All Comments on 'A Note from a Reader'

I think that each of the authors here at lit are learning and fine tuning their craft. I have read stories with mistakes, but later I see that the author is learning and working it all out. Time sometimes is hard to come by when one is writing. I know that I get tied up while at work then trying to get in the right frame of mind to write later on...well it can be difficult.

Your points have been well thought out and presented. I am glad that a 'reader' took the time to write out a story format with a legitimate complaint and not fire off some of the negative feedback or public comments that some writers get. I have seen promising writers never post again after bad feedback and public comments.

Thank you for your thoughts and the presentation. As a writer here, I have taken note and will strive to do even better. I know I have come a long way from when I first submitted my first story here several years ago.

I applaud u for putting your say across without sounding patronising! An author can read their story countless times and still miss the odd mistake, i know lol!! I have now started to use a dictionary and a thesaurus to help me out a little, and have been told by a few friends that my writing is getting better. I still get confused with the basic mistake of 'it's and its' lol!! No doubt u will now run through my work and point out the mistakes lol!! thanx for writing your 'how to..' xxx

As a writer, this is very helpful in what a reader wants in a story. I'll definitely keep all of that stuff in mind while I'm writing.

"take the extra time to insure that they, too,"

shouldn't this be ensure?

To anonymous in UK: You're right, I'm not perfect after all. But then, I never claimed to be. If I was, maybe this site would be called 'Bhoberotica' because people would only want to read my stuff (LOL). Anyway, thanks for reading and giving your input, I never knew there was a word 'ensure'. Now that I do, I shouldn't make that mistake again. If only we can get people to stop 'setting on the bed with there hands on their wastes'...

I agree with you. It is very disturbing to read waste when they mean waist it is like they dont know what they are writing about. It definatly ruins a story for me when the words are misused or the wrong word is put in place of a word u know.

CG

I definitely agree! When readers have to stop and figure out a word, it deters from the mood of the story. Thanks for pointing it out! Usually all a writer need is another set of eyes to go over it.

I share your views on spelling, correct grammar and proper usage of words. I find it truly annoying when this continues on and on through a story. Occasionally, we all make a mistake that we don't catch. That's not as irritating as finding the same things over and over. It completely takes away from the story. By the way, what's another word for thesaurus?

I also share your love for reading, however, I draw the line at instruction manuals and textbooks.

One other thing I'd like to point out is that even though most stories are fantasy, writers should try to make them believable. Describing a woman with a size two shoe or an 18 inch waist is completely absurd.

Thanks for your insights.

I know just how you feel. I, too, notice and am turned off by these simple mistakes. The English language is hard enough with words like 'wind' (the wind was blowing) and wind (Don't forget to wind the clock). We just have to re-read what we have written, as you suggest, a day or two afterwards.

It's ensure, not insure. Just goes to show, we all make mistakes and that spell-checker doesn't know everything. It's hard to catch your own mistakes!

My favorite pet peeve is the missuse of your when they are really trying to say you are or you're. Maybe they are all using speaking software rather than typing or else they just don't know better. Other obvious contraction errors are where for we're, their/there for they're and of course the total failure to use "too" properly. I too am an avid reader averaging over a 1000 books a year for 35 years and I find errors in virtually everything I read. Stops the flow of my reading as my error alert goes on and I look for more. Simple proofreads will eliminate many of these mistakes which otherwise detract from good stories. Writers please take note of all the comments in this area.

He did NOT omit "your - you're!" They're mentioned in, I think, the third paragraph. As to the argument over "ensure - insure,"

well, you get INSURANCE by reading the dictionary and you ENSURE that you have the correct word by GOING TO the dictionary.

So it's a moot point, really.

As for the other joker who can't spell "misuse," well, I give him a hearty bellylaff (sic!).

their always seems two be spelling errors that drive me nuts!!!!!!!

I'm with them... you/you're irks me ;-)

There can't be too many articles like this one. It is one thing to make grammatical errors in the heat of writing a good hot story. To send the thing up without careful editing is heinous.

You said alot of what I've been thinking. Waste instead of waist is one that bugs me because you certainly don't want to waste a nice waist. Another thing is getting a timeline right so dates and ages come out right. For instance,I recently read a story where a young boy talked about his upcoming 15th birthday and his sister's 12th. In the next sentence he talked about their (not "there"...LOL) four year age difference. I said...HUH!! These things might seem small to some (not..."sum") but you're (not..."your") right, if you are going to put it out there for others to read, it should be as error free as possible.

Boy, did that need to be said! I'm glad someone expressed the things that I find really annoying. My other Problem is with authors who don't have an original idea, so the rip off other's works. Good job, Bhob!

