Hark, indie authors!

This post is intended for those young authors who grew up in an era when English teachers did not teach this kind of thing. As surprised as I am that they just don't know, I thought I'd take the time to explain a couple things, just two, that really irritate me when I'm reading. I'm just a typical reader in some ways. But in this way, if you don't know this, you should. You should know how it's making my blood temperature rise.

First, don't change your time strategy mid-stream. That is, you can tell a story in present (I wake up, I look out the window, I see snow) or tell a story in past (I woke up, I looked out the window, and I saw snow), but don't tell your story in both. How did it happen that people don't know this? I have my own explanation. It became clear over the last twenty years or so that both are acceptable; in fact, you can have the same result with either - a good story. Present is more immediate, more dramatic, more in-our-face. But it's a perfectly good way to tell a story. The problem is when you switch back and forth. We can't handle that. We are still paying attention to the time. EIther it happened, or it's still immediate. But not both!

Second, if your parents have a house, it is your parents' house. That's because they own it together. It is very unlikely that you can write about your parent's house, because if you have only one, it's more likely to be your mother's house or your father's house. Possible, but unlikely. What happened to putting the possessive apostrophe on a plural? People just don't do it anymore. They didn't learn it. But they should.

We readers are tasked with figuring this stuff out, getting meaning from it. Telling us you have two parents and then that one of them has a house buy you're not willing to tell us which one, or you're willing to let us guess that apostrophes are totally random in this book and just don't matter - sorry. that's like hitting me in the face. You're a writer. Get this stuff together. If you have any questions, just ask. I hate sitting around getting mad at you.