Authors - Biggest Pet Peeves?

[HordHolm]

I'll start. This might not be my biggest, but recently and off the top of my head it's the one that comes to mind. Beware - this is an (informative) rant.

Over the top or incorrect dialogue tags.

I cannot stand when in dialogue every SINGLE dialogue tag is changed to some more specific verb - instead of just "saying" something, characters cry, shriek, argue, confess, joke, urge, bluster, accuse. If a character is confessing something we should KNOW that - we don't need to be told "they are confessing now." Same goes for jokes, urgings, accusations, etc.

In moderation, strong verbs can work well. They are sharp and set the tone of a character's speech. But authors are encouraged away from adverbs so much, and encouraged to find the right word so much, that their verb choice sometimes swamps their prose; it starts to read like a storybook designed to teach children vocabulary.

"Said" is the chef-d'oeuvre of dialogue tags. USE IT. In moderation, adverbs are your friends. USE THEM. Dialogue tags are often redundant due to narrative context and the physical actions characters perform. Don't be scared to DROP THEM.

Similarly, some verbs are NOT dialogue tags at all. Specifically actions that are separate from speech. You cannot smile a sentence. You can say a sentence and smile, but the smile does not form the words. Nor does a grin, or a giggle, or a wave.

Unless a verb specifically relates to the vibrating of vocal chords and thus the formation of speech, the dialogue does not belong to that verb. Put a period in or before the dialogue, not a comma.

"Okay." She smiled.
She smiled. "Okay."
"Okay," she smiled.
She smiled, "Okay."

If a dialogue tag does not immediately precede or follow a sentence, use a period and not a comma.

She leant across the table. "Someone might be listening."
She leant across the table, "Someone might be listening."
"Lower your voice." She leant across the table. "Someone might be listening."
"Lower your voice," She leant across the table, "Someone might be listening."

On top of that, if a line of dialogue has prose in the middle you only use commas when it is one sentence split up by prose. If the first clause of dialogue concludes a sentence, use a period before starting the second.

"Lower your voice," she said. "Someone might be listening."
"Lower your voice," she said, "Someone might be listening."
"Did you ever hear," he said, "about the tragedy of Darth Plagueis the Wise?"
"Did you ever hear," he said. "About the tragedy of Darth Plagueis the Wise?"

Is this excessive and pedantic? Yes, but that's why I made this thread.

This may all be correct in US English, but UK English plays by different rules...

 

[AG31]

Ok sure, it is possible to write an interesting or even gripping erotic tale with no plot, no tension and thoroughly cardboard characters, but the author's skill would have to be monumental and it would have to be written from a spark of pure genius inspiration.

Check out the stories by @ElectricBlue that I list in my "simple erotica" post. That's cheating a little on my part, because his eroticism is tied up with intimacy. But there's no character building that I remember outside of erotic encounters.

Read some of the others. I think they're all really short.

 

[CatGirl69]

So as long as you use them judiciously, you're fine. The trouble is that all these writing courses don't make that distinction. They just put a blanket ban on all adverbs, because one person has learned it from another, who learned it from someone else, who probably got it from Stephen King.

Oddly enough, I first heard about NO ADVERBS reading a musician's memoir (who's probably similar in age to Stephen King), and he learned it from his English teacher who pushed him to be the best writer he could be.

But your explanation makes sense. "Show, don't tell" is something I try to abide by generally when writing.

Great discussion! I've got a lot to consider when I write my next story.

 

[StillStunned]

But your explanation makes sense.

I'm a very wise man. I have the beard to prove it.

 

[AchtungNight]

because any character can be horny. In fact, in erotica we expect that the main characters at least at some point will be horny. Characters who are horny for no reason or no explanation show absolutely nothing to separate them from the massive throng of horny characters out there. This makes them boring cardboard cutouts and little more than plot devices instead of actual living breathing relatable people. When I read these characters it's an immediate 'been there, done that' and my experience goes straight 'bored to death'.

I get that. Sorry if my characters bore you then. I go for the "Keep it Simple & Stupendous" principle too. Overly complicated plots are a bit much for me, I guess.

 

[mildlyaroused]

This may all be correct in US English, but UK English plays by different rules...

