I started to write this blog about two other subjects then the following came through on my e-mail and I had to share and add to it.
7 Rejected Metaphors & Similes
(from an upcoming novel based on the TV show "24")
...The information that Jack Bauer found imbedded on the stolen
computer chip was like an explosive so explosive it could explode,
creating a massive explosion.
...Nina Myers' blazing eyes danced like Astaire and Rogers, but since they were crossed on account of the intense pain she was
experiencing, it was an ocular tango, and Jack's eyes had to foxtrot
just to maintain eye contact.
...Ramon Salazar had a voice so husky it could have pulled a dogsled, and the gun he was holding gave Nina a bad case of barrel envy.
...Sherry's parting words lingered heavily inside David Palmer's gut like last night's Taco Bell.
...The neon sign reflected off Chloe's gun, like the moonlight
reflects off my brother-in-law's bald head after a night of beer
drinking and cow-tipping.
...The killer was a misplaced comma in the jaunty, happy sentence
that made up the party crowd.
...A single drop of sweat slowly inched down Jack's brow -- a tiny,
glistening Times Square New Year's Eve Ball of desperation.
Sometimes we get so tied up in our words that we can forget to KISS. Keep-It-Simple-Stupid. It's not always the big words or metaphors that hit home with your idea or meaning, but the simple straight to the point words that have more punch.
Julie wanted to put her hands around his beefy neck and make his eyes bulge like the bucking bull at the Stampede last year.
Julie wanted to throttle Mark for his remark.
Just as effective, but more efficient and doesn't pull the reader away from the point.
I'm reading a submission where the writer has given a half-breed woman brought up on a ranch a vocabulary to sophisticated for her upbringing. She doesn't use these words in dialog, but they are in her POV. It is jarring knowing the woman's background and reading her dialog. ( I also don't like having to look words up in the dictionary to see if they are used correctly) It is a case of trying to show a large repertoire of words where plain simple ones would work better.
Have you ever tried so hard to make more out of a sentence that it became this convoluted and hysterical? And did you notice it before a CP? When a writer uses big words does it impress you as a reader?
14 comments:
Fun blog, Paty, though I disagree that the following is all bad, I kinda like it!---"The neon sign reflected off Chloe's gun, like the moonlight
reflects off my brother-in-law's bald head after a night of beer drinking and cow-tipping."
It's the cow-tipping that does that one for me. Gotta love a cow tipping.
I also like that tiny bead of sweat like a Time's Square New Year Eve's ball. Ah, me.
My favorite reminder of this is what a writing friend told me once. We were having a writing retreat together. I was working under a deadline and the book was almost done and I was a little panicky. So I say to her, "Caroline, Caroline, how do I say, 'the waiters passed around trays of hors d'houvres?' and she said, 'How about this--the waiters passed around trays of hors d'houvres?'"
Duh.
For me, it's always a struggle to find a clever way of saying something and fancying it up a little can add to the fun. I have a stable owner who is really mad and I could say, "Bill Stiles was really mad." or I could say, "Bill Stiles was so mad his left eye twitched." or I could say what I ended up on because it evoked his occupation and their location and that's: "Bill Stiles looked mad enough to string up a rope and hang Alazandro from an overhead rafter." though now that I see it here I can see that I should work on it more. But you get my drift.
Paty, I so totally agree with you about the writer who gave the woman raised on a ranch a sophisticated vocabulary. There's nothing that tears you away from a book like dialogue and internal narrative that doesn't fit because it reminds you she's just a puppet, the author is back there pulling the strings.
I don't mind big words as long as I know them (!) or if I don't know them, realize I am reading a book that is a stretch for me. When they pop up in popular genre writing, they look like toadstools. The writer is running loose with her thesaurus! Ick. So, no, it doesn't impress me.
Thanks for a laugh before breakfast!
Alice
Don't throttle me, but I love big words. I like my romantic fiction to be intelligent and so the occasional big word makes my inner lit geek happy. But--the words have to be true to the character/situation. I know that my YA heroine uses a lot of metaphors and big words--but it's also true to who she is.
Beautiful, intelligent writing just flows--you don't stop and go, "oh that's a 50 cent word" or "man, look at that that sentence." I'm reading "Riding with the Queen" right now and it's just superb intelligent fiction.
I have a pet peeve with historical that DON'T use big words/period vocabulary. If the dialog/internals seem too modern, I'm really put off.
I think it all comes down to voice--you can tell when a writer is stretching--abusing that thesaurus. Other writers just have a pretty large vocabulary, but it fits so naturally into what they are writing that it's not jarring.
And metaphors have to be natural and appropriate to the situation. I think of them as verbal salt--too little and the meal is too dry, too much and you might as well call for takeout.
Alice, I think clever is good as long as it doesn't deter from what you want to say.
I like your third sentence just cut it off after "hang Alazandro".
Wavy, I don't mind a large vocabulary if it fits and reads well. But when the character speaks cowboy lingo and thinks like a debutante who was schooled back east - and wasn't- it pulls you out of character.
I also don't mind metaphors, if they are fresh and true to the character.
Interesting blog, Paty. I happen to love metaphors and similes and use them a lot, then sometimes go back and take them out when they just don't work. 8^) The Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers conference features a simile contest every year and some of the entries rival your reject samples. They're lots of fun.
I prefer writing that's not so simple as it is energetic. A few good verbs can make a world of difference to a blah sentence. Like in your example you use "throttle" which is so much more imaginative than a simple "choke." Word choices are huge for me as a reader and as a writer.
Karen
Alice, I like your third line. Totally painted a picture in my mind, although I like snarky characters/thoughts/actions, so maybe I'm on the outs here.