I am reading right now about the demise of the English language. It cites things that this author mentioned. Thank you for writing it- it was quite timely! We can't rely on the spellchecker as many of the errors aren't just spelling- they're usage. Using the wrong word, either a homonym or the wrong word entirely. When in doubt: use a dictionary. We all make simple errors or typos (I am the world's worst typist), that's part of life, but there are chronic offenders out there. One example I saw the other day was the use of "foliating" when they (hopefully) meant "fellating"!

Thank you for this long overdue missive to the wonderful, well-meaning writers of Literotica! Please, please, please read, re-read, edit, re-edit and then read your work again BEFORE you submit it! (And look up the difference between "taunt" and "taut".) Thank you very much.

Thank you so much for your timely criticism of the egregious errors found in many of the postings on Literotica. Although it is my favorite erotic site, I am driven to distraction by the lack of literacy of the authors. And I am one of the authors! Although, I do hope that my errors are less distracting than those I commonly encounter.

Thanks,

Gypsyred

My Biggest pet peave is when the writers use "came" or "come" when refering to an orgasm. I would like to see the writers use climaxed instead of "came" and of course "cum" looks better when refering to sexual pleasure. My one great peace of advice for the writers out there is go to a freeware web site and down load a text to speech program. It will help so much when you actualy hear some thing else reading your story. **WebAttack freeware** has a few good TTS softwares and they are FREE

Hope my little add on helps some one

Wouldn't it be nice if this particular submission could be made required reading for all authors? Well done, Bhob!

I guess I'm a bit more understanding when it comes to typos and grammatical errors since I'm Finnish and my English isn't as good as I'd want it to be. I tend to forgive and forget errors (even though they sometimes irritate me) on the basis that nobody's perfect. The story is more important to me in the end.

But YES, please do use your dictionaries. (I do too!)

Authors, please remember the names of your characters. It's frustrating and very distracting when the name of a particular character suddenly changes. I find myself wondering, "Who is this and where did he come from?" It's like a roadblock in your story.

Also, don't give your characters similar names. Like Jan and Jane or Tom and Tim. If I can't remember if Jan is married to Tom and Jane is married to Tim or vice versa, I'll stop reading. No Ron and Don, and no Jean and Jane and Joan and Jen. Forget Lisa and Linda and Lana.

A very timely article. Proofreading is a definite must. Another trick I use is to load the text into a word processor with a different font. For example, if I write in Arial font, I'll proofread in Courier or some other monospaced font. This makes it look different enough that my mind doesn't skip over mistakes due to familiarity. Still... accidents happen. Even after a week of proofreading, not only by me, but also by a volunteer editor, one of my characters changed his name from Joe to Jim half way through the story! Keep up thye good work!

This is excellent. A writer who writes for her or his own pleasure, and never shows the story to anyone else, may do anything at all. But when the author's intent is to have the story read by others, then he or she has an obligation to present a finished work. Readers want to read the story. They don't want the author's silly mistakes (or ignorance) to interfere with their enjoyment. The trouble with trying to copyedit your own work, is that you know what you meant to say, and may read over the mistakes as if they weren't there. One trick is to start at the end and read backwards, one word at a time. Then you are forced to look at what you've actually written. If you've typed "to" when you meant "too," you have a good chance of catching it. If you've used the wrong character name, you should catch that also. Remember, all writers make errors. Good writers catch and correct them before the manuscript goes out.

Great article!! I get especially irritated with writers who use the excuse that English is not their first or even their second language when saying, "Pardon me if I make errors." If the would-be writer is going to write for publication one way to get the sense and structure of the new language is to read commercially published works in that language. There millions of published words of erotica. READ,THEN WRITE!!

Thanks for the comments. I'm like you i.e. some of the ways writers express thier stories, along with the spelling turns me off, and yes, I find another story to read.

Well said, Bhob. It doesn't matter if it's porn or electronic manuals, it has to be well written within its context. Great imagination will only carry a story so far...

I love you. I couldn't have said this better myself. These are alot of things that bug me, too. That and when in a story a guy just HAS to mention how big he is. Which makes it seem like a total and complete lie...

Very well said Bhob, I agree on everything you've said, and I also agree with the "anonymous" comment titled "excuses, excuses". I'm Dutch, and English is only my third language, but I get goose-bumps (and not the good kind) when I stumble on the more obvious errors coming from someone who is actually writing in his/her mother tongue (the "their, they're, there" one is my biggest pet peeve).

I use an online dictionary; it doesn't only function as a dictionary, it also has a translator and a thesaurus feature and I can't even begin to express how my vocabulary has expanded since I started using it. And my stories are only getting better thanks to it.

Truly a great post.

