Two questions

West with a small "w" is correct. West with a capital "W" means a specific area, rather than a direction, as in "How was the West won?"

I will admit that your fragment sentence gave me a bit of a giggle. I don't wish to seem cruel, but I had visions of two humungous eyebrows, from under which these tiny eyes were flying around. I think you'll have many people agreeing that the whole sentence needs to be reworded. How is it a fragment? Pass. But I'll bet if you said "that gave him..." instead of "giving him" it'll make Word say it's okay. (I just tried it.) Please remember Word is not the be-all and end-all in grammar.

No cap for "west".

Word will often tell you sentences are fragments; sometimes it's right, sometimes it's not. You can probably make it stop by inserting the word "his". If you do, I'd leave out the word two", as in: "Beneath his bushy eyebrows, his small piercing eyes darted . . . " I don't think you need a comma after "small", but I'm not sure. It's 4:45 in the morning where I am, my brain is only half awake.

ETA: I was typing as Sandi was posting. I didn't mean to duplicate her reply.

I think it may be a fragment because there's no clear subject. It's probably several fragments. Actually, I don't really know.

I do think it's more likely that his gaze, and not his eyes, would be piercing and darting about. Most eyes that I've encountered are squidgy and attached, not sharp and independently mobile. I'm reading the line out of context though, so perhaps your character isn't like the people who live round my way. Or maybe you have some other good reason for phrasing it the way you have.

Sorry if I'm rambling/ranting here. I once had a bad experience with an unattached eye and I think it may have traumatised me for life.

It's not a fragment, but MS Word's grammar check has trouble with complex sentences.

I'd fix it, though.

I prefer the first version of the sentence. "Which" is an ugly pit bull of a word that should be avoided. Word has no brains at all.

"Beneath his bushy eyebrows, his small piercing eyes darted about the room as he spoke, which gave him the look of a scavenging buzzard."

Click to expand...

The problem for me with this sentence is the "scavenging buzzard" part is separated from the "darting eyes." It's almost like "spoke" is modified by the "which" phrase. Easy fix:

Beneath his bushy eyebrows, his small piercing eyes darted about the room, giving him the look of a scavenging buzzard.

Robert<><>

Beneath his bushy eyebrows, two small piercing eyes darted about the room as he spoke, giving him the look of a scavenging buzzard.

Click to expand...

Word's grammar checker is dysfunctional; turn it off or ignore it. Grammatically, that's a perfectly good sentence, not a fragment. It does read quite awkwardly, though. I think you're trying to cram too much into one sentence. I can't find any order for it that flows smoothly. Every variation I've tried has something in an awkward place.

I'm afraid, however, that my issues with this sentence go far beyond grammar.

"Eyes darted about the room" makes me visualize a pair of eyeballs jumping out of his head and bouncing around the room. Have you considered "eyes glanced", "eyes peered", or "gaze darted"?

"Two small piercing eyes" is quite a pile-up of adjectives. Most people have two eyes; why is it important to tell us this guy does, too? Even so, "two" is the least noticeable. (ETA: I just reread the thread. You've already changed "two" to "his". Doesn't help much, though.)

The "small piercing" combo is what really gets me. Plus, there are two more adjectives elsewhere in the sentence. The overall effect is cloying.

And maybe it's just me, but "bushy eyebrows" aren't very suggestive of a "scavenging buzzard".

euclid said:

But Wow! I mean, this manuscript has about 90,000 words. That's maybe 3,000-4,500 sentences. What if every sentence I've written evokes the same sort of reaction?

Click to expand...

Remember that mine is only one opinion. Take any single opinion with a very large grain of salt. Think it over, see if any part makes sense to you, but don't swallow it whole.