I can assure you that in this regard it absolutely doesn’t. Everything I’ve ever written or published has been in UK English. If there is a specific error let me know.

 

[pink_silk_glove]

Check out the stories by @ElectricBlue that I list in my "simple erotica" post. That's cheating a little on my part, because his eroticism is tied up with intimacy. But there's no character building that I remember outside of erotic encounters.

Read some of the others. I think they're all really short.

Ok, I may not be the most well-read on this forum but I have read a substantial amount from Atwood and Rushdie to Melville and Wilde, to Bukowski and a range of talented unknowns, and I have a fairly strong understanding of all the elements that may or may not constitute quality writing. I also understand (and have stated such in this thread and at least one other author has agreed with me) that the bar for quality in erotica is lower than elsewhere, and in many cases considerably lower. That does not mean that I can't keep my personal bar (for both writing and reading) somewhat higher.

I can go further and say that probably half of the submissions in the vast lit-iverse have no bar of quality, and I understand all the reasons why. There's nothing wrong with that - lit is a place for everyone and anyone to post and be read and I fully support that mission - but I won't be forced to read any of them let lone like them. Now I'm not here to argue and tell you that you're wrong in this thread because the OP stated off the top that this is about sharing opinions only and yours is as valid as mine and I respect that, but I'm also not about to be suddenly convinced to lower or otherwise change my own personal standards (which are flexible and hardly etched in stone) for quality of fiction writing just because a writer like yourself believes that I am 'missing out' or wrong in some way and is passionate about convincing me otherwise.

Now there are certain authors on this site that operate on a professional level, and I believe that most of them would agree with me in a ballpark general sense at least that there are certain aspects of writing (erotic or not) that are accepted as pillars of quality in one's work within the craft and/or the industry. These would be, immersive setting and sense of place (including but not limited to world-building), interesting relatable characters with depth and main characters that develop, strong descriptions and imagery (at the appropriate moments), compelling plot with conflict and tension usually driven by character motive, good flow and a style and voicing appropriate to the story. I'm sure that there are a couple of others but these are essentially the accepted technical pillars. Now one does not need to max out each of these aspects and in fact can even leave some out (and in shorter stories often indeed require that some are left out) but the more of these aspects that one omits, the more one paints himself into a corner, as he has restricted his arsenal of options to engage the reader.

This is not to say that ignoring all of these aspects (and very often these stroke fantasies indeed do ignore all of them) to please the 'no-bar' reader is invalid, but it hardly makes it good writing.

 

[ElectricBlue]

This may all be correct in US English, but UK English plays by different rules...

Those examples are grammatically correct or incorrect In UK English, too.

The differences between UK and US rules are insignificant, and mostly come down to ' versus " and one or two others that are so unimportant I can't think of what they are.

 

[Zandrite]

Ok, I gotta admit, I'm probably guilty of some of the peeves in this thread.
(Confession: I love sentence fragments. I do it on purpose as a matter of poetic pacing.)

That said, I think one of my biggest pet peeves is absolutes. Not rules, but rules that won't budge.

It reminds me of "Politics and the English Language" by George Orwell. I know, I know. Not fiction... but still. I think the general point can be carried across into many areas. And certainly it can get one to reflect about how and what they write. And the big, big thing for me is the last rule written:

"Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous."

I think George Orwell knows a bit whereof he speaks and I found that essay a source of influence across all my writing.

Have rules, by all means have them. We need them. I simply feel like almost everything can be bent or broken in some way. And granted, there's a difference between a style choice and a plain bad or lazy habit. For instance I'm not fond of capital letters, much like e.e. cummings, but I recognize their need in prose.

 

[HordHolm]

Those examples are grammatically correct or incorrect In UK English, too.

The differences between UK and US rules are insignificant, and mostly come down to ' versus " and one or two others that are so unimportant I can't think of what they are.

Actually, the major one concerns the use of a comma at the end of a section of speech, followed by a dialogue tag, when there is no further speech following the tag. In UK English, this is correct.

 

[HordHolm]

I can assure you that in this regard it absolutely doesn’t. Everything I’ve ever written or published has been in UK English. If there is a specific error let me know.

