pet peeves

Story Conventions that Drive Me Batty

July 29, 2019 Krista Walsh

This post is a bit more of me being a fuddy-duddy about writing choices, but I’ve been bedridden for four days with nothing else to do but binge watch some old favourite TV shows, and it got me thinking about some of my dramatic pet-peeves in storytelling.

So, you know, to get them out of my own head, I figured I’d throw them down here.

Please note: this is not a personal attack on any story in particular; just choices I’ve noticed that are not suited to my personal tastes.

You might have seen my tweet about this, but why oh why do people blackmail murderers? You know this person just killed someone. It doesn’t matter what their reasons were, they were able to turn off their conscience long enough to exterminate the life of another human being, surmounting some of the basic barriers of human nature. You think they’ll turn to you with your request for $5,000 and go “Yeah, sure, let me get right on that. I absolutely trust that you’ll keep your mouth shut.” No. They’re going to come after you and bury you in their backyard.
Why go upstairs if someone has broken into your house? Stay calm and find the nearest exit. This is the first thing you’re told in a drill, going back to when you’re six years old and the fire alarm in your elementary school is going off. Screaming like an idiot and running upstairs into your bathroom—unless there is a conveniently located fire-escape/porch with ladder attached to it—is silly, and you will likely die.
One of my absolutely biggest pet peeves—and I catch myself doing it in my own first drafts until either I or my crit partner catch it and slap my wrist—is when characters keep secrets for no good reason. It’s too easy to see through this decision as a way to heighten tension in the story/between characters, and it’s incredibly frustrating. COMMUNICATE. Unless your character has been set up as someone who never tells anyone anything (which would be a very difficult character to empathize with), either spill the beans or give a really damned good reason why you’re keeping your mouth shut. A good lesson in relationships as well as storytelling.
When the main character has proved time and time and time again that they know what they’re talking about and they’re really good at [insert skill here], but when the time comes where they make a life-or-death observation, no one believes them. Like the above, this is such an obvious “We are raising the stakes” moment that no real tension comes from it. Again, unless there’s a really good reason, like character wakes up in a parallel universe with all the same people where he usually isn’t good at [insert skill here]. Hmm….. Something to think about there.

I’m sure there are more, but these are the ones that caught my attention over the last many many episodes of many many crime shows.

Even sick, apparently, I keep a critical eye on a good story. I find it helps improve my own writing.

And it means watching television is research…

What are your storytelling pet peeves?

update, writing

Pet Peeve: Nauseous vs. Nauseate

November 19, 2018 Krista Walsh

cold-and-flu-season We’re heading into cold and flu season, which also means the start of hearing another one of my language peeves.

This one isn’t a full peeve. It doesn’t make my eye twitch like “impact” does, but I do notice it. I can’t help it. I can be exactly the kind of language purist whose tea you want to lace with some kind of relaxant so I’ll go to sleep and stop talk about how words should be used.

I would apologize for it… but I won’t.

This particular gripe? Nauseous vs. nauseated.

Anyone who watched or remembers Drew Barrymore in Never Been Kissed will appreciate this one.

Common usage says that these two words are interchangeable. Fine. I accept that, but at the very least I feel people should make a conscious decision about which word they’re using.

Nauseous means something that makes you feel ill. The rotting garbage is nauseous (not to be confused with noxious, which is something that is physically harmful or destructive). If you were to be nauseous, it would mean that your very presence was enough to make those around you feel ill.

That might be the case, who am I to say? But I find it unlikely that if someone were to provide a description of you, “makes me queasy” would be included. If so, my apologies.

Typically, however, the word you should be going for is nauseated. It’s fun to say, sounds fancy, and doesn’t run the risk of accidentally giving people the wrong impression about your personality. Win-win!

writing

Pet Peeve: Impact vs. Affect

October 8, 2018October 8, 2018 Krista Walsh

I openly admit to being one of those people whose eye twitches when words are used incorrectly.

I know that education, and therefore proper usage, is a privilege not everyone has, so it’s not that I judge people for the way they speak, it’s more an automatic reaction, like when you hear a discordant note in a piece of music.

Some of these discordant notes strike me worse than others, so I figured I would take advantage of my platform here to share my particular pet peeves as I think of them over the next little while, and maybe play my part in weeding them out of existence.

Okay, that’s kind of a huge ambition. Language changes. I know this. As certain usages become popular, they become accepted, often replacing the original word or use. We see it all the time, and it’s a facet of the English language I find fascinating.

But I have a hard time letting go.

Take impact vs. affect.

In my dayjob, it has become acceptable to use these two words interchangeably. Every day, documents go past my desk with sentences like “This policy impacts the program.”

It’s a personalized form of torture.

Unless you are specifically talking about something physically colliding with or hitting something else, impact is not a verb, it is a noun.

Your car can impact the telephone pole.

The asteroid can impact the Earth.

In both of these cases, the result is serious injury and expense.

If your policy impacts your project, then that would suggest said policy was taken in hand and slapped against your project, or maybe stuffed into a cannon and fired into your project, or possibly raised to a height of some significance, then dropped onto your project to the distress of all involved.

However, your policy can have an impact on your project, or your policy can affect your project. Neither of these alternatives risks any kind of bodily harm, depending on the nature of your business.

For a quick and easy way to know whether you’re using impact correctly, Grammar Girl suggests an simple test: if you can use an article like “the” or “an” before impact in a sentence, than you’re likely in the clear.