Personally, I'm not wild about a writer showing off their vocabulary skills in a book. If I have to stop to look up a word while I'm reading, it pops me out of the story and makes it easy for me to put the book down. No one wants a writer to do that. I think this tends to happen a lot more in literary fiction - at least from my experience - which might explain why I don't read a whole lot of literary fiction.
The only time it works for me is if it's true to the character. In one of my favorite books, the heroine has a very large vocabulary and it's evident in both her internals and dialogue. She's smart, and has devoted her whole life to education. It worked well with the story because it was something about her the hero - this big, macho, famous guy - was surprised (and frustrated) by.
As for metaphors, I admit to liking them when done in moderation. And I do use them. In fact, I thought some of the ones you listed were great - used in the right context of course. I could totally see my smart-ass former beat cop heroine looking at the hero's gun with a bad case of barrel envy. ;) But again, depends on the tone of your book, the characters and what the author's shooting for.
Karen and Eli, I like metaphors too, when they fit or work and aren't over the top.
I just had to post these because they gave me a good chuckle and I figured it was a good blog subject.
Okay, let me just say that I'd not even heard of "cow tippin" until Pixar's movie "Cars" came out and the characters went "tractor tippin". I had to get an explanation as to why tractor tipping was so funny. After my DH told me tractor tipping was in reference to cow tipping it got a whole lot funnier. Heck, I had no idea you could tip a live cow over. I mean, come on! Them beasties is big!
Alice--I loved this comment you made: "Caroline, Caroline, how do I say, 'the waiters passed around trays of hors d'oeuvres?' and she said, 'How about this--the waiters passed around trays of hors d'oeuvres?'" Too funny! And I totally get where you were coming from with asking that question.
Paty--Those examples you found cracked me up! I loved them. Maybe I like wasted words. Hmm...
Your post is thought provoking and now I'm going to be watching to make sure I don't waste words writing. (Sheeyeah, right.)
I try not to waste words, but it's sooo hard.
Like one time, when my mom and I were at a wee greasy spoon that was hotter than hell inside, my mom complained to the waitress about the heat, and she told us we could write a comment and she'd be sure to give it to the owner of the place because she and the other gal that worked there were dying in the heat too. So we proceeded to write something about the place needing air-conditioning to cut through the (Piper gets her thesaurus out) sultry, sticky, stuffy, torrid and muggy heat in that place. Well, my mom took her paper and wrote a few words, something to the effect of-- 'It's too damn hot in here!' and then she signed her name and slid the paper back to the gal. In the meantime, I stood at the counter still scribbling out my comments about the sweltering temperature of the place, but how delish I found the all-American cuisine, except it was much too hot to actually eat inside the stuffy little place...well, you get my drift. Anyhoo, my mom stood there, totally wrecked from the heat, (she has very low tolerance for heat, she'll never make it in hell; not that I think she's going there or anything, geez!) and after a bit she grabbed my pen, shoved the paper at the chick and said, 'Piper! You don't need to write a damn book!' Crushed, I looked up at her, (cause she's taller than me, that's why) and I said, (my voice all trembly, I'm sure) 'But mom, it's what I do.' Then she rolled her eyes and stomped off to get a diet Pepsi packed with ice. She's lucky I wasn't so hurt that I couldn't eat my greasy hamburger and fries, that's all I can say! Well, maybe not all I can say, after-all who drinks diet Pepsi anymore, I mean, diet Coke is sooo much better.
As far as using big words and metaphors, I don't think I do that, but I'm sure I don't make every word count either.
It seems to me that Alice is always using "BIG" words I've never heard of, and it's great too, cause I just go look em' up and learn all sorts of new stuff!:)
Fun post Paty! Lot's to think about. Thanks!
Paty--I disagree. Diet Pepsi is so way better than diet Coke although Coke beats the pants off Pepsi. Go figure. Lisa is the authority on this. I know, I know, let's do a taste test!!!!
Loved your diner story, Piper! Get back to writing and think about the YA market because your voice is so fresh and full of fun!
Alice
Piper! ROFL!!
Yes, I agree with Alice, you definitely will go places with YA.
I LOVE reading anything you write.
And Alice, I don't drink either Coke or Pepsi - the carbonation isn't good for bones!
I found your article interesting and while I agree some metaphors can be overdone, just for the same reason you wrote the post, they stand out and bring notice, not to mention a smile to the reader.
I guess I'm old enough to enjoy some colorful words to liven up a story. Simple is nice, but it can be tedious. It's finding a balance between that's, not boring, but not silly. I'm still working on that in my own writing.
www.BrendaWilliamson.com
Welcome brenda!
And piper, I may never recover. Spewed coffee all over my new laptop :P :P :P
I liked the tiny bead of sweat too, Alice. Cow tippign seems overdone these days, so I couldn't get into that one.
Good blog, Paty.
I don't enjoy reading a book with big words that I don't know. Unless it "feels" right. Like I intuitively know that word, although big and uncommon, is exactly the right word for that particular spot. Make sense?
If a writer is too full of himself to be true to voice and story, I'm too busy to read them.
Okay, diet Pepsi any day of the week. Without caffeine. And I thought the carbonation was bad for muscles....
And yes, Piper, I agree. Your meandering, fresh-voiced stories are a total riot.
Aww...Thanks Danita. I'm working on a homeless YA because of you now! LOL
And sorry sweetie, but Coke beats the pants off Pepsi in my taste test. :) Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I love hot Mexican food and I've somehow screwed my taste buds up? LOL
Oh, and the carbonation is bad for your bones, but I suppose it's not great for the muscles or any other body part either, so we should really give the crap up regardless if it's Coke or Pepsi. Dang it!
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