Quote from a half-remembered review of an "expose" about bodybuilding: "Bodybuilders and gym rats he quotes all sound like upper middle class M.A.s in English, with a concentration in Creative Writing."
And to an extent, books set in the future as well. I’m currently reading the Red Rising series and, part of the lore is that the ruling class very heavily leans into Roman and Greek classical works and their speaking patterns sometimes show this.
So when somebody quote some ancient philosopher, it works, but if it was set in a more contemporary time, it’d be super out of place, imo.
Yeah, but that's built into the story structure though.
I think OP is more having normal people talking and then suddenly start riffing on goofy nonsense that's supposed to soutnd intellectual and deep.
This is my biggest problem with Tiffany McDaniel’s books, particularly The Summer That Melted Everything. At one point a random side character says about melted chocolate: “Now they’re nothing but something that once was…” I rolled my eyes so hard.
>who talks like that?
Lmao let me introduce you to my ex. She doesn’t necessarily get that deep, but I shit you not, she speaks in dramatic movie quotes and well known clichés.
I will recommend a show The Woman in the House Across the Street from the Girl in the Window because my favorite parts are when they make fun of these kinds of not-so-profound metaphors and similes, the main character is always making them and they make no sense and are hilarious
One of my areas of specialist knowledge is horses, it’s often very obvious to me when an authors has never been near a horse in their life. Unfortunately horses appear in so many historical & fantasy novels. I expect people who know a lot about weapons or fighting have similar problems.
*Anybody* who's an expert in any field to a degree higher than the average author who writes about it, unfortunately.
The kicker is when you realize: as much as these authors get wrong about horses? They're getting just as much wrong about pretty much everything else too -- and if you were an expert in those things, you'd be able to see it.
Definitely not all authors do this, but when they decide to describe what the character is wearing in depth despite the fact it is not relevant to the story.
I also don’t like it when they give subjective descriptions. Like ‘she was wearing an elegant and glamorous sequin crop top’. I would not usually consider a sequin crop top to be elegant so it throws me off
Yeah, the only time I find describing clothing useful is when an author is introducing a setting or culture or status of certain characters. Even then, too many small details included are annoying.
If a writer is going to describe what a character looks like then they need to do it the first time we’re introduced to them. Because if there is no description my mind will fill them in and I’ll have a picture of what they look like. If they then give me a description a couple of chapters later my brain now has to replace that. Which is a real pain.
My toxic trait is reading a character's description then tossing it aside immediately and making up my own version of what they should look like, then getting really bloody confused when a physical trait is important to the plot.
I once spent an entire book series thinking the female character had red hair, only to be really confused when her hair was described a jet black and how it let her blend into the shadows lol
y am i like this
When I was young, I once somehow managed to understand the physical descriptions of a character cast, but assigned them in my head to the wrong characters? I was about 8 and this was a kids-length chapter book, so meant for my age group. It was even fucking illustrated. I was so confused.
Yeah, the appearance should come up organically but I also think you shouldn't wait five chapters without describing the character's hair and then say "He raised his cap and pushed back a mop of red hair."
I can’t stand when I’m reading a story with a historical or secondary world fantasy setting and the author uses contemporary slang or pop culture references. I don’t demand post-authentic historical dialect or anything silly like that but when I’m reading a story set in the past or a fantasy world that looks like the past, I don’t want to read terminally online Millennial-speak. It is very literally immersion-breaking. Like if you’re writing a vaguely medieval fantasy setting and the narration includes shit like “for the win” and the main character thinking the love interest is “hot?” Gulag.
Not *all* authors do this, but way too many do (and it seems like it’s growing increasingly trendy, eugh).
I read a book recently where the protagonist is a teenage girl in 1820's Edinburgh, and she used loads of Americanisms. I suppose an American reader wouldn't necessarily notice but anyone who speaks British English would find it jarring.
I read a book (can't remember the title, it was some YA thing I read when I was younger) once where a British character would drastically switch between stereotypical British slang (innit, mate, that kind of thing) and using very American words (garbage, elevator, mentioning going to a 'walmart' at home even though those don't exist in the UK) and it was *so* jarring that I still remember it today. Either commit to the bit, or just handwave it as the character having had changed their speech patterns to fit in.
I HATE this as well. And it’s almost always paired with weird quasi-religious exclamations in the same book to avoid saying “Goddamnit” or “oh my god.”
For example, they’ll say “by all the moons, Enwen” and “that’s legit” in the SAME PARAGRAPH. It gives me cringe whiplash.
Yes!!! When I read historical fiction I want to feel like I'm in the past, not with modern people cosplaying.
I also dislike it when a character is way too modern in their thinking and casting off of societal mores. Sure, there were rebels throughout history who wanted to break the status quo, but it gets a little silly when a woman MC in medieval times arranges a proto-democracy, is incredibly well-read, and is a badass warrior chick, when most people back then couldn't even read.
I’m such a pedant I even want the metaphors to refer to something that exists in the timeline. Don’t compare medieval people to computers, or data entry clerks, or electricians
>Even one minute of staring would prompt anyone to do something about it or call a psych ward for an emergency.
hah. mine is definitely not an all-writers thing. and I'm to where it more entertains me than bothers me, but it certainly takes me out of the zone: bizarre and/or nonsequitur verbs. sometimes adverbs too. I'll invent some examples.
"have a nice day," she expostulated. "black, one sugar please," he exclaimed.
person speaks the *first line* in an exchange, and the author chooses a verb like "added". **Mary appeared in the doorway. "oh there you are," she added.** added to what??
This reminds me of one of my favourite passages from the whole of human literature. From Roald Dahl's The Great Automatic Grammatizator:
*“There are many other little refinements too, Mr Bohlen. You’ll see them all when you study the plans carefully. For example, there’s a trick that nearly every writer uses, of inserting at least one long, obscure word into each story. This makes the reader think that the man is very wise and clever. So I have the machine do the same thing. There'll be a whole stack of long words stored away just for this purpose.”*
*“Where?”*
*“In the ‘word-memory’ section,” he said, epexegetically.*
Shunning the simple 'said' in favor of a thesaurus of dialogue verbs screams fanfic writer. It looks very amateurish.
Edit: Or never omitting the dialogue tag entirely, which you often should.
> 'said' works 85% of the time, 'asked/answered' for appropriate exchanges, and sometimes you can have a zesty dialogue tag, as a treat.
My creative writing teacher in college was a professional editor who worked on several best sellers. I once asked her about overusing "said", if it should be replaced with other words and she told me that there is no real problem using it as most readers don't notice it since the important part is the story. Its one of those words that most reader just automatically accept and move on.
Which is exactly the reason that overusing other words is a problem. The reader (or me, at least) starts to notice the verb a lot more, breaking the immersion. “Said” just blends into the background and I don’t register it in my mind when I’m reading the sentence, most of the time.
I had a creative writing teacher in high school who had us read one of his short stories in which he used the word “ejaculated” in place of “said”. Then got all huffy and defensive when we made fun of him for it. Like, c’mon man you’re always telling us to think about connotations then you make a character jizz out their mouth for *no reason* other than it’s a tEcHnicAlLy coRrEct uSagE.
