Fandom Pet Peeves, Part 45978:
(Obligatory disclaimer: this has been in no way sparked by any particular story, much less anything I've read recently. I was just thinking about it and felt like talking a bit. Just an opinion, my word does not come from On High despite my striking resemblance to a goddess, etc., etc.)
One of the few things I find universally jarring in fiction is when a story told from the perspective of a particular character uses the wrong name(s) for other character(s) in the story.
By "wrong", here, I mean something quite specific. I don't mean nicknames to which I object - although those can be a turn-off, they're not a pet peeve per se. I don't mean different imagined names for characters who don't have firm ones in canon - Lt. Groves as "Ellis" vs "Theodore", first names for Mr. Bennet or middle names for the Weasley children in stories written before those were established in canon, etc. (Tangent: she can correct me if I misremember, but as I recall krauthead had a story years and years (and years) ago where she deliberately messed with the widely-held assumption that Ginny Weasley's proper name was "Virginia" by calling her "Geneva" instead. I loved that she did that, and thought it was really kind of neat when that near-universal fannish convention was ultimately overturned by canon.)
What I mean, what I object to, is when Character X calls Character Q - even inside Character X's head, which is to say, within the narration of the story - by a name he or she would not use to address or think of Character Q in canon.
99% of the time, this takes the form of calling someone by his first name when his last name is the appropriate usage. If it's in the context of an established relationship, sure - but you've gots tuh establish that relationship, kids. Until you show me he's got a good reason to do otherwise, Harry Potter thinks of Draco Malfoy as "Malfoy", not "Draco". James Norrington thinks of Jack Sparrow as "Sparrow", not "Jack". Everyone thinks of House as House, everyone in the Navy thinks of each other by their last names, and I suspect Nick Stokes would still think of Grissom as Grissom even if they were fucking, just 'cause the alternative's kind of weird. Helo - hell, even Helo's wife calls him Helo. I could probably count on one hand the number of times we've actually seen someone call him Karl onscreen, so if I see someone doing it in fic, it just feels kind of ridiculous to me.
Bottom line? Fiction is great. Porn is great. I'm all about the pretty boys and girls getting together with the other pretty boys and girls; that's why I'm here. But most of the time I want to see how they get together. The flipside to this pet peeve - and something I consciously do in my own writing - is that I do like to see when that name-usage changes from the impersonal, the canon-established to the familiar. It can be subtle or overt, a quiet little signpost or a major turning-point of the plot, just so long as it happens at the right time for the characters. In short, I want you to convince me, people. Convince me of the porn, and I shall be yours forever. (...Or something.)
Anyway. Thoughts?
One of the few things I find universally jarring in fiction is when a story told from the perspective of a particular character uses the wrong name(s) for other character(s) in the story.
By "wrong", here, I mean something quite specific. I don't mean nicknames to which I object - although those can be a turn-off, they're not a pet peeve per se. I don't mean different imagined names for characters who don't have firm ones in canon - Lt. Groves as "Ellis" vs "Theodore", first names for Mr. Bennet or middle names for the Weasley children in stories written before those were established in canon, etc. (Tangent: she can correct me if I misremember, but as I recall krauthead had a story years and years (and years) ago where she deliberately messed with the widely-held assumption that Ginny Weasley's proper name was "Virginia" by calling her "Geneva" instead. I loved that she did that, and thought it was really kind of neat when that near-universal fannish convention was ultimately overturned by canon.)
What I mean, what I object to, is when Character X calls Character Q - even inside Character X's head, which is to say, within the narration of the story - by a name he or she would not use to address or think of Character Q in canon.
99% of the time, this takes the form of calling someone by his first name when his last name is the appropriate usage. If it's in the context of an established relationship, sure - but you've gots tuh establish that relationship, kids. Until you show me he's got a good reason to do otherwise, Harry Potter thinks of Draco Malfoy as "Malfoy", not "Draco". James Norrington thinks of Jack Sparrow as "Sparrow", not "Jack". Everyone thinks of House as House, everyone in the Navy thinks of each other by their last names, and I suspect Nick Stokes would still think of Grissom as Grissom even if they were fucking, just 'cause the alternative's kind of weird. Helo - hell, even Helo's wife calls him Helo. I could probably count on one hand the number of times we've actually seen someone call him Karl onscreen, so if I see someone doing it in fic, it just feels kind of ridiculous to me.
Bottom line? Fiction is great. Porn is great. I'm all about the pretty boys and girls getting together with the other pretty boys and girls; that's why I'm here. But most of the time I want to see how they get together. The flipside to this pet peeve - and something I consciously do in my own writing - is that I do like to see when that name-usage changes from the impersonal, the canon-established to the familiar. It can be subtle or overt, a quiet little signpost or a major turning-point of the plot, just so long as it happens at the right time for the characters. In short, I want you to convince me, people. Convince me of the porn, and I shall be yours forever. (...Or something.)
Anyway. Thoughts?