Hatrack River Writers Workshop: Glaring Mistakes

This is topic Glaring Mistakes in forum Open Discussions About Writing at Hatrack River Writers Workshop.

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Posted by Kolona (Member # 1438) on :

John's glaring mistake about his queen's champion feeling the beating of her heart and the softness of her skin through his armor made me laugh -- not at him but with him

-- since I knew I've make similar glaring mistakes.

Like having my hero and company take a shuttle down to a planet, only to discover, after many ineffective re-readings, that the shuttle on the ship had been flown to a nearby ship earlier.

Anyone else?

Posted by srhowen (Member # 462) on :

I've done them, sometimes with plot. In one story a guy had been staked to the ground, through his hands and feet. He got his hands lose and then got up and walked. Sheesh--dumb.

I've seen them in published books as well. In one by a bestselling author she switched the names of two characters around.

Shawn

Posted by Doc Brown (Member # 1118) on :

I've written several plays. One time I had my buffoon character leave the stage just before a scene began. In a later scene the character returned.

All well and good, except that while writing the scene I thought of a great line for the buffoon, so I wrote it. Then I kept writing without thinking further.

You can imagine the first rehersal. It's the middle of the scene, when suddenly a voice offstage shouts the line at the top of his lungs!

Posted by JOHN (Member # 1343) on :

I found another one, but not as bad as the first. Something to the effect of…”[John]had frequented several taverns in the last several years, but none like the one he and [Samantha] entered shortly after sunset.” I then give little or no description of the tavern, much less state what sets it apart. Man, this editing thing is going to harder than I thought---thank God for the highlighter on MS Word---I can just come back to it later.

JOHN!

[This message has been edited by JOHN (edited January 30, 2003).]

Posted by Chronicles_of_Empire (Member # 1431) on :

Ah - don't think I've written something similar - but I was once in a performance of "Twelfth Night" where halfway through Act 3 someone messed up their cue and somehow Act 3 was repeated. Just one of many issues we had with an overlong run of 7 days. My worse stage experience ever, and I haven't cared much for the play ever since!

Posted by Kolona (Member # 1438) on :

Maybe if you folks had done Act 3 twelve times, you might have gotten away with it.

Posted by Kolona (Member # 1438) on :

Actually, your response worries me, CofE. It might mean your glaring errors are still lurking in your text.

Posted by Chronicles_of_Empire (Member # 1431) on :

I can assure you that I am completely retentive when it comes to linking plot detail together! Perhaps I just don't remember examples where I may have gone wrong. As for performing "Twelfth Night", on the other hand...never again! Gimme Puck anyday!

"How now spirit, whither wander you?" ;>

[This message has been edited by Chronicles_of_Empire (edited January 31, 2003).]

Posted by DragynGide (Member # 1448) on :

In one scene I had my character order a cola, and then several scenes later, she explained to another character that she doesn't like cola.

Luckily it was an easy mistake to fix, and pretty amusing in the long run.

Shasta

Posted by Hildy9595 (Member # 1489) on :

Hmm, let's see. There are so many to choose from

I've caught myself changing details about certain characters' appearances. At the beginning of the book, they have green eyes. In the middle, blue. By the end, poof! Green again!

To catch these kinds of boo-boos, I've taken to using the FIND feature in Word, typing in the words "Jane's green eyes", then "Jane's blue eyes" and reading over each reference for consistency. The devil is in the details, as they say!

Posted by mags (Member # 1570) on :

I changed named. Couldn't think of a name for a characters wife, so I wrote one in fast, and by the time she showed up in the story again, her name had changed, and she stayed with the new one for the rest of the story.

-- luckily I had my computer read over it (read-please) before I sent it to anyone. the name immediately stuck out, since I didn't remember it as being anyones name in the story.

Posted by Kolona (Member # 1438) on :

Oooh...I found another one. I had the comlinks in some characters' space suits go out, then shortly thereafter had one of them overhearing another's excited comments during an emergency. <cringe>

(Anyone besides me think the embarrassed Smiley is rather dorky and doesn't look embarrassed at all? More like a fake innocent look to me. )

quote:
luckily I had my computer read over it (read-please) before I sent it to anyone. the name immediately stuck out, since I didn't remember it as being anyones name in the story.