As I have replied to ElectricBlue, a comma following a section of speech, before a dialogue tag that then has no following speech is correct. Thus - "Ok," she said. - is correct.

 

[mildlyaroused]

As I have replied to ElectricBlue, a comma following a section of speech, before a dialogue tag that then has no following speech is correct. Thus - "Ok," she said. - is correct.

If you mean this:

"Hi," she said.

This is not a difference in grammar between the US and the UK; this is basic grammatical correctness. I never said that this was incorrect. This is pretty much the most basic and true form of dialogue you can write.

"Hi," she smiled.

This would be incorrect, as I said in my example, because you cannot smile words.

 

[BobbyBrandt]

Ok, I may not be the most well-read on this forum but I have read a substantial amount from Atwood and Rushdie to Melville and Wilde, to Bukowski and a range of talented unknowns, and I have a fairly strong understanding of all the elements that may or may not constitute quality writing. I also understand (and have stated such in this thread and at least one other author has agreed with me) that the bar for quality in erotica is lower than elsewhere, and in many cases considerably lower. That does not mean that I can't keep my personal bar (for both writing and reading) somewhat higher.

I can go further and say that probably half of the submissions in the vast lit-iverse have no bar of quality, and I understand all the reasons why. There's nothing wrong with that - lit is a place for everyone and anyone to post and be read and I fully support that mission - but I won't be forced to read any of them let lone like them. Now I'm not here to argue and tell you that you're wrong in this thread because the OP stated off the top that this is about sharing opinions only and yours is as valid as mine and I respect that, but I'm also not about to be suddenly convinced to lower or otherwise change my own personal standards (which are flexible and hardly etched in stone) for quality of fiction writing just because a writer like yourself believes that I am 'missing out' or wrong in some way and is passionate about convincing me otherwise.

Now there are certain authors on this site that operate on a professional level, and I believe that most of them would agree with me in a ballpark general sense at least that there are certain aspects of writing (erotic or not) that are accepted as pillars of quality in one's work within the craft and/or the industry. These would be, immersive setting and sense of place (including but not limited to world-building), interesting relatable characters with depth and main characters that develop, strong descriptions and imagery (at the appropriate moments), compelling plot with conflict and tension usually driven by character motive, good flow and a style and voicing appropriate to the story. I'm sure that there are a couple of others but these are essentially the accepted technical pillars. Now one does not need to max out each of these aspects and in fact can even leave some out (and in shorter stories often indeed require that some are left out) but the more of these aspects that one omits, the more one paints himself into a corner, as he has restricted his arsenal of options to engage the reader.

This is not to say that ignoring all of these aspects (and very often these stroke fantasies indeed do ignore all of them) to please the 'no-bar' reader is invalid, but it hardly makes it good writing.

I am one that agrees with you.

I won't lower myself or my writing to the level of the average Literotica reader and will continue to strive to raise the bar for everyone. The site name is LITerotca, not POORrotica no matter how convenient it is to believe otherwise.

My pet peeve is judgement without knowledge or understanding, and all the discourse in this thread related to grammar is a perfect case in point.

Dialog is not narrative and should not be judged grammatically in the same way, yet it too frequently is. This is often most obvious with the use of pronouns. "Her and I had the best fucking sex of our lives,' he proudly exclaimed, may not be the grammatically correct way of writing the phrase, but at least the reader knows that they aren't reading about the sexual exploits of Professor Higgins and Eliza Doolittle. The OP speaks to the proper use of dialog tags. This speaks to knowing that what sits between the quotation marks needn't be proper grammar.

Similarly, one must be certain of understanding the narrative voice when assessing the proper use of grammar in the writing. One example that I have personal experience with is a story that I had to fight with two editors over because they could not grasp the concept of the narration being told in third-person by a ten-year-old son to the family counselor who he was trying to help save his parent's marriage. Even though this was clearly detailed through the frame story (prologue), they kept trying to get me to change key elements of the narrative that embodied the maturity of the person telling the story.

