Overuse of annoying phrases

writingismypassion · Apr 25, 2011

Who else is greatly annoyed when an author uses the same phrase over and over again?

For example, in a book I recently read, every time one character looked into the eyes of another, he/she was "looking into his/her soul."

"He looked into her soul."
"She looked into his eyes and into his soul."
"He saw her soul."

Blah, blah. Okay, I got it. They look at each other and see the other's souls. This author used this phrase so repetitively that it made me cringe. Anyone else want to share phrases/expressions that drive you nuts?

blacbird · Apr 25, 2011

Even one use of that particular phrase is five too many.

Reservoir Angel · Apr 25, 2011

Anything about looking into souls is too much, even if it's only used once.

In general, repeated phrases tend to...not get on my nerves, exactly, but after a while whenever I notice them I really notice them and they just stick out as if they were written in bright red and double the font size of everything else.

There is only one phrase repeated in a book series I will never grow tired of reading:

"A word which here means..."

CaroGirl · Apr 25, 2011

References to eyes that have complete and fulfilling lives of their own. Eyes that dance, roll, slide, jump, and have their own bank accounts. That's annoying.

Wicked · Apr 25, 2011

The soulful eye thing wouldn't bother me on it's own, but I'm an ElfQuest fan. When they say, "soul meets soul when eyes meet eyes", they mean it literally.

Any phrase gets annoying if it shows up in scene after scene. Like a house guest who overstays their welcome.

*raises hand in shame* Guilty of writing eye rolling.

Phaeal · Apr 25, 2011

You're allowed to roll eyes no more than once in every 50,000 words of prose. And yes, even if your novel is 99,999 words long, you still only get one eyes-rolling. And at least 25,000 words must separate each rolling incident. Don't make me throw the rulebook at you. It is extremely heavy and has pointy iron-clad corners.

Kitty Pryde · Apr 25, 2011

QUIRKING. A death to all quirking. Quirking eyebrows, lips quirking upward, any part that quirks (tee hee) needs to be eliminated. That's not even what the damn word means! GAH! Make it stop!

frisco · Apr 25, 2011

hmmm. How many times can I narrow my characters eyes. I might have a problem here lol.

MaryMumsy · Apr 25, 2011

"couldn't help but..."

stop dancing around the ly word! I don't know any one who uses that phrase in normal conversation.

MM

kaitlin008 · Apr 25, 2011

Kitty Pryde said:
QUIRKING. A death to all quirking. Quirking eyebrows, lips quirking upward, any part that quirks (tee hee) needs to be eliminated. That's not even what the damn word means! GAH! Make it stop!

This! Quirking eyebrows and mouths appear in way too many of the books I've read lately and it drives me crazy.

pandora1983 · Apr 25, 2011

*meticulously searches ms for any use of the word quirk*

I never even thought of that one before

Looked bothers me when it is the only word used to convey that particular meaning....I mean the thesaurus button is Right there

AlwaysJuly · Apr 25, 2011

You're allowed to roll eyes no more than once in every 50,000 words of prose.

But I'm writing teenagers right now! When I was a teenager, my eyes really were autonomous... I'd be saying "Sorry ma'am" and they'd be trying to roll back in my head in disagreement.

tanglewoodtracey · Apr 25, 2011

Repeated words and phrases jump out at me quite a bit. What I don't understand is, if *I'm* noticing it, why didn't the agent/editor?

Tracey

Sirion · Apr 25, 2011

writingismypassion said:
"He looked into her soul."
"She looked into his eyes and into his soul."
"He saw her soul."

Using this phrase even once is too much.

Bleh.

Sunnyside · Apr 25, 2011

For some reason, I am constantly seeing the phrase "He/she shoveled forkfuls of eggs into his/her mouth." I swear I am not making that up.

Reservoir Angel · Apr 26, 2011

Sunnyside said:
For some reason, I am constantly seeing the phrase "He/she shoveled forkfuls of eggs into his/her mouth." I swear I am not making that up.

That seems oddly specific for a repeated phrase. Are the novels you find it in all by the same author, with some kind of egg fetish?

