Dear Authors

[ladysprite]

Please take at least a little time and energy to research the details of what you're writing about, lest you wind up looking like an idiot in the eyes of your readers. Especially if you're creating an intricately detailed world, and then wind up including completely irrelevant details that are unnecessary for plot, draw attention to themselves by being forced in out of the blue, and irk your readers to the point that they wind up getting drawn again and again into ever-worsening frustration and distraction over, say, the fact that the average sheep does NOT, in fact, weigh a quarter-ton.

I'm looking at you, Jim Butcher.

In other news, I have been informed that a "blue-faced leicester" sounds less like a kind of sheep and more like Cockney slang for a criminal act. I shudder to think of what said act might be, though.....

Comments

[visp.livejournal.com]

Blue-faced leicester... hm... something that involves faking your own death?

[catalana.livejournal.com]

Oh, I hate it when things like that happen. I read a mystery series that drives me up the wall because they keep referencing a character as an assistant professor who is still finishing her dissertation...which for the university she's purportedly at WOULDN'T HAPPEN. There's no way they would hire her for a tenure-track job without a Ph.D.; at best she'd be a (non-tenure-track) instructor. Sigh.

Or the exercise video I've been watching that has you move your hands "like you're kneading bread" and I'm going "Uh, if you need bread like that, you're an idiot." I get the sense they don't bake much.

Neither of which matters much in the grand scheme of things, but they still annoy me. :)

[citabria]

Okay, I've got to ask: how in the world does the video want you to be moving your hands?

[catalana.livejournal.com]

It wants me to be moving my hands in these strange little circles. I guess if they'd said that I was stirring or mixing something it wouldn't bother me as much (although I'd probably still grumble), but it's definitely not how you traditionally knead dough.

[citabria]

Hmm, definitely can't explain that, then. I know that there's a different way of kneading bread if you're working with large batches so thought it might be that method (pulling to almost behind you, slapping down, then throwing the ball of dough over) -- but no.

[citabria]

That's the same problem I had with a book I read recently, when the author (Lee Child) not only forgot what he'd written in his last book, but despite living in NYC was convinced that the officers working below ground were the "transport police."

::facepalm:: Ironically, the one bit of very detailed geography he used? That he got right. And yes, these anomalies bothered me through the whole darned book.

[bess.livejournal.com]

mmmm.... blue-faced leicester.... I know I have some bfl around here somewhere..... (rummages through fiber...)

[wcg.livejournal.com]

Quarter ton sheep? Shades of Norstrilia!

[deguspice.livejournal.com]

Putting in too many details, especially those that don't advance the plot, can be annoying or distracting. If someone picks up a pen, I don't need to know that it's a black ballpoint pen with blue ink. And if you're writing a book that is science fiction, you really don't want to describe the tech anymore than necessary, especially computers, data storage, display device, communicating devices, ... wait 10 or 20 years and some of that futuristic tech will be out of date.

On the other hand, a sheep probably will still weight the same amount now that it weighs in the future (unless you're talking about the giant, sick sheep in Norstrilia by Cordwainer Smith (excellent book).

For another book involving sheep, there's "The Android's Dream" by John Scalzi, which involves the search for a breed of blue sheep called Android's Dream (this book takes place in the future, so genetically engineered electric blue sheep could be possible). These sheep don't weigh a quarter-ton.

[keshwyn]

Amen.

Can we add S. M. Sterling to the list? He's spent at least three books (and probably more, but I've given up in disgust) trying to convince me that the reason archers wear bracers on their forearms is because the string hits them there every time they shoot. Every. Time.

And yet he did the research on who makes really good traditional bows, and talks about bowmaking with the correct details! ARGH. Maddening.

[danceboy.livejournal.com]

I don't know about the rest of the books, but that's why I wore a bracer when I shot competitively. It doesn't happen to everyone with every bow, but a significant portion of archers, using the bows they use, have it. I'd be willing to guess a fair majority, but I have no numbers, only chatting with other archers. It may be that my archery subculture (which tended to use recurves around 30-40#) had it worse than most, I dunno.

It wasn't a whonking smack from the string; harder than being tapped, but not as hard as being slapped even with a single finger. But if you're doing things right, it's in the same EXACT place every time. After a hundred arrows or so it hurts just enough to positively reinforce variance in my shooting, and eliminating variance is precisely why I was practicing.

Also, the bracer doesn't have to be armor or anything, one guy I know used a tennis sweatband.

[keshwyn]

It doesn't happen to everyone with every bow, but a significant portion of archers, using the bows they use, have it.

Interesting. I shoot a 33# recurve with no compensation and no sight, and I don't hit myself with my string. I wear a bracer in cold weather to keep from fouling my shots on my long sleeve shirts, but my teacher and most other archers I've shot with tell me that if you're whacking yourself with the string, you've got your elbow hyperextended and your form's off.

I wonder if it has something to do with the grip of any given bow.

But if you're doing things right, it's in the same EXACT place every time.

Because if you're doing things right, your form is exactly the same every time - right. I just protest that one shouldn't be whacking oneself in the arm in the first place.

Especially after I ran the bowstring down my arm when I did hyperextend my elbow at one point. Boy HOWDY did that hurt.