TheMoody1

Literotica author

Feel free to check out my submissions.

That was really helpful. Thanks for taking the time to send it.

When I was writing for a profession, I found that a useful method of catching "errors" was to read my efforts out loud. It is slow, but very effective.

Thank you for your insights, Bhob. I, too, find myself distracted by some of the egregious errors in many amateur erotic stories. A few of my main pet-peeves include the misuse of: you're vs your; whose vs who's; accept vs except; and have vs half.

I appreciate your sense of literary style and desire to uphold the standards of proper formal writing techniques.

To you I say, "Write on!"

With today's society, which emphasizes such uses of shorthand and the like learned from such programs as AOL and those of similar aspects, it isn't surprising to see people's grammar degenerate into something awful. It is a shame to read some stories that have fantastic ideas, but the poor grammar makes it very hard to read. I know I have skipped over many stories on here when I have run across tales that showed signs of poorly executed grammar.

I could have, and very nearly did write this little missive, or one very similar, myself.

A case in point. Our hero emerges from the bathroom with a towel around his waste. Click and I'm gone and the author has lost another customer!

There are some common spelling errors that always jerk me right out of the story, such as the mis-use of "shutters" when the writer means "shudders." Shutters belong on windows, not in the middle of a sentence describing how the heroine shuddered in fear.<br><br>

Someone else already mentioned use of the word "waste" when the author actually means "waist," as in the part of the body between the hips and the rib cage.

<br><br>My other pet peeve is over-descriptiveness. This occurs when the author feels that every sentence should include at least four to five descriptive words. It's overkill and it detracts from the story.

If only people could be forced to read it ;)

Thank you so much, Bob!

I've just started writing for an audience so these tips are more than enough for me! Very helpful, precise and useful!

THANK YOU (a million times and more!)

Oooray...!

It' grate..! I no wot you're meening. I ate all of them thins two...

Very harticulate.

Tanks...

Heehee...:)

Hey Bob,

I loved your piece...but you spelled your name wrong hunnie...:)

Thank goodness I'm not the only person who has stopped reading a story because of bad grammar!

Your (or should I say you're? Teehee) soapbox is welcome on any street corner I happen to frequent.

I just wanted to thank you for your article, I have recently started writing and found your words to be very helpful.

What destroys a really good fantasy/sci-fi novel is how worlds, countries, and main characters have such similar names. JESUS!!!! Sometimes you just dont have time to demolish a novel and have to get back to it in a day or two, by which point you forgot where the story got up to. Sometimes you cannot get a whole goddamn trillogy and have to start at novel two and have no friggin idea. KEEP IT ALL SIMPLE. Anyway I love the submission and perhaps you should write and publish a book that all authors could read. How do you feel about other country's english though? Colour/color. Encyclopaedia/encyclopedia. I'm sure there are other words like these but i cant think of any at this time. Oh, please forgive my grammer,spelling and punctuation. I only started to enjoy reading recently; can't believe what i was missing!!!!!

A very usefull essay, good that you made a point on the old spell

checker as two words can sound alike but have different spellings and meanings and the spell checker would be right but the word may not fit properly in the sentance though.

Anyone considering the idea of writting should read this.

Shoeslayer

I wonder if the adjective version of humble is spelled correctly in the title (?) Improper word usage can be so crippling to the reading experience that noting else matters

I've found it quite useful to write my first draft on paper. I catch so many errors transcribing it onto the computer I sometimes shock myself. It's not foolproof, but it helps.

All your points well-taken, especially not putting off the reader with incorrect spelling, grammar or word usage. You want your reader in the story, not distracted by "it's" or "its". Nothing turns me off faster than what I call illiteracy--respect your characters, respect bodily geography, respect Eros, respect your language, and you're halfway to a good story. Now if you have a touch of genius, that also helps.

Thanks, very helpful indeed.

Bhob: thanks for taking the time and trouble to make your valuable points.

I know that my own writing skills leave a heck of a lot to be desired and, I am grateful to people like yourself who take the time and trouble to help clumsy scribblers (such as myself!) along the road to better writing.

I already practise many of the points you make - such as using a dictionary to check my spelling, and to confirm the meaning of words - but, an area where I struggle, is the seemingly (to me!) 'grey' area, of how to correctly use punctuation marks, such as hyphens, colons, and semi-colons.

Oh yes there are words out there the spell checker will never tell you about like, oar to paddle a canoe with,

ore like a mineral in stone or "OR" like you can do this "OR"

that KillerMuffin has a great 3 part piece on punctuate like a pro.

Damn your scary, lol

I agree. I've found a good editor and we're working well together. Little things make a big difference. With most people writing online, dictionaries and synonym sites abound. It's just laziness to ignore them. Polish your story.

