Jul 06
Reviewerspeak
I found this great article on examiner.com about the new language reviewerspeak that lists the 20 most annoying book reviewer clichés. Read it! I don’t know about you but I can’t count the number of times I’ve read the words “poignant” or “gripping” in a review, so there must be some truth in it.
4 responses so far General talk
Oh blimey, but I’ve used *lots* of those in the past when I’ve given feedback to an author *lol*. And I always thought they were perfect for the purpose *sigh*. But I understand what they mean about using words that say nothing really important. I’ll keep an additional watch on myself in future
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Ooooh, Rikki, this is great! I’m so relieved that “vivid” didn’t make the list because that’s my favorite reviewer word.
Cliches I really dislike in reviews have definitely got to be “rollicking” and “tour de force” for sure, closely followed by “lyrical.”
I’m afraid I’ve overused, “Poignant, gripping, and compelling.”
The worst cliche of all has to be “X meets X meets X” or as the author of the piece says, “Stephen King meets Charles Dickens meets Agatha Christie in this haunting yet rollicking mystery.” Ick, ick, ick!
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Clare and Val, thanks for stopping by.
. I just write the way I talk, and I don’t think I’ve ever used the words “poignant” or “gripping” in everyday speech.
I found this very interesting as well. I think the only reason I’m not using those terms all the time is because I’m no native speaker and had no idea about their usefulness (and their lack of meaning),
I think that’s exactly what you want to do: write as you talk. It’s a good rule of thumb for us all, or we’ll find ourselves getting awfully pompous as reviewers and blathering on about tour de force, ha, ha! I had to laugh, picturing myself saying that in conversation because at least I have enough sense not to do that.
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