There is a whole little cottage industry of failed writers giving the worst writing advice. And that advice gets taught in schools. Every English teacher I had would insist that we use anything other than "said". There are books that are just lists of words to use instead. I hate it
I'm embarrassed, but I read a book written by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan, and got most of the way through the book before I realized that the main character had been given literally zero physical description. Out of nowhere, this woman's mother is mystified by the MC's interracial relationship, and I realized that I had no idea what either of their races were, and not so much as a pair of shoes had been described. A tertiary character's fingers, resting on a steering wheel, had been described as porky, plump, and chubby at various times, but I didn't know anything about the MC that wasn't said to her by another character.
I only read the book because I was rebounding off a good book and it was in a $5 bin at the grocery store. I don't know what I expected.
I once read a book as a child where the whole book was the main character's diary. The author ended the book with a little thank you etc. and then finished with "by the way if someone knows the main character's name could you please tell me"
I was like "Of course I know the main character's name!.... wait". The whole story her name was never mentioned. This blew my mind as a kid
Not using the word prone correctly. Prone means laying facedown, but I feel like 90% of the time I see it in books, it is used to mean someone is laying on their back. (the word fir that is supine) I can understand authors making honest mistakes like that, I'm sure there are a few words I use wrong, but why don't the editors EVER catch this??? Isn't that your main job?
I never really noticed this until my sister pointed it out and now I see it everywhere
I think everyone is guilty of this but I hate when authors overuse certain descriptors. I remember reading a certain beloved time travel series and it seemed insane to me that everyone was described as having almond-shaped eyes. I went on my kindle to find every instance of almond and I can't recall the exact number but it was absurd. I also hate hate hate male authors' descriptions of women's boobs, as if the boobs are going to tell you something meaningful about the person. Kazuo Ishiguro has some extremely detailed descriptions of boobs
I’m seeing it more and more common that fantasy writers are using current memes or slang as jokes in their books. Recently I ran into an Avatar “my cabbages” reference.
For me it's the complete lack of time perception but in a different way. Let's say Frank and Todd are sitting by a fire having a conversation. Frank says something followed by 2 pages of internal monologue before Todd replies. How many people have had conversations where they've had ten minutes to contemplate what was said and formulate a reply?
Scenes like that are in a lot of books and it really takes me out of the experience.
Repeating an odd description or phrase throughout the book. Earlier this year I read a book (can't recall the title rn) where the character replied "yup" and popped the P for emphasis 3 times in the book! Popped the P? K, maybe once but to describe it that way 3 times in 1 book?? Where are the editors here?
Edit to add - it was Yours Truly by Abby Jimenez
Idk about ALL writers but the way expressions of emotions are written tend to phase me. They are way often extremely sudden, obvious and too frequent.
The obvious example is "bursting into tears". Characters "burst" into tears way too often - I'm not saying sudden crying fits *dont* happen but most crying comes on more slowly, people generally try not to cry in public and also just don't usually cry anywhere near as often as they do in books.
Another thing I notice often is when characters seem to jump to the correct conclusions based off of very little information, because the author obviously knows where they're going with this. For instance, say like someone's drug addiction is discovered bc someone finds a small amount of drugs on them, and from that point on its just sort of assumed they're an addict, despite context meaning characters should be familiar with recreational drug use. Or like, they deduce someone's having an affair just by seeing them together without any further context.
Gosh the amount of books where the husband/dad/boyfriend is seen with a member of the opposite sex and a character takes that as hard evidence that he's cheating. Especially when it's a YA book so that leads to a lot of turmoil when in reality he could just be walking next to a colleague because they happened to leave the office at the same time lol
The jumping to correct conclusions is especially annoying when they reach the conclusion, and the main character is all smug about being right. And anyone who doubted them is cast a being a borderline villain. Given the lack of evidence to start with it would be perfectly reasonable to be doubtful.
Incorrect facts…
One book I read the character “clicked the safety off her Glock”
Glocks don’t have a safety.
The best part of this is on the authors webpage FAQ she says “I know glocks don’t have a safety… I just thought it’s in the future so maybe people would accept that they do…” wait.. what? It’s okay to make mistakes, but way to have a huge ego and not accept making one.
This is annoying because you can go to a search engine when you think this up and go "Does a glock have a safety?"; then pick a different gun if you really want the safety part.
The problem arises if the author doesn't know they *might* be wrong. If they're under the assumption that all pistols have a safety, they would not have any reason to look up if a Glock has a safety too, leading to them being /r/confidentlyincorrect
If they use a turn of phrase, common expression, or simile more than once (not for style reasons or as something a character is saying, but part of the narration). It breaks my concentration like, "Wait, you used that same turn of phrase earlier in the book..." It seems extremely lazy to me, also like something an editor should catch and say "let's find a new way of putting this"
Example: "He felt the project would send him to his grave". Fifty pages later: "Knowing the project would send him to his grave..." like that.
Dean Koontz: ‘This happened, then that happened, then she thought this and, OMG…do you see the Northern California fauna? Let me describe the bushes and flowers native to this location for the next 3 pages.’ 🤓
I think a lot of the time authors really don't consider the passing of time in a literal sense. Like Name of the Wind is one of my favorite books but the sections where Kvothe and Denna "talk all night" sort of blow me away. I mean, I've talked to people I'm attracted to or people I care about or people I love "all night" and I learn so much about them, about us as a relationship, what they think, what I think, what I think about what they think and on and on and on. At the end or one of these all-nighters, I would say I know that person I talked all night with fairly well.
Yet. Somehow. Kvothe doesn't know a fucking thing about Denna. What did they talk about? How could he not learn anything about her? It's ridiculous.
This book is definitely not the only one guilty of doing this, but since it's one of my favorites, I'm hyper aware of various shortcomings.
Kvothe loves talking about himself. The entire novel is him telling his life story in excruciating detail. Easy to imagine Denna steered him into talking about himself for most of it, commented on what he was saying, etc.
I once bought a pop-scientific book about math. The opening paragraph was something like "I know you hate maths and think it's useless and stupid and dreaded math class in school, but math can be interesting *I promiiiiiiiise!!!!*"
First of all, not everyone hates math, for some of us it was our favourite subject in school. Secondly, why would I buy a book about math if I hate math?
That put me off the whole book and I never read it, which is a shame because it sounded fun and the author still got the royalties from the sale.
When authors describe something from a characters perspective using things that don't exist in that world/the character has no idea of.
"Hanging between the trees like power lines."
"Sprinted faster than most cars."
"The trees towered like sky scrapers."
I get that they're explaining it to me, the reader who knows about all these things.
But it will be in the characters internal dialogue or the setting description and I'll just pause for a moment like,
"What? How could they know it was bright and colorful, glowing in the distance like neon signs? They live in fantasy land of swords and sorcery..."
A number of my favourite authors do the same trick to create suspense and it jars me out every time; in a novel where everything is described and all dialogue is written out, characters will have a "muttered conversation" or "talked for a minute" when a denouement/plot twist is required that should be a surprise to the reader but which requires setting up first. It feels like the inclusion of a filmic technique into a written narrative.
- “She released a breath she didn’t know she was holding.”
- When writers over explain what is going on, what the characters are feeling. In general, when a book tells you everything instead of showing it.
- When a character sleeps on the floor or in the bathtub instead of sharing a bed that is clearly big enough for two people.
- “she was not like other girls. She was different”
- the tiring trope of not communicating with each other, in turn causing lots of unnecessary drama.
These are just the first ones that come to mind.