Homophones, those pesky little works that sound alike but are different are truly a problem. Sometimes I find myself looking up words that I thought were simple, only to find out that I had it wrong. Literotica offers a venue to write and improve. That's my goal. I want to get better at this craft. I'm busy reading good fiction as well as some books on grammar and diction. Some can be really funny.

Read the helps on literotica, sign up for free word-a-day emails and look for common works that are used incorrectly. It's worth doing the research.

If you're hoping a publisher will find you and beg you to write for them because you're stories are so good and believe they won't care if your grammar or punctutation sucks because 'they have editors for that stuff', keep dreaming. If you want to be a writer, it's not about you - it's about the reader. Respect them by learning.

Bravo from one avid reader to another who reads EVERYTHING (ceral boxes included)! Thank you for this article - our peeves are the same.

An additional peeve:

* Alot - is NOT a word…EVER…spell-check knows it and you won't find it in the dictionary!

* A lot - TWO words generally meaning a large portion of *something*

* Allot - one word (note the double 'L') meaning to divide, distribute, portion out, or assign

Shit! I was hoping that nobody caught the "insure/ensure" mistake! I thought maybe the OP did it intentionally to see if anyone was paying attention. lol. All in good fun, though, and good article.

Another helpful piece, another favorite story on my list.

My personal 'favorite' is reading "he put his arm around her waste." Really?

The most obvious common mistake that comes to my mind is "could of." Sounds like could've, doesn't mean the same thing. Doesn't mean anything, really.

Ensure rather than insure, surely? :P

This is a useful site for learning about those common innocuous errors:

http://public.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/errors.html#errors

I have also found that the book "The Glamour of Grammar" by Roy Peter Clark was very helpful in understanding the use of punctuation and sentence structure.

I am so glad that I am not the only person with this pet peeve!

I liked reading your pet peeves as a reader. Without readers, authors only have one reader. I think you hit it pretty well.

Some things I've noted:

There are some pretty good online dictionaries and thesaurus. It can be useful to see the etymology of a word. That could also be used to flavor a story.

Give it a rest, another great idea, unless you have a deadline for English class.

Read it backward. Start at the end and read forward. You end up paying more attention to the words.

Another tip the works well for me is to have the computer read it to you via text to speech. I've found sentences that were perfect both spelling and grammar. They sound like hell. When they do, it's time to rewrite the sentence with the same meaning and different words or even same words in a different sequence.

Last but not least, when you have it perfect, have someone else read it. Enlisting an editor from Literotica is very useful. These people are editors because of our love of reading. I never change anything. I make suggestions and the story is the author's.

I have always loved both reading and writing; and this may odd to hear from a stranger, but I think you would make a fantastic proofreader. Look up Chapterhouse Publishing. Their courses may be something you're interested in. I hope to be submitting more stories over the coming months, the one I have submitted so far isn't perfect, but seeing positive feedback from it has really encouraged me to keep going, and posts like these are great to read as an aspiring writer!

I've been reading from this site, off and on, for a long while now. I agree that too many grammatical errors detracts from the enjoyment of the story...and let's be honest, we read this stuff for the sexual aspects, so being distracted while you're being turned on is always shitty ;-)

I'll be submitting my first story soon, please look for it and I hope to benefit from your feedback!

I also have a serious thing about tenses. Some people think that "drunk" is just a state of inebriation when it's also the past participle of drink. I try not to fall into that trap myself so I'm particularly mindful of it.

I'd add another which I've seen in a number of stories here the word site.

Site refers to a location, e.g. A building site, a campsite, the literotica site.

Whereas sight refers to something that you see. e.g. She'd set her sights on him, the sight of her heaving breasts made his breath catch, he was a sight for sore eyes.

You must have been the one to critique my story, pointing out malapropos and misused homophones! Just kidding. Actually, that comment lead me to look more intently at how and what I said. Which led me to search Literotica where I found your article. I found my errant word processor was doing a number on my fast-typing fingers by literally changing my intended words to the misused homophones and the spell checker went right along with it! So, as in your advice in the article, I have taken your word and the anonymous commenters word to more carefully edit my work looking specifically for those pesky words that so irk you and other readers.

Well said sir!

Using the same word to excess: I wrote a novel in which one character winks at another about five times, spread over 80,000 words. It still started to read as if the character had a tic. I changed his wink to something else in a few cases. (Besides, winking is kind of schmarmy.)

Another good reference: Urban dictionary, for the here and now.

And thank you for this article. I'm in a similar boat. If the writing is poor, I'm gone. There's too much to read out there and too little time.

Thank you for the advice!