One word is ruining my book

[Lifenov86]

I’m reading the new cj Tudor book “serenity falls”. Really enjoying the story. My problem! No one walks anywhere they “pad”. It’s so jarring once you notice it

Just about to say there’s a lot of it in Jane Eyre!

Also Sherlock Holmes

Or the opposite, someone who is smiling but only with their eyes, the rest of their face remains emotionless but of course their romantic interest can pick it up because they Know Him So Well.

Even Oscar Wilde is an offender. I think it is in The Picture of Dorian Grey that ALL of the young men habitually "fling themselves into a chair". No one ever just sits down. Though if there were any female characters at all (can't remember if Ozzie managed this) I guess they would have to skip the flinging, on the grounds of propriety and corsets.

Can I add: authors not knowing the difference between melting and dissolving.

They're different physical processes and the words can’t be used interchangeably. I know it’s science, but it’s very basic, primary level science. If you’re not sure, please ask. Happy to help!

I can raise an eyebrow, and frequently do.

I normally raise my right eyebrow, but as a teenager I practised a lot (yes, I did have a sad little life), and taught my left eyebrow to raise.

So now, if I want, I can make my eyebrows do a little dance (you put your right brow up, your right brow down, left up, left down and… well, you get the idea). Sadly, that just looks ridiculous, not the cool effect teenage me hoped for.

At the beginning of Fifty Shades of Grey the character “scrambles” out of a lift. I stopped reading there, can only imagine how bad the sex scenes are!

That is really quite common in period books. It does jar though doesn’t it! I must reread that book.

I hate the overuse of 'pad' this way too and if it appears too early in a book I will stop reading it.

But young men do fling themselves into chairs (and women though maybe not so much then and if a woman did ….well). I think it’s a lovely way of describing it. It’s a kind of sitting flounce.

I just finished a book on kindle where everything was “on”.

On a sigh …
On a grin…
On a laugh…

Every single time I reported it as a typo. Rage.

My other bug bear is when I’m listening to a book and the narrator keeps pronouncing restaurant in the French pronunciation. It’s jaring and pretentious.

The use of gender when the writer means sex is irritating. Or British characters using Americanisms, like an English family talking about their heirloom ‘dollhouse’.

But if a writer describes a messy eater, I usually close the book & dump it at the first opportunity. Icky & unnecessary.

Modern usage stole intercourse and ejaculate, probably other useful words as well. Ejaculatory prayer will find it hard to come back into fashion.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ejaculatory_prayer

It's not just newer books. I've been on a Wilkie Collins spree this year and he uses the adjective "trumpery" ALL THE TIME, in every book. It annoys me.

Yes! I distinctly remember our English teacher explaining to a very innocent bunch of 11 and 12 year old girls this meaning of ejaculate c. 1990 and we definitely read Sherlock Holmes at school around then so I suspect that's where it came up.

I've just read (under duress for my book group) Whatever happened to Madeline Stone? and one of the many annoyances was the characters constantly 'taking a beat'.

Totally with you on 'padding'. It's very twee.

I am afraid JK Rowling overuses "the latter" in her Strike books. Once you have noticed it really bugs me. Should be edited out.

I am listening to a silly cosy mystery series on Audible at the minute where the detective is always noticing people's jaw tightening slightly. It irritates.

And I had to abandon the Sebastian Clifford books because the author (Sally Rigby?) writes dialogue so badly and uses the word "as" far too much. I feel for the voice actor, trying to make the characters sound natural talking in a way people just don't talk.

Also "making love" meaning to "flirt". in Jane Austen people are always making love in carriages or at the corner of the room, or on park benches.

So did Dickens.

I hate horrible descriptions of eating too. One book I was editing, the characters gobbled food, stuffed their mouths, tore chunks off bread - it was all really unattractive and over the top. Totally jars you out of the book.

Totally agree about all the "padding" What are they? Caged lions? Would also like to complain about everyone unable to pick anything up quietly. They always "grab their coat" "grab the car keys" "grab a coffee" Rude if you ask me.

Patricia Cornwall and the word 'and' where it's not needed and not called for. She uses it to link clauses, multiple times a page, and once noticed it is horribly distracting.

I had to google what that was…

it was the later Scarpetta books for me. Clearly as she got more popular the editing got lazier and she descended into very American language.

”I gotta” and “I don’t gotta” all over the place. It would jar and I’d have to reread to make sure I’d got the negative correct. That and suddenly they started eating “sausage biscuits” all the time after never being mentioned before. In the days of very early/no internet it was much harder figure out what on earth that was.

considering the main character was well educated and had previously not used such colloquialisms it really spoiled it for me..

They should. But maybe the author overrode them?

One of my favourite books, that I re-read every year repeatedly uses the work "lighted" which immediately pulls me from the story every time.

"She lighted the candle"
"passion lighted within her"

Do they not use the work "lit" in America? It reads very oddly to me.