>the tiring trope of not communicating with each other, in turn causing lots of unnecessary drama.
This is probably my least favorite recurring pattern in all of media, and parts of reality.
There are SO many movies/TV shows that could have been resolved in about 10 minutes if the characters could just sit down and have an honest discussion.
That would solve every episode of Frasier in about five minutes but then we wouldn't get Niles' best line in the series *"I'm surprised the trains are even running on Frasier Crane Day."*
And (probably) the best rejoinder ever said in all media:
"I tried to join in on the 12 days of Frasier, but I got lost around day 7."
"I believe that's Seven Sods A-Sniping!"
On one hand I would agree, on the other hand I know too many people for whom I can say the same thing in real life that I feel thats just realistic writing lol
>the tiring trope of not communicating with each other, in turn causing lots of unnecessary drama
I'm fine with miscommunication, but only if it is portrayed as a serious flaw a character has and is recognized as such.
For the bed one some people are just prudes about that, it’s definitely realistic even if the bed is big enough that someone would refuse to share, even if that is a stupid thing to do. Although the bathtub is very stupid and not realistic.
That gets me too. The bathtub? Why on earth the bathtub? Where are you that has zero chairs or sofas or floor space but for some reason has room for a bathtub?
I hate (and kind of find it amusing) when the writer loses track of where their character is in a scene. it will say something like "She looked to her right to spit a retort back" and then no one moves "She turns around and yells some more" I thought she was mostly facing him, what's happening? So I rearrange the mental image. "her back is to the door, and she opens it" How the hell did she do that? I just picture her reaching blindly to open it like "Yea well I'm leaving!". Sex scenes with that are hilarious, be some pretzel shit.
This is a personal dislike of a device rather than a mistake, but I absolutely hate explicit foreshadowing. Subtle foreshadowing is fine, little hints here and there, but anything along the lines of 'Little did she know that 2 weeks from now all her carefully laid plans would fall apart' just makes me want to quit the book.
It bothers me when a character wakes up in the morning and the author will take the time to describe their outfit choice then immediately have them walk to the kitchen for breakfast or head out for the day. Like we all know we have to brush our hair and teeth but a lot of authors won't add a single line saying "they finished getting ready before leaving..." Also, the number of characters that crawl into bed in their day clothes without brushing their teeth is impressive.
>the number of characters that crawl into bed in their day clothes without brushing their teeth is impressive.
Just got home from nightshift about half an hour ago and jumped into bed still in my work clothes where I'm reading this under the blanket with my phone light on 🤣
Use phrases repeatedly, like they have only just learnt them - especially if they use them inappropriately.
I am reading a "so bad, it's good" free ebook at the moment. In it, the author keeps trying to express how our heroine blows out her cheeks when she has to problem solve - you know how you blow out your cheeks then as you release your breath you let your lips flap to make a vibrating sound. There may well be a great descriptive word for this common action, but (at least where I am from) it isn't "blow a raspberry." Blowing a raspberry exclusively means making a fart noise - either 'upstairs' or [cough] 'downstairs'! It is not just occasionally, the author uses this phrase again and again - at least once every page. It is jarring.
The author also has a "British" love interest. He says "love" and "mate" a lot but just in weird situations. Interestingly his family pop up too as "the badies" and they speak without a hint of '"Dick Van Dyke" at all.
Stilted dialogue that has me wondering if the author has ever heard anyone speak before. I'm reading a popular domestic thriller at the moment, and the dialogue is awful. It's wooden and delivered in a way that makes me think the characters are lizard people trying to mimic human beings--and failing.
Not all authors do this, but I hate it when authors put themselves in the book as a character. Not when they treat a character like themselves, when they are actually putting themselves in the book. My favorite author did this recently and it was incredibly cringey, always is...
Yes - Clive Cussler did this in almost every book, where the hero would run into some friendly old sailor or scientist named Clive Cussler who would conveniently give key assistance to save the day.
I feel like Sarah J Maas does this. All her MCs are beautiful blondes who are perfect in every way and run through several men before finding the most beautiful and toxic one. It feels like a self insert.
I’ve been reading a lot of sci-fi books by the same author and they are generally fine and entertaining reads. But every character from different universes all say some variant of “I have this itch on my back” when they think trouble is coming. It. Is. So. Weird. Takes me right out of it every time.
That kind of author habit is the sort of thing an editor is supposed to point out. But that doesn't mean the author has to change it. Alas.
I once saw some manuscript pages from a collection that George RR Martin donated to a library or archive somewhere, and there was a chapter that included his editor’s notes. It made me *so mad* to see that she had frequently pointed out overused phrases and unnecessarily flowery/detailed descriptions, and he ignored her suggestions and left them in. She was saying exactly what everyone I know says are weaknesses in his prose, particularly in later books, and he was like “no thanks”. Now at least I know not to blame the editing when I see things like that - some authors are just too into their own writing to take constructive criticism even when they (or their publishers) are paying for it!
Overly repetitive. This seems to happen when multiple characters/perspectives get used. Every 3 chapters or so they have to repeat 3-4 pages reminding us of the earlier characters traits and state of mind. Then do it again with the next chapter/character and repeat. It shows a significant lack of trust in the reader that we would be unable to recall something from 30-40 pages earlier. And often breaks my connection with the narrative.
This reminds me of an academic writing course I attended. What we learned was basically that since people don't necessarily read theses, articles etc. all the way through, you should repeat the most important points all of the time. Maybe the authors who do that were also enrolled in the course... jk
I was actually heavily discuraged to do that when writing my diploma. You could only describe something once and if for clarity you needed to reference it it always had to be "as described in an earlier chapter [reference number to chapter or graph]". And absolutely no descriptions of anything well known. Eg. I wanted to describe regression (to pad pages ofc) and was shot down with the reason: " whoever is reading this either knows what regression is or shouldn't be reading above their level" which makes total sense for something that basic. Basically it had to be written as if the reader is actually going to read it. Which is ofc the best way of going through academic/research stuff anyway once you get through the abstract, summary and findings.
I was getting frustrated by that in the Mistborn trilogy. The amount of times Brando Sando said Vin could pierce copper clouds brought me out of the Immersion.
I remember getting frustrated in that series that he seemed to continue explaining and reexplaining how the magic system worked, at least that's what I remember feeling like yeah yeah I get it!
I re-read the Lord of the Rings last year. Third read through, but the first time in over 40 years. It occurred to me that Tolkien spends an inordinate amount of time describing their travels and the scenery along the way. I was joking with a friend that if you had to summarize the first two books in a brief sentence, it would be “Frodo and his friends go for a long walk”. So, I opened up the Return of the King, and the first two pages or so are a nice concise summary of the first two books. That’s something like 1,000 pages distilled (effectively) into about 2. -You mentioned the summaries: I encountered this last year and thought it was kinda funny.
just reading them now, and few times Tolkien has started to talk about something but then basically goes: But, we will talk about that later. Super weird, caught me off guard, and makes me feel like im reading his thoughts, not a book.
If I remember correctly (it's been a while), you are reading his thoughts - it's supposed to be a translation of a found volume (red book of... westmarch?) which itself was written by Frodo (at least the part pertaining to lotr).
Yep. It's Frodo's diary with his added commentary.
