After years of trying to coin my own acronym/mnemonic, I have finally come up with one.
The category is "Words Never To Use In Your Writing" and the mnemonic is SHARIB (or, if you prefer, BARISH).
A word on the genesis of this list. I was talking with my assistant, who's a big fan of YA (young adult) fiction, and we were trying to come up with a list of differentiating points between YA books and adult books. (There's a lot of crossover, of course -- but that's the subject for another post.)
That conversation turned into a discussion of the "signal words" that, to me, are the mark of an immature or unsophisticated writer. These signal words may be perfectly acceptable in the YA market, but when I see them cropping up in the early pages of a manuscript, I know that the writer's likelihood of getting a contract has plummeted.
On another note, I have seen these words used too often in adult bestsellers, and I think their presence in a novel, though not necessarily commented upon in Amazon's reader reviews, leads to the perception that a book is poorly written.
So, without further ado, I offer you SHARIB.
Stunning. As in "She wore a stunning red dress that caused all eyes to turn toward her." The issue is that stunning has almost no specific meaning. It's one of those words used by lazy writers who don't feel like looking for those two or three perfect sentences that will create a vivid sensory picture. Whenever I see this word, I get a picture in my mind of someone getting Tasered. Now, don't get me wrong. I rarely like to see extended descriptive passages. But if you're going to tell me that a mountain range is stunning, I want to know WHY. Being stunned is in the eye of the beholder (as well as the person on the receiving end of that Taser).
Hunch. Ah, how can you be a lazy plotter and storyteller without having your characters rely on hunches to move the story along? Hunches by amateur sleuths are particularly infuriating. Let's see--You have zero experience in terms of dealing with the criminal element and the darker side of life, and yet you have a "hunch" that you'll find your missing person in that abandoned crackhouse? For the love of God, please have your sleuth engage in some strenuous mental gymnastics to put the pieces together. Very few jigsaw puzzles have been put together on the basis of a hunch.
Amazing. In our cynical and technological age, how many things are truly amazing? I think the last time I was amazed was when I learned about the Coriolis effect. This is another one of those lazy, adolescent words that substitute for something accurately descriptive. It's particularly bad when the word is used to describe someone's physical being, as in "He looked amazing emerging from the ocean in his tight swim trunks." The only person I can think of these days who looks amazing is Lady GaGa, and that's certainly the look she's going for. Everyone else probably falls short of amazing.
Really. Some religious types across the ages have had issues with fiction for being a "lie" and therefore immoral. If you are writing for that audience (though I doubt anyone is), you can't ever justify using "really" in a novel, because the whole thing is fiction. If you're NOT writing for that audience, why do you want to have your readers questioning your reliability as a narrator (unless that's your goal)? By saying that something is "really cool," "really great," or "really mind-blowing," aren't you implying that any adjective NOT modified by "really" is suspect? You're the writer--you're the authority within your book. If you say it, it is so. You don't need to emphasize the truth of something with the word "really."
Incredible. See above re: amazing. "Laverne looked incredible riding her snow-white stallion through that field of opium poppies." Well, perhaps, as I think relatively few people in real life ride white stallions through poppy fields. But if I saw a woman doing such a thing the next time I am kicking around the Orient, the sight would not be so arresting that I would question its reality. For those of you who have daughters, it is certainly enough to tell the young lady on Prom Night that she looks "incredible," which prevents you from having to lavish praise on her hair, dress, corsage, shoes, etc. However, your readers do need to know at least some of these details. When I picture a young lady looking incredible on Prom Night, I see her with three heads, breathing fire, and time-warping to the medieval period.
Beautiful. I read a book recently (it shall remain untitled here) in which the author used the word "beautiful" three times in one paragraph composed of three sentences. That 100% use of the word "beautiful" told me nothing. Standards of beauty differ and are fertile ground for fictional exploration, but the word "beautiful" probably shouldn't be used by anyone who's progressed beyond the third grade. (And if I ever get the name of the copy editor who let beautiful stand three times in that paragraph, his/her name will be forever anathema in these hallowed halls.) Note how many times I used "beautiful" in this paragraph--aren't you sick of it?
This post will have every writer running to Edit and Find.
Can dialogue be the exception? I hope so, as my characters use 'amazing' eight times.
And I've got 'stunning' twice, in quotes from tabloids.
As for beautiful...changes may have to be made.
Posted by: Lexi Revellian | July 13, 2010 at 09:01 AM