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[DiapDealer]

Here's how "out there" I get sometimes: in a fantasy (other--not Earth--world fantasy), a character used the word "quixotic" in spoken dialogue.

Believe me ... I don't want to be that picky. But these things rise up to trip me right out of my (admittedly a little shallow) immersion.

[issybird]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Here's how "out there" I get sometimes: in a fantasy (other--not Earth--world fantasy), a character used the word "quixotic" in spoken dialogue.

Wow, you're hard core. I think that would have gone right over my head.

[Cinisajoy]

The one that threw me totally out of a book was the guy lost control of his bowels then he cleaned the feces out of his pants.

Ok truth be told, not only did that throw me completely out of the book it also closed my wallet forever to this author.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by issybird

Wow, you're hard core. I think that would have gone right over my head.

I'm fairly certain I was a continuity consultant in another life.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Here's how "out there" I get sometimes: in a fantasy (other--not Earth--world fantasy), a character used the word "quixotic" in spoken dialogue.

Believe me ... I don't want to be that picky. But these things rise up to trip me right out of my (admittedly a little shallow) immersion.

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I'm fairly certain I was a continuity consultant in another life.

Let's be fair. They probably had some other word entirely, and the author was having mercy on us poor souls who don't speak their language by translating stuff for us.
Certainly, translating culturally meaningful words and sayings.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Let's be fair. They probably had some other word entirely, and the author was having mercy on us poor souls who don't speak their language by translating stuff for us.
Certainly, translating culturally meaningful words and sayings.

Nope. Fictional literature is not allowed to have fictional characters speak words whose origins can be traced to the names of fictional characters from other fictional literature. It's quantum stuff. I'm frankly surprised the page the sentence was on wasn't sucked into a black hole immediately after I read it.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Nope. Fictional literature is not allowed to have fictional characters speak words whose origins can be traced to the names of fictional characters from other fictional literature. It's quantum stuff. I'm frankly surprised the page the sentence was on wasn't sucked into a black hole immediately after I read it.

Oh well, if it is Quantum then I see your point. Can't trust that stuff.

(We might have pyramids doing "something perverted to the fabric of time and space".)

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Nope. Fictional literature is not allowed to have fictional characters speak words whose origins can be traced to the names of fictional characters from other fictional literature. It's quantum stuff. I'm frankly surprised the page the sentence was on wasn't sucked into a black hole immediately after I read it.

So you'd object to words like "iridescent", on the grounds that characters in your world couldn't have been aware of Iris, the Greek goddess of rainbows?

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by HarryT

So you'd object to words like "iridescent", on the grounds that characters in your world couldn't have been aware of Iris, the Greek goddess of rainbows?

Of course not. Because Greek mythology isn't fictional.

[Fbone]

Books that contain unpronounceable hyphenated names are usually abandoned. I don't do alien phonetic dictionaries from the planet Trozk'hdo'Exzk.

And OCR errors are mostly tolerated if I can still follow along. One of my recent was f*cky instead of lucky.

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by Fbone

Books that contain unpronounceable hyphenated names are usually abandoned. I don't do alien phonetic dictionaries from the planet Trozk'hdo'Exzk.

And OCR errors are mostly tolerated if I can still follow along. One of my recent was f*cky instead of lucky.

What about from Zoltanian Ork?

[4691mls]

Originally Posted by Cinisajoy

The one that threw me totally out of a book was the guy lost control of his bowels then he cleaned the feces out of his pants.

Ok truth be told, not only did that throw me completely out of the book it also closed my wallet forever to this author.

Yuck! That book should have come with a warning.

I once read an otherwise OK book (not full of errors) where the main character sat on a couch with her legs "tucked up behind her". I pictured some kind of circus acrobat pose.....

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by 4691mls

Yuck! That book should have come with a warning.

I once read an otherwise OK book (not full of errors) where the main character sat on a couch with her legs "tucked up behind her". I pictured some kind of circus acrobat pose.....

I could see that one if she was sitting on her feet.

My problem with that scene besides the gross factor was the fact it was just wrong physically.

[meeera]

Originally Posted by issybird

I always remember a deal-breaker for me. In the first few pages of a book, the author described sheep's bellies as "swelling with incipient pregnancy." I was halted in my tracks. What is an incipient pregnancy and why would a belly swell with it? I couldn't get past it.

I'm actually somewhat ok with that aspect of the sentence, as I reckon incipient can stretch to the earliest swelling of the belly. But there's a nasty dangler at the end:

"From the chimneys of scattered farmhouses and small stone cottages, smoke rose, straight as columns, up into the still air, and flocks of sheep, heavy with wool and incipient pregnancy, gathered around feeding troughs, stuffed with fresh hay."

(OK, OK, perhaps the sheep were stuffed with fresh hay. But I don't think that's what we were supposed to think.)

[murg]

Originally Posted by meeera

(OK, OK, perhaps the sheep were stuffed with fresh hay. But I don't think that's what we were supposed to think.)

They were Scaresheep...