Little things

[Duil2]

I'm not sure. In that classic I mentioned, the author, for sure, was being faithful to a fantasy... on purpose.

Well that's fair enough, if it's deliberate, but as a reader then I think I'd like a head's up because otherwise my editor brain just sees inconsistencies which seem like errors and personally it would ruin my enjoyment.

 

[AG31]

Well that's fair enough, if it's deliberate, but as a reader then I think I'd like a head's up because otherwise my editor brain just sees inconsistencies which seem like errors and personally it would ruin my enjoyment.

True. It can get in the way.

 

[StillStunned]

Just read a short story today where the dominatrix enters the office with a man and two women, and a couple of pages later there are two men and two women, and at the end one man and one woman. The story was short, less then 20 minutes of my slow reading. Somehow this contributed to my sense that the author was scrambling to write down a fantasy, and that it morphed, as fantasies do. There's a classic erotica book that has two openings. I think it's The Story of O, but I don't have a copy available.

Some years ago I read a fantasy trilogy (the "Scavenger Trilogy" by KJ Parker) that had some really weird inconsistencies. A group of spies were sometimes referred to as having five members, sometimes six. A man who was introduced as a character's uncle was his father in the next book. Things like that.

But the whole series was mind-screwy. There were so many plots and twists and lies and deceits going on that I wasn't sure until I was done whether these inconsistencies were part of the plot, or just sloppy editing.

I was quite disappointed to find out it was just sloppy editing. Even worse, "KJ Parker" is a pseudonym of Tom Holt, who really should have known better and/or tried harder.