Dandroid · Apr 26, 2011

I see, "...,he said around a mouthful of..."

and.... ", he groused."

chevbrock · Apr 26, 2011

I'm guilty of having my MC chuckle until, my now nearly-insane beta reader threw the book across the room! The problem has now been solved.

RobJ · Apr 26, 2011

Annoyed is too strong. No sense getting annoyed about such things.

But 'trudged'.

It's like everyone read the same book, which said "Instead of walked, use alternatives such as trudged'.

And how many more characters named 'Johnny' do we need?

But annoyed? No. I just bang my head against the wall for an hour or two, maybe cry a little, then carry on reading.

Purple Rose · Apr 26, 2011

blacbird said:
Even one use of that particular phrase is five too many.

Have to wonder how the writer managed to get an agent and how the agent managed to get a publisher. I am baffled.

Sunnyside · Apr 26, 2011

Reservoir Angel said:
That seems oddly specific for a repeated phrase. Are the novels you find it in all by the same author, with some kind of egg fetish?

It's been in at least two books, by two different authors, that I've seen lately. It was eggs at least twice. Other times it's been "shoveled forkfuls of [whatever food]" which is still close enough.

Mandy-Jane · Apr 26, 2011

I got very annoyed by the over use of the word "-wise" as in "money-wise, work-wise", etc. Very much overused in the last book I've just read. Blah!

Darklite · Apr 26, 2011

I just finished a book where every time a character sat down, they'd throw themselves into the chair/couch etc. After reading the phrase about 5 times in one chapter, I rather wished the character would throw herself through the window instead. Just for a change

Quentin Nokov · Apr 26, 2011

Darklite said:
I just finished a book where every time a character sat down, they'd throw themselves into the chair/couch etc. After reading the phrase about 5 times in one chapter, I rather wished the character would throw herself through the window instead. Just for a change

Lol! I try to avoid someone 'throwing' themselves down. I always have this humorous mental image of them getting lifted up and then thrashed to the ground. Maybe it was due to the fact I watched Spongebob in my youth and remember the one episode where Patrick beats himself up.

Anyway, back on topic, I can't stand the use of 'Her blue orbs stared at me with an incessant desire to. . .'

Seriously? Orbs? It sounds terribly lame. If you're talking about her eyes -- say eyes. Orbs makes me think of some obnoxious teenager role playing on a wolf-site and trying to sound all prosy and eloquent.

Devil Ledbetter · Apr 26, 2011

Phaeal said:
You're allowed to roll eyes no more than once in every 50,000 words of prose. And yes, even if your novel is 99,999 words long, you still only get one eyes-rolling. And at least 25,000 words must separate each rolling incident. Don't make me throw the rulebook at you. It is extremely heavy and has pointy iron-clad corners.

This. Don't read The Help if you share my eye-rolling aversion. It was a good book overall, but every single time any character disagreed with another, it was accompanied by eye-rolling. And these were adults.

MaryMumsy said:
"couldn't help but..."

And "I couldn't help but wonder." SITC used this dumb phrase so often it now makes me hork.

AlwaysJuly said:
But I'm writing teenagers right now! When I was a teenager, my eyes really were autonomous... I'd be saying "Sorry ma'am" and they'd be trying to roll back in my head in disagreement.

Read or re-read Twilight. Highlight all of the eye-rolling. Your highlighting pen will go dry, and you will realize just how overused eyerolling is as a short cut to showing disagreement.

I think if eyerolling is going to be used at all, it should be reserved for a single (annoying, immature & disagreeable) character.

Other overused things I hate to see:

The redundant "She shrugged her shoulders." WTH else can be shrugged?

Sighing. I dislike people who go about sighing all the time, and that goes double for characters who sigh a lot. Save it for that insufferable drama queen character nobody else in the story can stand.

Most references to breathing or concentrating on breathing. It's been done to death. Unless the character is catching her breath after escaping a madman, she's probably not thinking about her breathing.

Any tired catch phrase (hint: if it's been on Jeopardy, it qualifies as a tired phrase). Like ducks in a row. Bored to tears. Screaming like a banshee. Raining cats and dogs. When all was said and done. Line in the sand. Etc.

As usual, JMO.

Overuse of annoying phrases

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practical experience, FTW

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Come on you stranger, you legend,