Authors Electric

  This post is brought to you courtesy of profanity. Or perhaps the lack of it, and some thoughts on when, or indeed, if it is appropriate when writing. This train of thought was started the other day by my elder daughter. She's fourteen, and my alpha reader for my YA books. (And boy, does she tell me if she thinks something doesn't work, but that's a story for another time.) She's been an avid reader for as long as she's been able to read, and has recently caught the 'fan-fiction' craze. We were talking about this – genuine interest on her part as I don't really understand the allure of it myself – and she told me she'd started writing some, based on her favourite Marvel characters. We had a good chat about it, as she seems to be serious about writing (even asking what the difference was between a rewrite and an edit) until her younger sister, who's her test reader, let slip that she'd used swearing in her writing. Her response was s...

Put it away you bad boy! Filth! Profanity and filth. There’s a lot of it in books these days, and some people want none of it. In which case, may I have their share please? Yes I’m nailing my mucky colours (scarlet and blue, natch) to the mast right here, right now. The recent furore over the recent ‘Clean Reader’ App reminds me of my July 2014 AE blog post ( A Cock and Balls Story) in which I found rudeness in old books that the authors probably didn’t intend. Pop back and look if you want a cheap laugh. So anyway I’m clearly well qualified to blog about this here today. 'We like a good time as much as anybody.' 'Hester! you said b-o-d-y!' Mainly in the US, and mainly evangelical Christian, readers have for some time now been wielding their mighty Amazonian Swords of Review to cut the dirty bits off us authors (ouch!). You know, the ‘I’d have given this four stars but…’  or 'I'm giving this one star because someone said a rude word' syndrome. ...

Authos Electric Debbie Bennett It’s interesting to see how polarised people become over swearing in fiction – authors and readers alike. In books or on television, in stories, films and dramas. There’s the camp which advocates against swearing of any kind: on the grounds that it isn’t necessary, may offend people and rips a hole in the moral fabric of society. Then there’s the opposing camp, north versus south, which believes in freedom of speech, in allowing characters in books and on screen to be themselves and if people don’t like it, well they are free to switch off their device and/or close the book. There are always two sides to every coin (there are two sides to most things – except, of course, to a Mobius strip …). Why swear unnecessarily when writing, when you know you risk alienating some of your readers? Having said that, dear reader, swearing is as old as the hills – it’s not some new device intended to corrupt the youth of today. Our medieval ancestors were...

Naffing heck, smegheads! Today I’m considering swearing in books, so take a break from pinning crinolines round your piano legs or uttering paint-peeling oaths as you quote Pulp Fiction: whichever end of the sweary spectrum you inhabit. Recently, I gave an hour’s author talk/reading to an audience of 160 delightful people. They were very appreciative, and at the end, a queue of book buyers formed (a beautiful sight). One man waited patiently until it was his turn. But he wasn’t buying. He was waiting to tell me that he’d bought my crime novel, THE ROTTING SPOT, previously. He told me it’s a very good book, BUT there’s some swearing in it. (Very little, in fact.) And he wanted me to know that he didn’t think there was any need for it. I was fascinated that he’d felt the need to say it. It reminded me of another town, a group of mostly older women who listened to my pathology poetry from ALL THAT LIVES with great attention and interest. At the end, at question time, one woman st...