Dear fellow writers, 
The one thing that gives me hives faster than nettles, hives, or food allergies is SLOPPY TENSE by a writer!
I am currently reading a book (Spinning Jenny) that could have been an excellent story, could have been pretty good writing for a debut book, and could have some well-thought-out and developed characters except for the writer (Sylvia Ann McLain) who wrote the entire thing using the present tense. Then slipping into past tense and frequently mixing the two. (Grrrrr….teeth gnashing.)
Here’s a sample, quoting from the book: “Children race about, babies are wailing, and clusters of women talk among themselves. Some sit by themselves with Bibles in their laps. Farther off in the woods, blacks (did they use this term in 1833?) have set up their own camps; their tents are made of quilts thrown over ropes between the trees.”
Edited: Children raced around, babies wailed, and clusters of women gathered to talk amongst themselves. A few sat by themselves with their Bibles in their laps. Further off into the woods Negroes set up their camps. Their tents were made by throwing quilts over ropes tied between the tree trunks.
and: “But back at Carefree, there’s a body waiting for her to view it. She dreads it as she drives up the hill to her home. A body! Has she ever seen a dead person before? Not that she remembers. Why can’t Sophronia get up out of her bed and do something for once? But it’s getting on to twelve o’clock. She has to hurry.”
Edited: A body waited for her to view back at Carefree. Stephanie dreaded it as she drove up the hill to her home. A body! Has she ever seen a dead person before? Not that she remembered. Why couldn’t Sophronia get up out of her bed and do something for once? But it was close to noon. She had to hurry.
I like to use italics for internal dialogue but it’s not a rule. What is a grammatical rule is “i.n.g.’ ing” every other word is poor writing no matter how you look at it.
There is no rule set in stone somewhere that fiction must be written in the past tense. But it is the accepted and expected tense that 98% of writers use. More importantly, readers expect it even if they are unaware.
99% of the time, if a book is written in anything other than past tense, it has not been written that way on purpose; the writer is new, and the book is their first one, and they are ignorant of what is expected and what the industry standard is. It makes them look like the amateur that they are.
PS. Finally. Finished it. This book was a real slog. And then to find out the ending was a setup for a sequel. The storyline didn’t support that. Ugh!!!!!!
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Watch for more interviews with authors. September: Culley Holderfield. October: Simon Gervais for ROBERT LUDLUM, November: Kevin J. Kennedy, December: Marc Cameron, writing for TOM CLANCY
A few BOOKS BY TRISHA SUGAREK
Q. What first inspired you to write?
Simon Gervais is a former infantry officer and federal agent. He spent twenty years in the military and in law enforcement, specializing in protective operations and counterterrorism. His assignments took him all over Europe and the Middle East. He left the RCMP in 2014 to pursue writing full-time.
windows with direct views on the mountains, is grandiose. It’s by far my favorite room in the house. It just feels right. And that’s especially true during the fall and winter season. The second is on the terrace of our beach house in the Bahamas. There’s something very special about writing a novel while enjoying the ocean breeze.
Q. and the all-important: What does the process of going from “no book” to “finished book” look like for you? (cont.)
Q. Are you working on something now or have a new release coming up? If so tell us about it.
Q. and the all-important: What does the process of going from “no book” to “finished book” look like for you?
Q. Where/when do you first discover your characters?
of Western North Carolina. I grew up, like Caroline, the main character of the novel, spending my summers and weekends there. One summer, my father was cleaning out an attic we didn’t know we had, and he uncovered a box full of old photos. They were from the 1930s and before. Presumably, they were the people who had built the cabin and lived there. I was fascinated by those black and white images of these men and women who lived in that same place where I spent so much time yet had such different lives from mine. Later I would turn my historical research skills onto those families and the entire Hickory Nut Gorge region. Eventually, I made up a fictional family, the Quinns, and their fictional lives intertwined with real history, which became the fodder for this book.