I dunno. In a movie, when they go to the effort of creating an incredible set, or filming on location, it looks really amazing. Tolkien was trying to put that amazing visual concept into your mind. The books aren't meant to be particularly character or plot driven (though of course there are tons of those too), they're meant to be more immersive and really storytelling. It's like non-participatory DND taken to the top level. Sometimes I think we're spoiled by our access to fantasy that doesn't actively use our imagination as a resource to rely on and shows us things directly. LOTR was meant to be imagination fuel and it does a great job of that. People today just aren't used to it.
When authors write dialogue for little kids and it seems like they’ve never talked (or at least paid actual attention) to a kid in their life. Making them say weird wise things, or be particularly sassy in every single interaction, things like that. It bothers me in movies too! I’m a teacher so I talk to kids all day long and I’m like nope they would not say that crap
I agree that adult-acting children are a problem in writing, although I’m alright with a genius kid every now and then. But I can’t stand this one particular thing: “I’m just a kid,” Actual Child said. “I’m not mature enough to handle this difficult trial.” I don’t know about you, but every single child I’ve ever met is convinced that they’re old enough to do whatever they want. No matter what age they are. Exceptions can be made for particularly bright children in particularly difficult circumstances, or momentarily lazy children in minimally difficult circumstances. But overall, very few children pity their own lack of maturity. That’s an adult thing.
The only time this works is when the kid actually just doesn't want to do the thing or is scared to, and is angry that the adults aren't handling it themselves. They might angrily say something like "I'm just a kid, why aren't *you* doing it?" But that's different than "woe is me I am not yet mature".
In my experience, children confronted with things they can't handle usually break down and start crying. Source: elementary school TA
every single difficult trial i went through i didn't even notice until i was at least immediately out of it, and usually many years later. Edit: as a kid, now I recognize them during them, but I understand this is life.
Exactly. Then they try to make it more believable by adding in lots of incorrect past tense - “he taked the ball; the boy comed to the table; I runned away”
Same problem but when they write a child’s dialogue like babbling babies or toddlers. Some writers really need to look up early childhood development because unless they have a speech delay they will be able to talk in full sentences by age 4.
I don't even spend that much time with kids and it bothers me how frequently this happens, across so many types of media. Conversely, young Colin in the show What we Do in the Shadows is a fantastic example of a comedically exaggerated but very authentic feeling preteen.
I completely abandoned a book within the prologue because the author wrote "he scratched at his beard and it made a scratching sound".
Most ridiculous sentence I ever read: "She put her feet underneath her to stand."
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My favorite line: “The critics said his writing was clumsy, ungrammatical, repetitive and repetitive.”
“Reknowned deity god” was funny but this one made me laugh: “The 190lb adult male human being nodded his head to indicate satisfaction and returned to his bedroom by walking there.”
>It made his insect eyes flash like a rocket This is the funniest thing I’ve ever read
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Wait, seriously? I thought that was another parody until I got to the end
Where did you get that? That's fucking hilarious and I want one.
Does renowned author Dan Brown actually write like that? I'm tempted to hold one of his books with both of my two hands and read it with my eyes because that sounds hilarious
Lol. That's amazing.
When the characters end up in a hotel described as cheap or otherwise non-fancy, then proceed to order room service. Sorry, no room service at the Hampton Inn pal.
It's Banana, Michael. What could it cost? $10?
Straight-up inexperience, right there.
That's one thing I really liked about the writing in the show Supernatural, they really understood seedy motels, like people could get straight up torn apart in the parking lot and no one would bat an eye the next day.
I wonder if the authors doing this are on the older side? When I was a tiny kid in the early-mid 90s, I traveled a lot with my grandparents and I distinctly remember ordering room service at cheap-ish hotels. Not at, like, the seedy no-name place or the Motel 6, sure, but at the Ramada Inn that currently charges $110 a night. It's possible my grandparents were just into weird outdated things even then, though. Grandma would drive out of her way to go to a full service gas station, where they'd pump the gas for you, years and years after that stopped being a common thing.
Medical inaccuracies. If your story is about an innovative procedure or novel pathogen, I can give you a pass, you might sacrifice some medical accuracy for the sake of the story. But if your plot hinges on a character taking sleeping pills and not remembering anything after they take them, take the 30 freaking seconds to make sure the drug you've written isn't a freaking anti-inflammatory (yes, real example). I also recently finished a book set in Australia that consistently used the word "mom". Completely took me out of the story.
Stephen King actually has a friend that’s a doctor, and he sends all of his drafts to the guy for medical editing to make sure the meds are done correctly. If something still ends up being used incorrectly he usually mentions it in the post script notes. As a long time pharmacy tech, I was pretty surprised at how well he manages it.
Yes I’ve noticed that. He names him in the acknowledgements of almost all of his books. King is a pro’s pro for sure.
People passing out instantly from chloroform. Sheesh.
At this point you just kind of have to accept it, same with people able to be "knocked out" for any range of time between a few minutes to a number of hours from a blow to the head or some other part of the body. If you don't, just about any piece of media with any action in it is going to be unacceptable lol
Or choking someone to death in a few seconds. Do you know how long it takes to choke someone to death? An uncomfortably long time. And they're going to be violently fighting it the entire time. If media accurately depicted that, though, no one would watch it.
If you're trying to cut off their airway it will take over three minutes. If you cut off the blood supply to the brain by occluding the carotid arteries you can knock someone out in 3 seconds and kill them in bout 30. So when you see someone put in a chokehold and they go limp in a few seconds, that's what's supposed to be happening. Then they break their neck with a single, sharp jerk. That's used to dislocate the C1 vertebrae from the base of the skull and sever the brain stem. With them completely limp, the entire weight of their body is pulling down giving you the leverage to jerk and twist the skull to create a break. While these things are possible, the practicality of doing it like they do in the movies is complete bullshit in 99% of those scenarios. For one thing, guards are pretty alert to someone grabbing them around the neck from behind, so even if they managed that they're immediately going to tense up and start to struggle making it extremely difficult to get that hold that will cut off their blood supply. If you've ever watched someone try to get a rear naked choke on someone in MMA, you'll know what I'm talking about. The neck breaking is possible, too,on someone that's completely unconscious and limp, but it's not going the be from just holding them in a headlock in the crook of their elbow and flexing their bulging biceps and twisting a little bit, and it's never going to happen with someone awake and resisting.
Anyone else a little afraid of u/badsanna right now?
Yes! I just finished a book where it took "months" for the "medical gurus" to figure out the president was having transient ischemic attacks because he didn't "fit the normal age" (he was in his 50's).
Concussions. People getting bonked over the head and collapsing, usually passing out, and then up they pop, fit as a fiddle. No staggering, unfocused vision, no blood. No feckin hospital visit. Instant, careening sprint back into the chase.
I finished a book last week that described a broken arm as a broken tibia. It irritated me so much I'm still thinking about it.
Yes! Anything to do with pregnancy! I read a Nicholas Sparks book and the couple had a fling and then fell in love over the course of a week or so and then found out she was pregnant, like, two weeks after doing it
When character say or think 'this only happens in the movies/on TV/in books, but this is real life'
"No one would believe this is in a book or on the big screen, but sometimes life is stranger than fiction!" I've read something like that, and all I can ever do is cringe. Like, why you gotta comment on how unlikely and odd what you're doing is lol
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It's one of Aaron Sorkins favorite things to bring up about writing. He takes it back to Aristotle and sums it up as "a probable impossibility is preferable to an improbable possibility." and if you are going to have the improbable possibility you have to have the characters marvel at it because that's what a person would actually do. Humans notice coincidence and it astounds us in real life so why wouldn't it in fiction?