I didn't catch this earlier, Mags. I'll bite. What function on your computer caught the error? Or are you being facetious?

Posted by Alias (Member # 1645) on :

I've made a few of those, to be sure. The most recent one, and quite a bad one at that, was when I had an antagonist's "foil" (for lack of a better word) change names. "Conrad", "Artemis" and "Gray" all referred to the same person. Yeah that's bad.

BTW what is the technical term for a character who is not the main protagonist, but is a protagonist and and the same time an enemy to the main protagonist from whose POV the story is taking place?

That sounds contradictary I know, but it actually happened in one of my stories.

Posted by mags (Member # 1570) on :

quote:
I didn't catch this earlier, Mags. I'll bite. What function on your computer caught the error? Or are you being facetious?

I was being serious, actually. There is a program on the market called "Read Please" and it takes text and ... well, reads it out loud. There is a freeware version which allows 4 voices, or a paid version, which allows you more choices on voices, in addition to being able to put in your own - you can also add words in.

The problem that I have reading out loud, is that I tend to pay more attention to what I'm reading and not what I'm hearing. - Which is better than when I was in elementary and middle school where if I read something out loud, I couldn't even tell you what I read so would also have to reread to myself.

Of course this would be easier if the computer could read my manuscripts and find all the errors which editors would, and/or errors that don't fit the genre in question.. but I'm sure that will be a few more years.

Posted by Christine (Member # 1646) on :

I love glaring mistakes...they make me laugh!

I came accross a good one in my series of novels recently. It's more subtle than you think, but after gratuitous rearranging of family ties my main love interests ended up being first cousins. Oops!

Posted by mags (Member # 1570) on :

depending on what kind of story you are writing, those things do come up, and on purpose.

There are a few authors out there right now who are doing mysteries which end up being solved by knowing the family tree of the various players.

Posted by Jules (Member # 1658) on :

quote:

BTW what is the technical term for a character who is not the main protagonist, but is a protagonist and and the same time an enemy to the main protagonist from whose POV the story is taking place?

Antagonist? Although I tend to prefer "scheming bastard", but possibly just because that tends to suit my characters particularly well...

Posted by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (Member # 59) on :

"Antagonist" works.

You can have a main antagonist, and minor antagonists, and so on.

In fact, I understand that one of the things about a "love interest" as opposed to a "side-kick" is that the "love interest" can be supportive to the protagonist at times and then at other times be antagonistic, where a "side-kick" is supposed to be supportive all the time (or if not a "yes-man" at least be in support of the protagonist's goals).

By the way, an antagonist does not necessarily have to be a "bad guy." All an antagonist needs to do is oppose the goals of the protagonist in some way.

Posted by Alias (Member # 1645) on :

So it is accurate to define the protagonist as being the POV character, and not necessarily the character with the most moral goals. If my story is from the POV of a psycho serial-killer, who lives only to murder, he is still the protagonist so to speak?

I guess that would be true, wouldn't it
Hard to accept because it is so commonly done that the POV character is a "good guy" in nature, and so this seemed to not work only because it contradicted patterns I was used to seeing in my mind.

That may or may not make sense to you, sorry. I have a tendency to not be able to adequately explain my thinking with the English language.

[This message has been edited by Alias (edited June 25, 2003).]

Posted by cvgurau (Member # 1345) on :

Like OSC said in HTWSFAF, the protagonist doesn't have to be the good guy (just like the antagonist doesn't have to be the bad guy). Instead, the protagonist is the guy the reader is rooting for. If your protag is a psycho serial killer, then you should tell the reader WHY he's a psycho serial killer and make it so that, even knowing he's a killer, we come to...not like him, exactly, but understand him, and hope his goals, maniacally evil though they may be. And who knows? Maybe he doesn't see them as being evil. Maybe he sees HIMSELF as being the good guy, as a kind of soldier of god, or something.

But what do I know?
Chris