 

[TheseLegs]

I'm not sure the bar is 'lower' in erotic, more lateral. It has different goals, and there are a thousand different bars you can aim for, and that's fun. I think it could be argued that if a piece of writing has a purpose, even if that purpose is pure titillation, and it does it well, it might still be considered well written.

sharing opinions only and yours is as valid as mine and I respect that

That's cool, my opinion is that it sometimes doesn't come through in your posts very well.

 

[lovecraft68]

Redundant threads.

 

[pink_silk_glove]

(Confession: I love sentence fragments. I do it on purpose as a matter of poetic pacing.)

Complete sentences are not necessary, although it depends on your style and voicing. I myself am a stickler for complete sentences in all of my omniscient work, although when writing first person I will sometimes break this rule.

Case in point is Bukowski whose style is chock full of fragments. Of course he writes everything semi-autobiographical first person (even his poetry) so not only does this work for his style but actually makes everything that he writes flow with consummate ease from the voice of someone sitting next to you at the bar keeping you enraptured with his incredulous yarns. It works great.

Have rules, by all means have them. We need them. I simply feel like almost everything can be bent or broken in some way. And granted, there's a difference between a style choice and a plain bad or lazy habit. For instance I'm not fond of capital letters, much like e.e. cummings, but I recognize their need in prose.

I actually believe that this actually is the zen of the highest levels of art. There are rules but if everyone follows them then everyone creates the same pieces. We want diversity, so if you bend break or even totally violate a rule or two at the right moment, you set yourself apart and create something truly original. The trick is to find the right spot to do so.

An example of this is the movie Adaptation written by Charlie Kaufman. I won't spoil it but he absolutely desecrates rapes and plunders the accepted rules of screenwriting (or plot writing in general) at the ending and he does so absolutely brilliantly, pure genius. Those who have seen it, you know.

 

[Bramblethorn]

I'll offer why the usage of an adverb like this trips me up a bit--not a lot, but a bit. It's telling, not showing. What does it mean to moan "desperately"? What does a desperate moan sound like? Take out the word "desperately," and the other words fully convey the content and delivery of the dialogue, don't they?

William Goldman's "Adventures in the Screen Trade" has a good bit about this issue. Goldman adapts his own short story "Da Vinci" to a screenplay and asks other film professionals to comment on it. There's a stage direction in it which reads something like "JOHN enters. He has the best haircut you've ever seen, the Mona Lisa of haircuts". One of Goldman's friends, a director, replies something like "How the hell am I supposed to film that? What does that look like?"

Granted, Goldman's issue is partly about the challenges of adaptation to film. He was a good enough writer to make that "telling" work in a short story. But it's not easy even there, and I find that "how would I film that?" (or maybe "how would I act that?") useful for sharpening description.

It may partly be an American v. British thing. My impression is that American fiction style is more influenced by the principles of journalism, which values economy in writing but also a habit of being very careful and accurate about describing things available to the senses. The British sensibility may be more comfortable with luxuriating in the sound and feel of the words themselves without regard to their journalistic accuracy. That's just a tentative hypothesis.

I would actually have guessed this one the other way around, if I had to guess. As a sweeping generalisation with many exceptions, I find American storytelling styles to be more heavy-handed than British, more likely to show me somebody being desperate and then add on a "desperately" just to make sure I got the point.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Check out the stories by @ElectricBlue that I list in my "simple erotica" post. That's cheating a little on my part, because his eroticism is tied up with intimacy. But there's no character building that I remember outside of erotic encounters.

Read some of the others. I think they're all really short.

Keep in mind, though, that people say this about these particular characters:

DeLaFaye11 months ago
Props be damned, I could use a cigarette after that. (And I haven't smoked since college!)

I love these two. They feel so desperately human. I'm very jealous of them. I can't wait to explore more of their sumptuous relationship. Although I will, because your stories have a lovely way of filling the mind for a good long while.

So clearly there's depth behind the surface. These aren't Tab A into Slot B stories, with cardboard cutouts.

 

[Bramblethorn]

I get a lot of manuscripts sent to me--mostly mysteries--for betta-read comment. I find too many, including ones that actually get published, with the formula of the woman protagonist going to confront the villain directly when she has strong evidence of his guilt and then having that inevitable final physical confrontation rather than contacting the police instead and figuring out a more creative and unique closing.