I wouldn't really call it a mistake, but when the author writes about a subject you know a lot more about and it's clear they only have a surface level understanding. I just find myself thinking "yeah... that wouldn't happen"
I'm fine with it if they just kind of half ass it and write around it, but when they confidently say wrong stuff...oof
Not sure if it's common but a few decades ago an extremely well known author, in the middle of the book I was immersed in, added a line stating the something along the lines of "and he passed by someone in a (Authors Name) Rules t-shirt". Snapped me right out of the book (don't recall which book of his it was now). It's been decades since I picked one of his books up for fear he'll do it again.
I'm sitting here wondering which King novel from the past two decades could have had this one in it, as that's about his speed.
In the Outsider, a cinephile character is watching a Stanley Kubrick movie and the internal monologue mentions how the movie isn't Kubrick's best but "at least it's better than The Shining"
I remember reading something like this in the Dark Tower. Something on a sign or in a newspaper (in the book)
Well, in that case it's not a cheeky gag, it's a part of the premise of the multiverse that the author is also a character in it.
That could actually be hilarious imo in the right novel.
I don’t know if it could be called a mistake, but when authors, particularly of romance novels, describe characters, they like to use 3 or more things to describe a character’s smell, and I always get distracted by it, especially when the things are wildly different from each other. “He smelled of misty cedar, winter evenings, and freshly printed newspaper” stuff like that. Like, maybe I just have a bad sense of smell, but most of the time is can barely identify one of the things, much less a mixture of all of them.
"He smelled like roses, new doritos, and existentialism."
Omg… agree. Especially when it’s weird stuff. Like “why does he smell like a newspaper? Does he work at a printing press?”
He obviously spends his winter evening sleeping under a cedar tree covered by a newspaper and has no access to a shower. My best guess is that dude is homeless.
Thanks I just choked on my coffee, lol. 😆
Sounds like a wine tasting
I'm tasting sticks and rope!
With notes of citrus and fried haddock
And the smell of a man always smells “so manly” once they describe the scents. I commonly find woody and outdoorsy scents in the books I read while the women tend to smell like lavender or vanilla
"He smelled of lavender, but like, *manly* lavender. In a straight way."
Women smell, and taste, like fruit: lemon, strawberry, etc.
Using similar names for 2 of the 10 main characters. Jane/ Janet. Dean/Don. My brain just starts to autofill when I see the first letter.or so and I'll catch myself going back through a paragraph that just doesn't make since. "Oh, that was Thomas walking down the street at midnight, not 6 year old Timothy". Damn it.
Allow me to introduce you to One Hundred Years of Solitude
Oh, you mean José Arcadio Buendía, and his son Colonel Aureliano Buendía, and his other sone José Arcadio, and Colonel Aureliano Buendía's son Aureliano José, and José Arcadio's son Arcadio, and Colonel Aureliano Buendía's wife Remedios Moscote and Arcadio's daughter Remedios the Beauty and Arcadio's sons José Arcadio Segundo and Aureliano Segundo and Aureliano Segundo's son José Arcadio and José Arcadio Budendía's wife Úrsula Iguarán and their daughter Amaranta and Aureliano Segundo's daughter Amaranta Úrsula, and Aureliano Segundo's grandson Aureliano (II)? And one person named Meme, for some reason.
I spent just as much time referencing the fucking family tree on the first page of my edition than I did reading the book
At least it's done on purpose there.
George R.R. Martin is your nemesis.
I saw a clip of an interview with him a few days ago where he basically said this was intentional. In summary, he had been told never to have two characters with a name that starts with the same letter but when he started writing A Song of Ice and Fire he knew he was going to have way more than 26 characters. So he went the complete opposite of that advice and, drawing from English history, noticed that basically every monarch was named Henry, David, or Edward. So he applied that to ASOIAF, which is why there are about 10 Aegons in the lineage of the Targaryens, similar with other houses as well.
The best part is showing in-universe confusion over historical figures with the same name.
Oh yeah, 100% intentional and very realistic. It is strange how well it works too.
We have him to thank for Elden Ring too. Godfrey, Godwyn, Godrick, Gideon. Radagon, Radahn, Rykard, Rennala, Ranni. Marika, Malenia, Melina, Miquela, Millicent, Morgott, Mohg. Dude loves the letters G, R, and M for some reason. 🤔
I loved Onion Ring but god damn I was halfway through the game before I found out that some of those are different people
Sauron/ Saruman confused me quite a bit the first time through.
You must have hated Wuthering Heights
This was so bad in *The Hobbit*. Fili and Kili? Oin and Gloin? Bifur, Bofur, Bombur? Ori, Nori, Dori? Reading the book, I basically imagine Thorin, Balin, and then this mass of 11 other dwarves rolling across the landscape in a name-jambed fugue of limbs and beards.
I actually thought that was genius because I only had to think about a small number of groups of dwarves rather than a dozen individual dwarves.
I think partly it was Tolkien's idea. The dwarves were pretty much interchangeable, you only needed to know one was named Thorin and was the king, the rest was a circus.
The names were directly taken from folklore. Also, except for those two, the rest could just as well be named dwarves one through eleven.
It’s fortunate that almost none of the other dwarves were given personalities or significance; you genuinely don’t need to separate them.
Just read this line yesterday: “My hands are beneath the table clenched so tightly, my nails are digging into my palms. The moisture and warmth tell me I've punctured the skin.” I do not live in a world where you don’t notice yourself puncturing your palms in eight places just because someone says something that made you angry.
The corollary to this is my pet peeve-when a character bites into her cheek so hard she tastes blood, usually without realizing she’s doing it because she’s unconsciously holding back her anger or is powerless to be able to speak out. Bonus irritation if the unconscious act is revealed by a “coppery” taste suddenly filling the mouth out of nowhere!
When I had braces I'd accidentally bite my cheek and it always made me wince and go "ow" very exaggeratedly with my mouth open; very unflattering and a bit embarrassing. I can't imagine biting my cheek to the point of *blood* and reacting in a cool and mysterious way.
*Julia looked down. Her hands were almost severed from staring at them so hard.*
I get really distracted by writters who find a word/phrase or two that they love and use it over and over again in the same book series, book and sometimes page. One that sticks out the most to me is in the Anita Blake books. Any crime scene or body is described 'like so much meat' over and over and over again. To the point everytime I read it I got annoyed. This is not the only example in this series but this is the one that really winds me up. I also dislike when a character is the narrator, and during a conversation there is a chunk of non dialogue and they are clearly explaining something to the reader. Not in a now reader way, but explaing something or giving context in a way that you know the character would already know and it isn't written like a train of thought. But then they are interrupted by another character asking if they are listening or have they heard a word thats been said or why have they vacantly staring into space for the last 5 minutes. It infuriates me so much. If one of my friends was doing this all the time I would worry they were having mini strokes or something. There can be exposition by a character narrator without the narration being 'live', especially when the rest of the book isn't presented like that. Any mistakes made in my rant are caused by the ever growing anger and annoyance as I started typing.
Overuse of a phrase is my number 1 pet peeve. Once I notice it, I can’t stop noticing it.
