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Default   #26   SolarCat SolarCat is offline
Addicted to Trisphee
Quote:
Originally Posted by Salone View Post
22. Seeing the exact same event from different third person perspectives.
This works better in television or movies, not books.

I actually saw a hilarious television episode who used this with great effect...
The first perspective you watched showed a rather hilarious disaster of a party complete with the hosts throwing expensive food on the floor and the guests fleeing the house due to a fire and an insect infestation. The later perspectives each added one piece to the puzzle of WHY that happened (which turned the craziness into logical events), and showed events occurring simultaneously to the others from different rooms, with some artful overlap to tie it all together. As a result, it was several different stories that happened to overlap with dire consequences. THAT worked, and the results were absolutely hilarious.
But the thought of reading the same situations, instead of watching them occur over a half-hour television show...? NO WAY. It wouldn't flow as well. That's too much juggling of information.



As for things that drive me nuts when reading?

24. Changes of tense within the same paragraph (unless it makes sense, like someone doing one thing while remembering another). It doesn't flow well if the events are on the same timeline, and actually makes things sound choppy.

25. Misuse/overuse of pronouns because it gets really confusing to try and keep track of things.
If there are many people of the same gender talking to each other, there has to be some way to differentiate which one is which, if it matters. If it doesn't matter (or you're trying to accentuate confusion in, say, a barfight or something), you don't have to use pronouns at all.
Likewise, the misuse of "they" makes me think there are at least two people involved, and I get lost looking for the non-existent person I missed, rather than paying attention to the story.
Old Posted 10-27-2014, 04:17 PM Reply With Quote