Pet Peeves in Fanfiction stories

[ginnyrules27]

Apr 25, 2014 13:06:56 GMT -5 stelladelnordxd said:

Apr 25, 2014 9:44:34 GMT -5 ginnyrules27 said:

RandomPasserby, you know what's really confusing? The fact that here in the US there are colleges and there are universities and some people think that their school is better just because they go to one labeled a university instead of a college.

It's the same here in Canada, though I thought the US had different names for the type of schools but they were the same? Whereas in Canada, College is more 'hands-on' and 'experience' while University is more 'theory' and 'learning'. But I think everyone in both countries think their school is better because it's labelled as a 'University'.    

We do have different names for some of the schools--the school I'm going to now was a college until 2002 when it became a university. I don't really know the difference but there's a private school down the road from mine that's a college but the boys there think they're better because they're a private school. They even have a little rhyme they like to say: "Longwood Girls to bed, Sweet Briar to Wed" (Sweet Briar is the private all girl's college about ten minutes away the other way).

Sorry, I know that's horribly off topic. Honestly, unless you go to a community college, people are always going to be comparing schools.

[Kitty279]

RandomPasserby, so you are saying that I had the misfortune to use one of the few exceptions as a model to understand the whole College/University mess?

ginnyrules27, I think that's normal that people keep comparing their schools, and nearly everyone thinks the own is better. Human nature

[RandomPasserby]

Yeah basically.

[Miss Wings]

The UK have this:
Nursery
Primary school with years 1-6
Secondary school with years 7-11
College
University

The education system is divided into early years (ages 3–4), primary education (ages 4–11), secondary education (ages 11–18) and tertiary education (ages 18+). But it used to be aged 16 when we left Secondary, it's only within the past year or 2 that it changed.

Most of the secondary schools are named as Academy, Secondary School, College and so forth. My own school used to be known as Bishopsgarth Secondary School before it became Bishopsgarth School, Maths & Computing College.

Full-time education is compulsory for all children aged between 5 and 17 (from 2013, and up to 18 from 2015), either at school or otherwise, with a child beginning primary education during the school year he or she turns 5. Students may then continue their secondary studies for a further two years (sixth form), leading most typically to A-level qualifications, although other qualifications and courses exist, including Business and Technology Education Council (BTEC) qualifications, the International Baccalaureate (IB) and the Cambridge Pre-U. The leaving age for compulsory education was raised to 18 by the Education and Skills Act 2008. The change takes effect in 2013 for 16-year-olds and 2015 for 17-year-olds. State-provided schooling and sixth form education is paid for by taxes. England also has a tradition of independent schooling, but parents may choose to educate their children by any suitable means.

[monkeymail]

I go to University in Australia and the campus college is the part that people live in. Here is tends to be used for private schools i.e. ones that aren't run by the government. We generally have:
- preschool/long day care (0-4/5)
- primary school (infants 4/5-7, upper primary 7-11)
- High(secondary) school (12-18, though you can leave at 17 if you have a full time job i.e. a trade)
- University or Tafe (18+) We don't have to pay upfront to go to Uni either (not sure about tafe but i think its the same thing), you just defer what you owe each year and then start paying it off once you start earning a certain amount each year I think it's like once you hit $30-50,000 a year.

[physicssquid]

New Peeve. Authors who switch tenses in the middle of paragraphs.

I find it really annoying when an author starts a paragraph using the past tense, then halfway through it, sometimes in the middle of a sentence, switches to using the present tense, which, to me, isn't as easy to read. It also seems to screw with the author's sense of grammar, which makes the story even less readable, despite the reasonably good plot.

for example:

It took her several hours but Athena eventually made it to the Leaky Cauldron, she noticed it was an old pub that ordinary people seemed unable to realize it existed, then she realised that the wizards had used magic to hide the pub from non-wizards. 'clever, crude but clever none-the-less' Athena muses as she walks into the Leaky Cauldron.

And that's just two, maybe three sentences from one story.

Plus, authors who can't seem to decide whether to write in first person or third person, and switch from one to the other and back again within paragraphs.

I can't think of any examples of that at the moment, but it really does annoy me when a paragraph starts with something like 'Harry walked into the bookshop and turned to his companion, "so where shall we start first?" I asked.'

That really does irritate me.

[Kitty279]

Yeah, I have seen a few of these, and it is confusing and irritating. Never really understood why people do that. I know I only write in past tense, though I have over time used both first and third person, depending on story. But I never had problems to keep that straight.

[stelladelnordxd]

I sometimes mix up the two, though I try really hard not to, aha.

[Kitty279]

It's strange how different it is for different persons - I sometimes switch between past and present tense, but first and third person was never an issue for me.

[RandomPasserby]

I tend to ooops with past/present tense but person has never been an issue for me either.

Mostly because I never write in first person.