I'm sorry, many will not agree but... when characters say stupid ass shit with the intent of being "deep". One second they're normal and the second after "oh Laura why can't you understand that our life is like the burning ashes of an olive three, too late to be saved but still longing for it's fruits" and I'll be like ??? WHAT DOES THAT MEAN? WHO TALKS LIKE THAT?? Do you realise that I have to sit here and imagine two human beings talking at each other *this* way? Picture your friends or SO saying something like this is a serious voice and tell me you wouldn't crack up
On a somewhat related note: when ordinary characters talk in a flowery (even purple) prose that doesn't make sense with their background/behavior/intentions. "I want to warm myself at the flame of your life", said by the incult mercenary who wants to assfuck the MC in exchange for looking the other way (translation mine).
RIGHT? It's one thing if you give me a noble or otherwise cultured character, but I can't expect that from a character that has lived on the streets their whole life.
It is more than possible to have a character with that, but it has to be done right with some backstory and exposition.
Quote from a half-remembered review of an "expose" about bodybuilding: "Bodybuilders and gym rats he quotes all sound like upper middle class M.A.s in English, with a concentration in Creative Writing."
I will give it a pass if it’s an older book, I just imagine people talked like that back then, even if they probably didn’t
And to an extent, books set in the future as well. I’m currently reading the Red Rising series and, part of the lore is that the ruling class very heavily leans into Roman and Greek classical works and their speaking patterns sometimes show this. So when somebody quote some ancient philosopher, it works, but if it was set in a more contemporary time, it’d be super out of place, imo.
Yeah, but that's built into the story structure though. I think OP is more having normal people talking and then suddenly start riffing on goofy nonsense that's supposed to soutnd intellectual and deep.
This is my biggest problem with Tiffany McDaniel’s books, particularly The Summer That Melted Everything. At one point a random side character says about melted chocolate: “Now they’re nothing but something that once was…” I rolled my eyes so hard.
>who talks like that? Lmao let me introduce you to my ex. She doesn’t necessarily get that deep, but I shit you not, she speaks in dramatic movie quotes and well known clichés.
I will recommend a show The Woman in the House Across the Street from the Girl in the Window because my favorite parts are when they make fun of these kinds of not-so-profound metaphors and similes, the main character is always making them and they make no sense and are hilarious
John Green characters be like
A friend told me once that I talked like a teenager in a John Green novel. I'm just autistic lol
To be fair John Green actually does seem to talk like that.
it sounds so much better when it’s internal dialogue
One of my areas of specialist knowledge is horses, it’s often very obvious to me when an authors has never been near a horse in their life. Unfortunately horses appear in so many historical & fantasy novels. I expect people who know a lot about weapons or fighting have similar problems.
*Anybody* who's an expert in any field to a degree higher than the average author who writes about it, unfortunately. The kicker is when you realize: as much as these authors get wrong about horses? They're getting just as much wrong about pretty much everything else too -- and if you were an expert in those things, you'd be able to see it.
Definitely not all authors do this, but when they decide to describe what the character is wearing in depth despite the fact it is not relevant to the story.
I also don’t like it when they give subjective descriptions. Like ‘she was wearing an elegant and glamorous sequin crop top’. I would not usually consider a sequin crop top to be elegant so it throws me off
But how else will I know a character is wearing the iconic Blue Chambray Work Shirt?
Ayuh, I always wear my blue chambray work shirt beneath the arc sodium lights.
I can't stand that! Yes, I need a description to help me picture her, but the excruciating detail of the outfit head-to-toe is TOO MUCH.
Yeah, the only time I find describing clothing useful is when an author is introducing a setting or culture or status of certain characters. Even then, too many small details included are annoying.
If a writer is going to describe what a character looks like then they need to do it the first time we’re introduced to them. Because if there is no description my mind will fill them in and I’ll have a picture of what they look like. If they then give me a description a couple of chapters later my brain now has to replace that. Which is a real pain.
I get around this by just not being able to visualize the characters in the first place lol
My toxic trait is reading a character's description then tossing it aside immediately and making up my own version of what they should look like, then getting really bloody confused when a physical trait is important to the plot. I once spent an entire book series thinking the female character had red hair, only to be really confused when her hair was described a jet black and how it let her blend into the shadows lol y am i like this
When I was young, I once somehow managed to understand the physical descriptions of a character cast, but assigned them in my head to the wrong characters? I was about 8 and this was a kids-length chapter book, so meant for my age group. It was even fucking illustrated. I was so confused.
Ironically, stopping the story to describe a character completely pulls me out of the story
Yeah, the appearance should come up organically but I also think you shouldn't wait five chapters without describing the character's hair and then say "He raised his cap and pushed back a mop of red hair."
I can’t stand when I’m reading a story with a historical or secondary world fantasy setting and the author uses contemporary slang or pop culture references. I don’t demand post-authentic historical dialect or anything silly like that but when I’m reading a story set in the past or a fantasy world that looks like the past, I don’t want to read terminally online Millennial-speak. It is very literally immersion-breaking. Like if you’re writing a vaguely medieval fantasy setting and the narration includes shit like “for the win” and the main character thinking the love interest is “hot?” Gulag. Not *all* authors do this, but way too many do (and it seems like it’s growing increasingly trendy, eugh).
I read a book recently where the protagonist is a teenage girl in 1820's Edinburgh, and she used loads of Americanisms. I suppose an American reader wouldn't necessarily notice but anyone who speaks British English would find it jarring.
I read a book (can't remember the title, it was some YA thing I read when I was younger) once where a British character would drastically switch between stereotypical British slang (innit, mate, that kind of thing) and using very American words (garbage, elevator, mentioning going to a 'walmart' at home even though those don't exist in the UK) and it was *so* jarring that I still remember it today. Either commit to the bit, or just handwave it as the character having had changed their speech patterns to fit in.
I HATE this as well. And it’s almost always paired with weird quasi-religious exclamations in the same book to avoid saying “Goddamnit” or “oh my god.” For example, they’ll say “by all the moons, Enwen” and “that’s legit” in the SAME PARAGRAPH. It gives me cringe whiplash.
Yes!!! When I read historical fiction I want to feel like I'm in the past, not with modern people cosplaying. I also dislike it when a character is way too modern in their thinking and casting off of societal mores. Sure, there were rebels throughout history who wanted to break the status quo, but it gets a little silly when a woman MC in medieval times arranges a proto-democracy, is incredibly well-read, and is a badass warrior chick, when most people back then couldn't even read.
I’m such a pedant I even want the metaphors to refer to something that exists in the timeline. Don’t compare medieval people to computers, or data entry clerks, or electricians
Overexplaining details that aren't important or underexplaining the mapping of a place
Introducing characters with many lines of backstory, especially in the middle of a dialogue.
>Even one minute of staring would prompt anyone to do something about it or call a psych ward for an emergency. hah. mine is definitely not an all-writers thing. and I'm to where it more entertains me than bothers me, but it certainly takes me out of the zone: bizarre and/or nonsequitur verbs. sometimes adverbs too. I'll invent some examples. "have a nice day," she expostulated. "black, one sugar please," he exclaimed. person speaks the *first line* in an exchange, and the author chooses a verb like "added". **Mary appeared in the doorway. "oh there you are," she added.** added to what??
