k_alexander wrote:What I've just recently realized is a peeve: Unsuitable language. It falls into the bigger category of "characterization", which said category I think should belong to me by squatter's rights since I've used the word so often.
It's a temptation to "upgrade" on one's vocabulary when writing, as you want to make things sound just a little bit more rounded, but very often that makes the dialogue absolutely dire for me. Point in case - a story I've just put down. I would have finished it, but for dialogue gems similar to the following: "Did you inform her of the erroneous nature of her belief?". Sure, some people do have a better vocab use than others, and I'm not saying they shouldn't utilize it fully (the only thing sexier than a smart word is someone who understands how to use it, in my opinion), but there's a difference. Not even a terribly educated person would phrase a sentence so stiltedly. "Did you tell her she was wrong?" takes less space and thought.
I understand what you're saying, K, but as always,
, there are two sides to every story. Where I come from, we were taught to use smart words. It was pounded into us. If you didn't use smart words, you didn't make good grades...I often didn't make good grades in English... that is until I got to college where English became more about explaining Victor Frankenstein's incestuous desire then grammar. So in fairness to that writer, it was probably how they were taught to write. Still, while I enjoy learning new words, I don't like reading stories with a dictionary by my side. As for giving characters male names, I believe that all names should be unisex. I have several characters with 'male' names, some are feminine and others are butch. I wouldn't change their names for the world because it suits them. Larisa is my idol when it comes to blurring the gender line between names...blurring all name lines for that matter. The only name that might stop me from reading a story is if the character has my own name. I just don't feel at ease. Luckily, my extremely feminine name is not often used.
My own pet peeve has to do with anatomy. There are several sex scenes where we learn that one of our ladies is a virgin. The nonvirgin lady will slide inside a few inches, find something blocking the way to fully claiming her love, say 'I love you', pierce the ['maidenhead', 'virginal veil', or aka the hymen], and giant orgasms occur.
I've read this in countless of stories, lesbian or otherwise. There is no 'veil' inside a woman. The hymen is located at the entrance of the vagina and it more a ring of tissue then a barrier. Can it tear, bleed, and hurt when first entered? Yes but there is nothing inside a woman to pierce...And that is my pet peeve.
. I consider the people who use this forum and open-minded sort of bunch, so this is my pitch for openness towards linguistic variation. I include ‘bad grammar’ in this pitch. Hear me out! When people write in a manner which might be considered grammatically incorrect, it is usually because they are writing the way they speak. We all speak differently; we use different phonetics, we use different idioms, we use different grammar. If someone uses a ‘simplified’ form of grammar and can still communicate effectively, you could argue that that is smarter not dumber than using the standardised form (Warning: Do not try this argument with your teacher). I will concede that if your grammar is so divergent from the standardised form that your writing is incomprehensible, then clearly there is an issue, but, generally speaking, this is not the level of divergence I’m talking about. The rich dialects of England are dying out, in part because they include forms of English which widely considered wrong and therefore, stupid. Where I come from the use of the form ‘I was stood’ is commonly used rather than ‘I was standing’, although this is ‘wrong’ according to standardised English grammar. Sometime I use it when I’m writing and then agonise over whether or not to change it. It is ‘my voice’, but I don’t want people thinking I’m stupid. If this is a forum for people to explore their voices as authors, we shouldn’t get peeved when people use their own voice, even if their ‘accent’ differs from ours, in fact, we should welcome it.
Cheque's in the mail, silver.
The writer was clearing trying to tell me something but I have no idea what. I was just confused.
That said, I personally don’t think the author was pushing the idea that goodness of spirit can only be gained through religion, though that seemed to be true for those two characters. WebWarrior and I did enjoy the story – though I was hoping for a bit for a different ending. 
The ending did work for the characters that had been developed though.