Seanan McGuire (seanan_mcguire) wrote,
Seanan McGuire
seanan_mcguire
  • Mood: thoughtful
  • Music: Counting Crows, "Round Here."

Do not want...but why not?

Recently, I picked up a book that looked interesting. It hit many of my "sweet spots" for plot, description, and cover blurbs from people I trust. The cover didn't do it any favors, featuring, as it did, a generic Urban Fantasy Hot Girl standing in a Playboy circa-1984 pose, but I've enjoyed books with way worse covers. I entered the text in good faith.

By page two, I was ready to fling the book across the room. Why? Because the author had chosen to scramble the spelling of a common-to-the-genre word in a way that made it look not only pretentious, but difficult to read. This is a personal bug-a-boo of mine, since I really do feel that spelling was standardized for a reason, and while I managed to soldier through, it colored my ability to sink into the text for several chapters.

(As an aside, seriously: not all words become more interesting and mysterious when spelled with a vestigial "y." The worst example I've ever seen was in a YA series full of "mermyds," and the fact that I made it through all three volumes is a testament to the power of raw stubborn.)

One reader of Rosemary and Rue posted a lengthy, positive review, more than half of which was taken up by complaints about the pronunciation guide. Specifically, I didn't write down the correct pronunciation of "Kitsune." It's a fair cop—if you pronounce the word as written in the pronunciation guide, you'll be saying it wrong—and it's been corrected for A Local Habitation, but it was, for this person, as bad as if I'd spelled Toby's name "Aughtcober" and then claimed it was pronounced just like the month. Bug-a-boos for all!

Kate recently delivered a long and eloquent diatribe on "back cover buzz-word bingo," which I really wish I'd had a video camera running for, because it was awesome. The summation is that she watches the back covers of books for certain "buzz-words," and, if the book works up to a magical bingo score, she doesn't read it. I do something similar with bad horror movies, since there are specific buzz-words that mean "soft core porn" and "gratuitous torture," and those really aren't what I'm watching the movie to see.

So what are your bug-a-boos? Terribly twisted spelling? Pronunciations that you don't agree with? Buzz-words oozing off the back cover and getting all over your shoes? How about heroines with ruby hair and emerald eyes who aren't appearing in an Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld fanfic epic? Inquiring blondes want to know!
Tags: contemplation, cranky blonde is cranky, don't be dumb, kate, oh the humanity, reading things
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  • 181 comments

angel_vixen

November 3 2009, 19:39:35 UTC 7 years ago Edited:  November 3 2009, 19:44:18 UTC

Most of mine have been covered - spelling, punctuation, plot coherency/consistency, doing your research (hey, NCIS, I'm looking at you and your non-map-reading skills!) -- but I also have an issue with heroines riding only the extremes of the "when it comes to men" spectrum. Either they're so wrapped up in not needing a man that they seemingly have no other personality, or they're so incapable of living their own lives that they need a "protector." It's one thing if a heroine who was tough and capable becomes so weak that she hides behind everyone else; that's something I might be persuaded into believing, if there's a viable reason for it (magic? battle scars?). There are women out there in Reality who can fall into either category, and I'm fully aware of that. Heck, as minor characters or heroines who come into their own, they can be readable. But there are a lot more women who hover around the middle ground, who can fight for themselves but won't say "no" to help (unless there's a reason for it, and hey, that drives plot!) and books with heroines like that are my preference.

I also take issue when the author flips between British and American spellings. Please pick one, for heaven's sake; you don't get to pick and choose so that they fight for honour in their armor.

Some authors also treat their readers as if they don't possess a bare minimum of intelligence; cut out the condescending description of what we already know to be a horse, and get on with the plot, please.

Oh, and overuse of an adjective, adverb, or slang-term. Not everyone can be dainty, not everyone should scoff menacingly, and for heaven's sake, if you're set on using foreign slang, use it in context and with purpose. Not just for S&Gs.

AngelVixen :-)
(edited for additional clarification)

rysmiel

November 3 2009, 21:05:16 UTC 7 years ago

I also take issue when the author flips between British and American spellings. Please pick one, for heaven's sake; you don't get to pick and choose so that they fight for honour in their armor.

You're not going to like my 22nd century Utopian SF novel where those two strands of English have reunited and the blending is intentionally uneven, then. (On the off-chance I ever get it published and a publisher ever lets me get away with it.)

Though if I read something like that and it was not visibly systematic, I would be inclined to credit it to lousy proofing.

angel_vixen

November 3 2009, 21:10:41 UTC 7 years ago

where those two strands of English have reunited and the blending is intentionally uneven, then

It's more an annoyance with people who do it because it "sounds better spelled that way" or "it's more sophisticated." However, your story, it makes me blink, but in interest. May one ask what brought about their reunion?

AngelVixen :-)

rysmiel

November 3 2009, 21:21:14 UTC 7 years ago

In brief; massive reduction in human population, followed by success in organising in the face of said catastrophe in a participate-or-die context, followed by several generations of essentially neutral selection (um, in the molecular evolution sense of neutral selection, is that adequately clear here ?) where the population was small enough any given element of one or the other usage that happened to become fashionable or just randomly popular could become established as the default relatively easily.

palmer_kun

November 4 2009, 10:50:05 UTC 7 years ago

Umm, that's called "Canadian English"

Up here, we use American for half the stuff, and British for the other half.

American stuff is like Analyze vs the brit Analyse
British stuff is giving proper honour to the U that colours our words.

Some of it is covered here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_English

Solution: Publish in Canada.

rysmiel

November 4 2009, 15:15:34 UTC 7 years ago

I am Irish by birth and upbringing and a Montrealer by choice, so I am familiar with more than one strand of English that's neither entirely USAn nore entirely British.