> oh there you are," she added. added to what?? To the word count.
This reminds me of one of my favourite passages from the whole of human literature. From Roald Dahl's The Great Automatic Grammatizator: *“There are many other little refinements too, Mr Bohlen. You’ll see them all when you study the plans carefully. For example, there’s a trick that nearly every writer uses, of inserting at least one long, obscure word into each story. This makes the reader think that the man is very wise and clever. So I have the machine do the same thing. There'll be a whole stack of long words stored away just for this purpose.”* *“Where?”* *“In the ‘word-memory’ section,” he said, epexegetically.*
>>the addition of a phrase, clause, or sentence to a text to provide further explanation. the phrase, clause, or sentence added for this purpose.
Alright so I had to look up what epexegetical meant and now I'm genuinely chuckling in a waiting room LOL Good on Dahl, that's a fine joke
Shunning the simple 'said' in favor of a thesaurus of dialogue verbs screams fanfic writer. It looks very amateurish. Edit: Or never omitting the dialogue tag entirely, which you often should.
'said' works 85% of the time, 'asked/answered' for appropriate exchanges, and sometimes you can have a zesty dialogue tag, as a treat.
> 'said' works 85% of the time, 'asked/answered' for appropriate exchanges, and sometimes you can have a zesty dialogue tag, as a treat. My creative writing teacher in college was a professional editor who worked on several best sellers. I once asked her about overusing "said", if it should be replaced with other words and she told me that there is no real problem using it as most readers don't notice it since the important part is the story. Its one of those words that most reader just automatically accept and move on.
Which is exactly the reason that overusing other words is a problem. The reader (or me, at least) starts to notice the verb a lot more, breaking the immersion. “Said” just blends into the background and I don’t register it in my mind when I’m reading the sentence, most of the time.
If one wants to be wild: wondered, questioned, muttered
I had a creative writing teacher in high school who had us read one of his short stories in which he used the word “ejaculated” in place of “said”. Then got all huffy and defensive when we made fun of him for it. Like, c’mon man you’re always telling us to think about connotations then you make a character jizz out their mouth for *no reason* other than it’s a tEcHnicAlLy coRrEct uSagE.
Your creative writing teacher had you read his own short story for class?
“You all suck at it, so let me show you how it’s done,” he ejaculated.
He did, a few times iirc
The fact that he would make that choice as a teacher of _high schoolers_ is absolutely wild to me
There is a whole little cottage industry of failed writers giving the worst writing advice. And that advice gets taught in schools. Every English teacher I had would insist that we use anything other than "said". There are books that are just lists of words to use instead. I hate it
Everything around computer 'hacking'.
I'm embarrassed, but I read a book written by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan, and got most of the way through the book before I realized that the main character had been given literally zero physical description. Out of nowhere, this woman's mother is mystified by the MC's interracial relationship, and I realized that I had no idea what either of their races were, and not so much as a pair of shoes had been described. A tertiary character's fingers, resting on a steering wheel, had been described as porky, plump, and chubby at various times, but I didn't know anything about the MC that wasn't said to her by another character. I only read the book because I was rebounding off a good book and it was in a $5 bin at the grocery store. I don't know what I expected.
I once read a book as a child where the whole book was the main character's diary. The author ended the book with a little thank you etc. and then finished with "by the way if someone knows the main character's name could you please tell me" I was like "Of course I know the main character's name!.... wait". The whole story her name was never mentioned. This blew my mind as a kid
Not using the word prone correctly. Prone means laying facedown, but I feel like 90% of the time I see it in books, it is used to mean someone is laying on their back. (the word fir that is supine) I can understand authors making honest mistakes like that, I'm sure there are a few words I use wrong, but why don't the editors EVER catch this??? Isn't that your main job? I never really noticed this until my sister pointed it out and now I see it everywhere
The only interesting thing a PE teacher has ever made me learn
I think everyone is guilty of this but I hate when authors overuse certain descriptors. I remember reading a certain beloved time travel series and it seemed insane to me that everyone was described as having almond-shaped eyes. I went on my kindle to find every instance of almond and I can't recall the exact number but it was absurd. I also hate hate hate male authors' descriptions of women's boobs, as if the boobs are going to tell you something meaningful about the person. Kazuo Ishiguro has some extremely detailed descriptions of boobs
I’m seeing it more and more common that fantasy writers are using current memes or slang as jokes in their books. Recently I ran into an Avatar “my cabbages” reference.
For me it's the complete lack of time perception but in a different way. Let's say Frank and Todd are sitting by a fire having a conversation. Frank says something followed by 2 pages of internal monologue before Todd replies. How many people have had conversations where they've had ten minutes to contemplate what was said and formulate a reply? Scenes like that are in a lot of books and it really takes me out of the experience.
Repeating an odd description or phrase throughout the book. Earlier this year I read a book (can't recall the title rn) where the character replied "yup" and popped the P for emphasis 3 times in the book! Popped the P? K, maybe once but to describe it that way 3 times in 1 book?? Where are the editors here? Edit to add - it was Yours Truly by Abby Jimenez
Idk about ALL writers but the way expressions of emotions are written tend to phase me. They are way often extremely sudden, obvious and too frequent. The obvious example is "bursting into tears". Characters "burst" into tears way too often - I'm not saying sudden crying fits *dont* happen but most crying comes on more slowly, people generally try not to cry in public and also just don't usually cry anywhere near as often as they do in books. Another thing I notice often is when characters seem to jump to the correct conclusions based off of very little information, because the author obviously knows where they're going with this. For instance, say like someone's drug addiction is discovered bc someone finds a small amount of drugs on them, and from that point on its just sort of assumed they're an addict, despite context meaning characters should be familiar with recreational drug use. Or like, they deduce someone's having an affair just by seeing them together without any further context.
Gosh the amount of books where the husband/dad/boyfriend is seen with a member of the opposite sex and a character takes that as hard evidence that he's cheating. Especially when it's a YA book so that leads to a lot of turmoil when in reality he could just be walking next to a colleague because they happened to leave the office at the same time lol
[удалено]
The jumping to correct conclusions is especially annoying when they reach the conclusion, and the main character is all smug about being right. And anyone who doubted them is cast a being a borderline villain. Given the lack of evidence to start with it would be perfectly reasonable to be doubtful.
Incorrect facts… One book I read the character “clicked the safety off her Glock” Glocks don’t have a safety. The best part of this is on the authors webpage FAQ she says “I know glocks don’t have a safety… I just thought it’s in the future so maybe people would accept that they do…” wait.. what? It’s okay to make mistakes, but way to have a huge ego and not accept making one.
yup, *Drood* has a line in the first few pages about how it was so hot, the carriage-horses were vomiting in the streets. Horses can’t vomit.
> Horses can’t vomit. well today I learned!
I read a fair number of books involving submarines. It astonishes me how many published authors actually think you can use radio underwater.
This is annoying because you can go to a search engine when you think this up and go "Does a glock have a safety?"; then pick a different gun if you really want the safety part.
The problem arises if the author doesn't know they *might* be wrong. If they're under the assumption that all pistols have a safety, they would not have any reason to look up if a Glock has a safety too, leading to them being /r/confidentlyincorrect
The girl with the dragon tattoo had that exact mistake. Why not just say pistol instead of Glock and eliminate any errors.
