There was also a were-cuttlefish erotica book on Amazon that got screencapped a lot a few years ago. :::PPP
SAME. Heat fic is my secret weakness... but I want fics where the social structure makes omegas into queen bees, not broodmares. :/
Stikki Minaj Unconnected gripe; authors unfamiliar with very simple words. Seriously, "she rid him"? Rode him, you halfwit, we're not asking you to use five-syllable words here and can't you at least look it up?
When an author cannot keep their fic in one tense. I was reading something just now that was really good except for constant switching between past and present tense, and I do mean constant, like in one sentence. It wasn't an intentional stylistic choice so far as I could tell—the fic was a straightforward PWP, no in-universe time shenanigans or anything. :/
Oh man, I hate when that happens. I always get drawn out of whatever is actually happening (or was actually happening, as the case may briefly be? :P) and into pure mental editor mode. And then look up five sentences later and realize I haven't registered a single part of it since the last tense switch.
I am always paranoid about tense switching because I often don't realize that I'm doing it. It's one of the things I go and check for as a result. It's also one of the reasons I write almost exclusively in the present tense now since more of my fuck ups are to it instead of to the past. I also like present more anyway so MEH.
Same hat! If I leave and come back to a fic there is a solid 50% chance I will pick back up in a different tense. Tempted to try the one-tense-only-always rule to avoid that.
This is pretty minor, but even if the fandom has more modern aus than canon era fics, please tag your modern aus. I shouldn't have to figure this out when the main character checks his phone.
See I do it mid writing even while I just going because I have difficulty wording things in certain tenses at times. Also because I do not think while writing I just do it. It happens with person as well at times. So we'll all be fine and happy in our third person and then SUDDENLY THE SECOND PERSON ATTACKS HOLY SHIT.
I only ever use past tense these days if I'm trying to mimic the style of source material, like LOTR (oh, and that one Lovecraft parody-thing I always forget I wrote). Everything else is present tense because it's happening RIGHT NOW, DAMMIT.
Constant use of epithets is annoying enough if you're not writing an epic poem or something, but coming up with brand-new terms based on hair color is 90% of the time just gonna be terrible. I actually kind of like the pun in "bluenette", but it doesn't work for any other colors. Someone with "raven" hair is not correctly described as "the raven". And so on.
I would say "but what if it happened a long time ago, in a galaxy far far away?", but that's the same line of thinking that leads to writing a whole wiki in past tense, so... :P
And now I have realized I need to try out the annoying hellscape of doing things like making words like moistsharp. I have no idea what that means or why I would ever use it but by gods I must smash words together and provide absolutely no hyphenization just like Kiernan-sempai. Please fanfiction writers be more annoying. Give me the Ulysses of fanfic. Create new and lovely words like sdowr which is just an anagram of words.
That would just make me think that the person was literally a raven. Or like a raven shapeshifter that changes shape constantly because FJUCK IT I CAN DO WHAT I WANT. God.
Time paradox, obviously. :D anyway MY oc is a whitenette or a pinknette or possibly a martinet so there.
Yeah, that or that in addition to the characters in the scene, there's also a random raven hanging around who keeps getting mentioned in the middle of other people's actions and chiming into their conversation and generally stealing the focus. (Which is a genre of fanfic I would read!)
One of the authors I've seen lately keeps misspelling "brunette" as "brunet." Possible overcorrection of the (haircolor)-ette phenomenon? (it is mildly infuriating either way; mild to moderate epithet-itis combines with incorrect spelling to produce something made of NO.)