[ginnyrules27]

Twilight ruined first person narration for me. I only write in third person though, even before Twilight.

[Kitty279]

I think I have used it a few times, but that was a very long time ago. Too limited. Third person works better.

[RandomPasserby]

I agree, first person can be very limiting. Admittedly I'm more third person limited than I am third person subjective or omniscient but at least with third person limited you're not confined to just what your protagonist(s) can see/hear and limited can jump between protagonists if they're split up.

I admit to finding some alternating first person narratives funny. Having read (or rather, listened to) Breaking Dawn (I had the flu, Twilight make so much more sense with a fever), there's a jump in the middle from Bella to Jacob but there's absolutely no tonal change in the narrative to reflect the change from a (supposedly) intellectual middle class 18 year old white female narrator to a relatively poor, not-particularly-intellectual 16 year old Native American male narrator. Meyer literally changes to Jacob so she can glorify Bella without making Bella seem egotistical.

[Kitty279]

Exactly. You can tell what different people do, which I find easier than to limit everything to the POV of one person. Of course, there are plots that work for the first person approach well, but for most, it doesn't.

*lol* Oh well, if it takes a fever to appreciate Twilight, then there has to be a huge epidemic all over the world In any case, that sounds like rather bad writing. You're supposed to tell your readers when you change POV! It's annoying when you have to guess who's telling the tale right now, IMO.

[unbeastly]

The one genre I think works better in first person is detective novels. I've read them in both and it's just so much easier to sink into the detective shoes and figure out the clues in first person than third.

[8lottie8]

Percy Jackson is pretty good too, and that's in first person. Interestingly though, Heroes of Olympus (the follow-on series) is in third person subjective but it switches between characters (but that may have something to do with the fact that the characters keep on getting split up)

[melodypottersnape]

I swear no matter what you do you can't win. In my summary when I started my story Backup I put a warning of slash in it. Now that I've updated I put the warning in again on my newest chapter because it is about to get slash heavy. I just got a review telling my that I am rude for not putting the warning in the summary when I in fact did. lol I finally got a new laptop to replace my broke one so I don't have to use my cell anymore. Hopefully I can get some things updated.

[fantasy]

Proof that some people don't read things, but you're right, you can't win. If you don't put a warning in the description, they complain. If you do put a warning in the description, they don't read it and still complain.

Were you able to reply to the review, or did you just roll your eyes and ignore it?

[melodypottersnape]

sadly no I could not point it out because they were a guest and they would most likely accuse me of lying and editing the summary.

[fantasy]

I hate it when people review/PM and call you a liar, as though they know you. Whatever happened to being civil to other people? It's a sad world we live in.

[Kitty279]

That just leaves me wondering again if people even read the summary before starting a story. I mean, how do they chose what to read, if not the summary? Because frankly, titles don't tell me much of anything. But still, such a behavior is just rude. It shows a lot about the "reviewer" and their absolute lack of manners.

[8lottie8]

I /always/ read the summary - for me, it's like a first mini chapter that makes most of the stuff in the story make sense

[Kitty279]

Exactly, but that's just it. How can you not read it and then decide what to read? And complaining about something you don't like when the summary warned about it already is just silly.

[teehee100]

I don't like it when authors use artist's fanart for their stories without their permission. Lexie, known as Lexieken on deviantart, has made it very clear that people do not have her permission to use her art for fanfics. Yet, every once in a while I will see people use her art on fanfic dot net. I tell her when ever I see it, but it is annoying when people won't repspect the artist's wishes.

[Kitty279]

Yeah, that's very bad style. Movie pictures are one thing (though probably not entirely legal, either), but using the art of private persons is another matter altogether. Particularly after the author said explicitly not to do it.

[teehee100]

What's worse is that some authors repeatedly use it and only take it down when she insists. It makes me sad to look through fanfic and see people using her fanart despite the fact she has told people she isn't ok with it.

[Kitty279]

Many probably think she wouldn't notice. That case isn't much better than plagiarising stories, if you ask me. Now you have me wonder if the site admins would act against these thieves, or do they not care? We all know they are unpredictable, after all.

[RandomPasserby]

Not exactly a pet peeve but the way some middle-aged male fanfic writers write teenage girls makes me deeply uncomfortable in a way I'm having trouble articulating.

[Kitty279]

Never noticed that, but then, what do I know about teenage girls nowadays ...
For me it's more the need for girlfriends even at age 11 that annoys me.

[physicssquid]

New Peeve.

People who don't look at a dictionary when writing certain words:-

Drag - the past participle is dragged, not drug.
Cast/Thrust - many add -ed on the end, when the past participle does not require it.
Definite - many use defiant, which means something completely different.

There are so many more words that people get mixed up that there wouldn't be enough space here, but the three above, are the most glaring that I keep noticing.