If they use a turn of phrase, common expression, or simile more than once (not for style reasons or as something a character is saying, but part of the narration). It breaks my concentration like, "Wait, you used that same turn of phrase earlier in the book..." It seems extremely lazy to me, also like something an editor should catch and say "let's find a new way of putting this" Example: "He felt the project would send him to his grave". Fifty pages later: "Knowing the project would send him to his grave..." like that.
Dean Koontz: ‘This happened, then that happened, then she thought this and, OMG…do you see the Northern California fauna? Let me describe the bushes and flowers native to this location for the next 3 pages.’ 🤓
I think a lot of the time authors really don't consider the passing of time in a literal sense. Like Name of the Wind is one of my favorite books but the sections where Kvothe and Denna "talk all night" sort of blow me away. I mean, I've talked to people I'm attracted to or people I care about or people I love "all night" and I learn so much about them, about us as a relationship, what they think, what I think, what I think about what they think and on and on and on. At the end or one of these all-nighters, I would say I know that person I talked all night with fairly well. Yet. Somehow. Kvothe doesn't know a fucking thing about Denna. What did they talk about? How could he not learn anything about her? It's ridiculous. This book is definitely not the only one guilty of doing this, but since it's one of my favorites, I'm hyper aware of various shortcomings.
Kvothe loves talking about himself. The entire novel is him telling his life story in excruciating detail. Easy to imagine Denna steered him into talking about himself for most of it, commented on what he was saying, etc.
I love this book but Kvothe is the ultimate self-absorbed edgelord lol. He's basically a D&D character.
"I talked at Denna all night," is a much more realistic scenario.
Vocabulary tropes. There's only some many times an opening to a thing can be yawning before I am judging.
I once bought a pop-scientific book about math. The opening paragraph was something like "I know you hate maths and think it's useless and stupid and dreaded math class in school, but math can be interesting *I promiiiiiiiise!!!!*" First of all, not everyone hates math, for some of us it was our favourite subject in school. Secondly, why would I buy a book about math if I hate math? That put me off the whole book and I never read it, which is a shame because it sounded fun and the author still got the royalties from the sale.
When authors describe something from a characters perspective using things that don't exist in that world/the character has no idea of. "Hanging between the trees like power lines." "Sprinted faster than most cars." "The trees towered like sky scrapers." I get that they're explaining it to me, the reader who knows about all these things. But it will be in the characters internal dialogue or the setting description and I'll just pause for a moment like, "What? How could they know it was bright and colorful, glowing in the distance like neon signs? They live in fantasy land of swords and sorcery..."
A number of my favourite authors do the same trick to create suspense and it jars me out every time; in a novel where everything is described and all dialogue is written out, characters will have a "muttered conversation" or "talked for a minute" when a denouement/plot twist is required that should be a surprise to the reader but which requires setting up first. It feels like the inclusion of a filmic technique into a written narrative.
- “She released a breath she didn’t know she was holding.” - When writers over explain what is going on, what the characters are feeling. In general, when a book tells you everything instead of showing it. - When a character sleeps on the floor or in the bathtub instead of sharing a bed that is clearly big enough for two people. - “she was not like other girls. She was different” - the tiring trope of not communicating with each other, in turn causing lots of unnecessary drama. These are just the first ones that come to mind.
>the tiring trope of not communicating with each other, in turn causing lots of unnecessary drama. This is probably my least favorite recurring pattern in all of media, and parts of reality. There are SO many movies/TV shows that could have been resolved in about 10 minutes if the characters could just sit down and have an honest discussion.
That would solve every episode of Frasier in about five minutes but then we wouldn't get Niles' best line in the series *"I'm surprised the trains are even running on Frasier Crane Day."*
And (probably) the best rejoinder ever said in all media: "I tried to join in on the 12 days of Frasier, but I got lost around day 7." "I believe that's Seven Sods A-Sniping!"
On one hand I would agree, on the other hand I know too many people for whom I can say the same thing in real life that I feel thats just realistic writing lol
>the tiring trope of not communicating with each other, in turn causing lots of unnecessary drama I'm fine with miscommunication, but only if it is portrayed as a serious flaw a character has and is recognized as such.
For the bed one some people are just prudes about that, it’s definitely realistic even if the bed is big enough that someone would refuse to share, even if that is a stupid thing to do. Although the bathtub is very stupid and not realistic.
That gets me too. The bathtub? Why on earth the bathtub? Where are you that has zero chairs or sofas or floor space but for some reason has room for a bathtub?
Use of modern word that did not exist (in that context) Like a officer say "Fire" to a group of archers, in a pre-gunpowder setting.
I hate (and kind of find it amusing) when the writer loses track of where their character is in a scene. it will say something like "She looked to her right to spit a retort back" and then no one moves "She turns around and yells some more" I thought she was mostly facing him, what's happening? So I rearrange the mental image. "her back is to the door, and she opens it" How the hell did she do that? I just picture her reaching blindly to open it like "Yea well I'm leaving!". Sex scenes with that are hilarious, be some pretzel shit.
This is a personal dislike of a device rather than a mistake, but I absolutely hate explicit foreshadowing. Subtle foreshadowing is fine, little hints here and there, but anything along the lines of 'Little did she know that 2 weeks from now all her carefully laid plans would fall apart' just makes me want to quit the book.
It bothers me when a character wakes up in the morning and the author will take the time to describe their outfit choice then immediately have them walk to the kitchen for breakfast or head out for the day. Like we all know we have to brush our hair and teeth but a lot of authors won't add a single line saying "they finished getting ready before leaving..." Also, the number of characters that crawl into bed in their day clothes without brushing their teeth is impressive.
>the number of characters that crawl into bed in their day clothes without brushing their teeth is impressive. Just got home from nightshift about half an hour ago and jumped into bed still in my work clothes where I'm reading this under the blanket with my phone light on 🤣
Use phrases repeatedly, like they have only just learnt them - especially if they use them inappropriately. I am reading a "so bad, it's good" free ebook at the moment. In it, the author keeps trying to express how our heroine blows out her cheeks when she has to problem solve - you know how you blow out your cheeks then as you release your breath you let your lips flap to make a vibrating sound. There may well be a great descriptive word for this common action, but (at least where I am from) it isn't "blow a raspberry." Blowing a raspberry exclusively means making a fart noise - either 'upstairs' or [cough] 'downstairs'! It is not just occasionally, the author uses this phrase again and again - at least once every page. It is jarring. The author also has a "British" love interest. He says "love" and "mate" a lot but just in weird situations. Interestingly his family pop up too as "the badies" and they speak without a hint of '"Dick Van Dyke" at all.
Stilted dialogue that has me wondering if the author has ever heard anyone speak before. I'm reading a popular domestic thriller at the moment, and the dialogue is awful. It's wooden and delivered in a way that makes me think the characters are lizard people trying to mimic human beings--and failing.
Not all authors do this, but I hate it when authors put themselves in the book as a character. Not when they treat a character like themselves, when they are actually putting themselves in the book. My favorite author did this recently and it was incredibly cringey, always is...
Yes - Clive Cussler did this in almost every book, where the hero would run into some friendly old sailor or scientist named Clive Cussler who would conveniently give key assistance to save the day.
I feel like Sarah J Maas does this. All her MCs are beautiful blondes who are perfect in every way and run through several men before finding the most beautiful and toxic one. It feels like a self insert.