More Moaning
I'm venting again so feel free to ignore.
Started reading a story today. Won't name the author or even the site, but within a few paragraphs I found these three (and they weren't the only ones).
"Brian took the man to his luxury suite in Sheraton hotel and fucked him senselessly."
Missing "the" before "Sheraton" of course. More critically, the use of the adverb "senselessly" means that it was meaningless, senseless, stupid for him to be fucking. So I suspect they meant "fucked him senseless".
"Brian put his hand out to feel the cool wind passing through his hand."
No. He really didn't. He might have felt the cool wind passing over/ past his hand. Or through his fingers. But unless he'd somehow become incorporeal, he really didn't feel it passing "through his hand".
"Brian held Justin’s hand to stable the wine bottle."
Okay - Justin's hand was shaking, so Brian may have gripped it to stabilize the wine bottle. I can't think of any circumstances under which he would have wanted to "stable" the wine bottle. A strange way to denote putting it back in the wine bucket or wine rack maybe? But in that case holding Justin's hand wouldn't help him achieve that.
It's a multi chapter story and I'm not even half way through chapter one yet, but I won't be reading any more.
So what do I do? Do I give the writer this kind of feedback (a little more gently phrased of course)? Would there be any point? Do I just advise them to get a better beta?
I get that everyone has to learn to write correctly. Goodness knows I still make errors myself. But not these kinds of errors nor to this extent.
I also know that the writer may not have English as their first language. All the more reason for them to get a better beta.
But you know what? I suspect that most of the time these things happen because they want to post quickly so they can start soaking up the feedback, so they don't do a proper read through themselves before ever they send it to a beta. They certainly don't print it out and go through it with a pen in their hand looking for errors and noting what needs to be fixed. And then they send it to a good friend who shares their own level of experience/ education and who just tells them that the story is great or makes "wouldn't it be cool if Justin ..." suggestions (which is not a beta's primary job).
Maybe I'm just being cynical. But in a world that Trumpism is reducing to the lowest possible common denominator, we need to strive even more than usual to uphold standards. Even in the smallest things.
Sorry. Rant over. Going to get a cup of tea now.
.
Started reading a story today. Won't name the author or even the site, but within a few paragraphs I found these three (and they weren't the only ones).
"Brian took the man to his luxury suite in Sheraton hotel and fucked him senselessly."
Missing "the" before "Sheraton" of course. More critically, the use of the adverb "senselessly" means that it was meaningless, senseless, stupid for him to be fucking. So I suspect they meant "fucked him senseless".
"Brian put his hand out to feel the cool wind passing through his hand."
No. He really didn't. He might have felt the cool wind passing over/ past his hand. Or through his fingers. But unless he'd somehow become incorporeal, he really didn't feel it passing "through his hand".
"Brian held Justin’s hand to stable the wine bottle."
Okay - Justin's hand was shaking, so Brian may have gripped it to stabilize the wine bottle. I can't think of any circumstances under which he would have wanted to "stable" the wine bottle. A strange way to denote putting it back in the wine bucket or wine rack maybe? But in that case holding Justin's hand wouldn't help him achieve that.
It's a multi chapter story and I'm not even half way through chapter one yet, but I won't be reading any more.
So what do I do? Do I give the writer this kind of feedback (a little more gently phrased of course)? Would there be any point? Do I just advise them to get a better beta?
I get that everyone has to learn to write correctly. Goodness knows I still make errors myself. But not these kinds of errors nor to this extent.
I also know that the writer may not have English as their first language. All the more reason for them to get a better beta.
But you know what? I suspect that most of the time these things happen because they want to post quickly so they can start soaking up the feedback, so they don't do a proper read through themselves before ever they send it to a beta. They certainly don't print it out and go through it with a pen in their hand looking for errors and noting what needs to be fixed. And then they send it to a good friend who shares their own level of experience/ education and who just tells them that the story is great or makes "wouldn't it be cool if Justin ..." suggestions (which is not a beta's primary job).
Maybe I'm just being cynical. But in a world that Trumpism is reducing to the lowest possible common denominator, we need to strive even more than usual to uphold standards. Even in the smallest things.
Sorry. Rant over. Going to get a cup of tea now.
.