Ah, the good ol' Idiot Ball.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Actually, the major one concerns the use of a comma at the end of a section of speech, followed by a dialogue tag, when there is no further speech following the tag. In UK English, this is correct.

It is in US punctuation too, I believe. Both grammars cater for run-on dialogue the same way. Each of those examples is correct in UK.

I suspect the poster is also illustrating another pet peeve, where writers use incorrect speech tabs. You cannot smile words, for example, so that must be a separate action.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Stephen King said in his book about writing "I believe the road to hell is paved with adverbs." Say what you will about the man's writing, he is damn successful, so his style aligns pretty closely with popular American fiction. It's definitely the 'done thing' to cull them. My poor babies (affectionately holds adverbs to bosom).

Scrivener has an option to highlight adverbs. I dropped in an excerpt from King's "Salem's Lot":



21 adverbs in two paragraphs (counting "all right" and "after all" as one each).

To be fair, from what I recall of "On Writing", it was focussed on adverbs that just add a little detail to description, the "-ly" kind. I don't think he meant to suggest that writers should cut adverbs like "not", "never", or "maybe" which significantly change the meaning of a statement rather than just refining it. Many writers might not even realise those are adverbs.

Even making allowances for that, though, he still has quite a few "refinement" adverbs which could be removed with no great change to the meaning, including two "-ly" ones.

Adverbs should earn their keep, but we don't need to kill all of them.

 

[AG31]

So clearly there's depth behind the surface. These aren't Tab A into Slot B stories, with cardboard cutouts.

EXACTLY my point. There's no cardboard in the simple erotica I'm supporting. That cigarette contributes to arousal, as far as I'm concerned. It has no other ultimate purpose. For your simple erotica (and not all of your stories are in that category, for sure), one needs a vivid "other." But we're not distracted by a full-fledged character.

 

[KeithD]

Ah, the good ol' Idiot Ball.

That describes it well. I really lazy ending.

 

[pink_silk_glove]

EXACTLY my point. There's no cardboard in the simple erotica I'm supporting. That cigarette contributes to arousal, as far as I'm concerned. It has no other ultimate purpose. For your erotica, one needs a vivid "other." But we're not distracted by a full-fledged character.

That's just not true in general.

You mention so very often 'simple erotica' which is really just your own personal euphemism for stroke stories, which is what everyone else calls them so let's just stick with that. There is nothing wrong or invalid about stroke stories, but let's not kid ourselves into thinking that many of them are of much quality at all. Sure, here and there one can find a stroker that aspires to a higher bar of quality writing (few and far between), but the vast majority do not strive for any bar at all other than kink and smut.

To assert that there is 'no cardboard at all in stroke stories' is well ... straight up preposterous. For every stroker that you can find with some semblance of nuance or depth, I could find ten, twenty, with zero depth ... if I have the time to waste.

If you enjoy these strokers, great. Really. That is a big part of lit's purpose, to allow authors and readers connect with plotless no-bar kinky smut fantasy, but it's not the only function of lit. It's like mustard on a hot dog. Most of us know that some fancy dijon or some bavarian beer mustard is a higher quality product than the fake yellow chemical crap from Frenchie's of Heinz, but most of us still prefer that old familiar yellow crap from our childhood anyways. There's nothing wrong with that, but don't pretend that it's just as good quality as the real stuff.

 

[AG31]

That's just not true in general.

You mention so very often 'simple erotica' which is really just your own personal euphemism for stroke stories, which is what everyone else calls them so let's just stick with that. There is nothing wrong or invalid about stroke stories, but let's not kid ourselves into thinking that many of them are of much quality at all.

Nope, I'm not going to stick to "stroke stories." And I'm not AT ALL claiming that all, or even most, or even more than a very few stories that focus on eroticism without focus on plot and character are worthy of admiration. But some are. And they should be called "simple erotica," not "stroke stories."

Edit: (I'm editing here, instead of posting another reply, because our back and forth is verging on a hi-jack.

I would go so far as to say that we should look at every story that does not attend much to plot and character as worthy of being judged on its quality. Please read my How Obvious post. Maybe pick up this conversation there?