From Star Well to Leadville
Friday, November 13th, 2009 10:41 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rolanniAfter my brief, satisfying fling with Mr. Villiers, I picked up another book from the closest TBR pile -- an historical mystery hight Silver Lies, by Ann Parker; a first novel. It was reasonably reviewed by PW, and won a prize -- I'm thinking a Willa, but I may have that wrong. Anyhow, I was having a harder and harder time with it, and finally gave it up. And then, as is my not entirely pleasant habit, sat around trying to figure out what bothered me so much.
The story takes place in Leadville, a silver town high above Denver, circa 1880. The viewpoint character is Inez...Something, who owns a saloon. One of Inez' customers is murdered in the alley behind the saloon of a frigid Saturday night and not discovered until next morning. Clearly, Inez is about to Have Some Trouble.
I had no objection to the story as it was unfolding per se -- OK, I got aggravated with Inez for tampering with evidence, but I could have let that go if there had been Other Forces at Work. I did think that the work of getting all the characters on stage was a thought laborious, but, hey, first novel: stage-setting is hard.
No, what distressed me so much that I couldn't continue wasn't the world-building, or the story-so-far, it was the Actual Writing. Not that the sentences, taken on a sentence-by-sentence basis were badly written, or confusing. For the most part, they were clear and unambiguous; perfectly unexceptional sentences. On, as I say, the sentence level.
So, you're wondering, what was wrong, then, with the writing. I'm getting there.
...the problem with the writing is that it clashed with the scenery. The sentences, unexceptional as they were, were built of the wrong words. Words that tended to put distance between the character and the world they supposedly lived in. Details that they may have noticed, but expressed in terms...too modern for story-time. At one point, Our Viewpoint is walking down the street to church and describes the crowd as being "99% male." She's been living there awhile, she's probably beyond noticing the disparity between men and women particularly. But, even if she was noticing this Fact of Her Life anew, as we sometimes do, I doubt she would have expressed it as written. She might have pushed her way through a bearded and smelly crowd of men on their way to the saloons, the while trying to keep her skirts clean and her hat on her head. The author -- I had the eerie and not-altogether-happy feeling that the author had been afraid to get too close to her world; that she didn't want to get story-stuff all over her hands.
Mr. Panshin on the other hand, bathed in his world. The sentences are not only amusing of themselves, but every one of them serves the story, the tone, the character, the world-building. Perhaps I wouldn't have been so hard on Ms. Parker's effort if I hadn't just come from Villiers' table.
In all, a pity about Silver Lies. I have with me today Uncommon Arangements: Seven Portraits of Married Life in London Literary Circles 1910-1939, which will, I hope, go better.
The story takes place in Leadville, a silver town high above Denver, circa 1880. The viewpoint character is Inez...Something, who owns a saloon. One of Inez' customers is murdered in the alley behind the saloon of a frigid Saturday night and not discovered until next morning. Clearly, Inez is about to Have Some Trouble.
I had no objection to the story as it was unfolding per se -- OK, I got aggravated with Inez for tampering with evidence, but I could have let that go if there had been Other Forces at Work. I did think that the work of getting all the characters on stage was a thought laborious, but, hey, first novel: stage-setting is hard.
No, what distressed me so much that I couldn't continue wasn't the world-building, or the story-so-far, it was the Actual Writing. Not that the sentences, taken on a sentence-by-sentence basis were badly written, or confusing. For the most part, they were clear and unambiguous; perfectly unexceptional sentences. On, as I say, the sentence level.
So, you're wondering, what was wrong, then, with the writing. I'm getting there.
...the problem with the writing is that it clashed with the scenery. The sentences, unexceptional as they were, were built of the wrong words. Words that tended to put distance between the character and the world they supposedly lived in. Details that they may have noticed, but expressed in terms...too modern for story-time. At one point, Our Viewpoint is walking down the street to church and describes the crowd as being "99% male." She's been living there awhile, she's probably beyond noticing the disparity between men and women particularly. But, even if she was noticing this Fact of Her Life anew, as we sometimes do, I doubt she would have expressed it as written. She might have pushed her way through a bearded and smelly crowd of men on their way to the saloons, the while trying to keep her skirts clean and her hat on her head. The author -- I had the eerie and not-altogether-happy feeling that the author had been afraid to get too close to her world; that she didn't want to get story-stuff all over her hands.
Mr. Panshin on the other hand, bathed in his world. The sentences are not only amusing of themselves, but every one of them serves the story, the tone, the character, the world-building. Perhaps I wouldn't have been so hard on Ms. Parker's effort if I hadn't just come from Villiers' table.
In all, a pity about Silver Lies. I have with me today Uncommon Arangements: Seven Portraits of Married Life in London Literary Circles 1910-1939, which will, I hope, go better.
Re: word use pet peeves
Date: 2009-11-18 11:26 am (UTC)My trusty Oxford English Dictionary (online) describes "enthused" as originally American (US colloquialism/humorous) first appearing in print in 1827 as "enthuse". It is recorded in print many times since in American and British publications as "enthused", "enthusing" etc. There is no suggestion that the word is considered archaic. Possibly the term has been taken up in British English but has declined in American English.
I was intrigued to see that the Free Online Dictionary (American Heritage Dictionary) notes that the majority of members of the late 1960s Usage Panel seemed to object to "enthused" when put in a sentence, possibly as it was a back formation from enthusiasm. Even in 1997 the Panel majority disliked it.
However is it necessarily out of place in a C19th historical romance or even possibly a late C18th one? No doubt appearances in medieval-set dialogue should be frowned upon.
I often find myself caught on word variations that may be used by American writers but not by British writers eg coolth instead of cool or waked instead of woke. Local custom?
Cheers
Morag in London