[danceboy.livejournal.com]

I'd agree that one shouldn't be whacking oneself in the arm. Hyperextension bad. It hurts, messes up your arm support, and shoves the string out of line.

It's a tap about 3 inches from the wrist, where the arm has to pass through the plane of the bow in order to support it. It's after the arrow has already left the bow, and the string is going past vertical. It's just a tap to get your attention.

Hmm, there were a bunch of Venturas, Widows, and Bushmasters floating around my crowd. Based on your hat it looks like you're doing something Mongolian, what were you shooting?

I'm guessing that it has to do with how the handle of the bow is shaped (so where it puts your arm), and what the fistmele is.

[keshwyn]

Interesting. Good to know that about Black Widows - it's not something I've experienced with most of my bows. I'm shooting a Bear Tamerlane because I can't yet afford a replica Mongolian horsebow. (It's going to be my present to myself when I reach Grand Master Bowman, but I'm not there yet, and I'm still saving for it.) My fistmele is about three inches up my forearm from my wrist, but it doesn't tap there when I shoot - possibly to do with the grip of the bow, which has suited me the best of any bow I've ever shot. If my Tamerlane ever dies, I'm going to be very, very sad.

I'd been considering getting a Black Widow. Now I will have to make sure to try one out before I buy, just to make sure the grip suits me. Thanks for the heads up!

[visp.livejournal.com]

Oh God, S.M. Sterling needed to do so much more research on the Northwest. For one thing, he says that all of Washington state turned into the wildlands first, when there's multiple military bases up there, and a goddamn mobilization center, with about 25,000 soldiers who would have nothing better to do than restore order. I mean, yeah, they're fun books, but I just have to pretend it's elsewhere.

[spiritdancer]

Sadly, yet another series where I've mostly given up. I'm willing to suspend belief to a point, but that got pushed a bit too hard in the later books.

Interestingly, it seems like the idea of the apocalypse in Dies the Fire has been lifted wholesale for a new series coming on NBC this fall (heavy advertising during the Olympic coverage), including the planes falling from the sky when all electricity goes away, and the hero gets to bring salvation later. I hope Sterling got a big payment, or is willing to take someone to court over that (credit for the concept behind the show is given to JJ Abrams and Eric Kripke, in online blurbs).

[spiritdancer]

Another example: fantasy novel where the heroine make a deal with the fae king, involving her having twins, the one child going to the fae in exchange for "the luck" for her family for the next generation (a deal the family has had for many generations). All thru the book, you are told that the deal has to be kept. When the babies show up, the fae king takes both children. Uh, hey, you broke the bargain, king - you lose. Instead the heroine gets to be Janet to Tamlin ::arrrgh::.

Oh, and the age of the heroine and her brother at the time he was taken by the fae seems to be variable, including who was older. Makes me want to make an edit pass & send the darn thing back, as that is nonsense a beta reader should thwap the author with. Too bad, as she used to be a favorite of mine. I suppose it's related to the editors (or lack thereof) at that particular publisher.

At least I borrowed it from the library, and didn't buy my own copy, or I'd be sorely tempted to mail my copy, with pointed snarky comments added, to the author asking for a clean copy or a refund.

[visp.livejournal.com]

But hey, maybe the fae king thought he could get away with cheating.

[spiritdancer]

Then the heroine should argue that point when she goes to collect the kids, rather than agree to go thru the trial. The "king" in this case seems to be an earned title from his clan, and that cheat showed him as not worthy to lead (stated in the epilogue - not the cheat, but what he put the heroine up to).

The book in question, btw, is Home from the Sea by Mercedes Lackey, under the Luna imprint. Luna was one of the first to cross-over romance with fantasy, with more of an emphasis on the romance. Lackey has done very well there, apparently, but the writing seems to have suffered quite a bit (see the note about reading a library copy - things have gone downhill enough that I'll still check it out, but only when I happen across a copy).

[spiritdancer]

I've been doing beta reading for a couple of authors on and off for a few years. What I'm having problems with in the book? Should have been torn apart by anyone actually reading for content before the darn thing hit the printer. I'm guessing there was a tight deadline, proofing for spelling/grammar only, and an editor who didn't really care about anything but getting the book out on the market in a hurry.

[gyzki.livejournal.com]

My favorite was the end of a romance novel where, just before the final clinch in front of the fireplace, the hero pauses only to throw a cord of wood on the fire. ("Hold that thought, dear, I'll be right along.")

Cockney slang is based on rhymes, so "blue-faced Leicester" suggests several unpleasant possibilities such as "child molestor" or "third trimester." Or maybe "tax protestor," with the implication of holding one's breath until one turns blue.

[corwyn-ap.livejournal.com]

What? I can stack an entire cord of wood in two days. Surely, she is willing to wait that much longer. Of course, she will be barbeque by then by the 25 MILLION BTUs a cord of wood puts out.

[for those not familiar with heating with wood, a cord is 128 cubic feet of wood, and I need less than 2 to heat my house ALL winter.]

[pixel.livejournal.com]

To this sort of end I offered to be the technical consultant on anything vehicular or machinery related for the publishing company V works for. It is a selfish act though, I pretty much did it so there was at least one company's books I could read without running into the sort of wrong things that make me twitch most.

[whiffert.livejournal.com]

I done a blue faced leicester an' now I'm takin' it on the lam...