Lack of quotation marks when someone is speaking. I recently read a book that had no quotation marks. It was so distracting! I could barely follow what was being said or when something was dialogue.
What bugs me is when an author doesn't keep good track of who is speaking. Typically I find most characters have a distinguishing voice and I know who is who. However, every once in awhile during a long dialogue I'll loose track of who is speaking and have to start over to make sure I keep who is saying what straight.
Misspellings can be a distraction sometimes, or instances where someone probably did use spellcheck, but ended up with the incorrect word (homonym?). Sometimes those are really glaring.
The one book that absolutely drove me crazy was Jean M. Auel's last book : Shelters of Stone. I loved her first few books in the Earths Children series but the last 2 were not so good - especially the last one where the dialogue was so horribly repetitive - it was so unreadable i finally had to skip over it just to get to the end (and i rarely give up). One of the amazon.com reviews says : It was a prehistoric rehash ! As for the writing, Auel has become increasingly fond of mind-numbing repetition. EVERYONE who meets Ayla has to remark upon her accent. EVERYONE thinks she doesn't look like all the other blondes in Southern France. And i swear, if she comes out with a 6th book and continues to use the word Zelandonii in every sentence again that will be the end for me.
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My #1 Pet Peeve in Print is this phrase: "He/She chewed then swallowed."
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Misspelled words bother me, or obvious lack of research.
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Lotsd of misspelling distracts me. An occasional one I can understand but when a book has more than two I find it very upsetting.
Sometimes I wonder about the cover art of a book or even the title can be distracting sometimes
My Reading Journal
Misspellings can be a distraction sometimes, or instances where someone probably did use spellcheck, but ended up with the incorrect word (homonym?). Sometimes those are really glaring.
Liz
Liz
One of the amazon.com reviews says : It was a prehistoric rehash ! As for the writing, Auel has become increasingly fond of mind-numbing repetition. EVERYONE who meets Ayla has to remark upon her accent. EVERYONE thinks she doesn't look like all the other blondes in Southern France.
And i swear, if she comes out with a 6th book and continues to use the word Zelandonii in every sentence again that will be the end for me.
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