Have you ever woken yourself up by sitting bolt upright in bed? Ever? I know I haven't. But people do it pretty much constantly in books and films. Why? And why is it always "bolt upright" anyway? Why not some other way of saying upright?
I do have a reason for asking. I bought Kate Mosse's Labyrinth last Friday night for a couple of quid in Tesco
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:)
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(What gets to me more about the tear thing is why is it always a single tear? The beautiful girl should have been sobbing her eyes out with a red nose.)
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You could make an argument that, simply because the phrase stuck in mind, means it's bad writing -- it obviously broke the narrative flow -- but I liked it. I think my point is that the "liquid diamond" thing was probably pretty cool the first time someone did it.
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But now reading it feels a bit like reading through several pages of the same name in a phone book, so that by the end the name stops meaning anything and just turns into a jumble of symbols.
I quite like 'liquid fur'. Even though it seems slightly off-kilter, cats actually having fur and all.
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She seemed all right - but the classes (taken by her husband) were terrible.
And it was clearly all just a way to get pre-publication publicity for her book, which was the worst thing - she had a piss poor website where she 'shared' the research she wasn't using, supposedly to help other writers.
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What sort of advice did they give you on the course?
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I can't really remember details, really - but her husband was po-faced and serious about the whole thing and every single piece of advice was followed by a mention of Labyrinthe or a plug for the website.
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Unfortunately, on waking himself up by doing this, he a) had no memory of having said it, and b) couldn't reconstruct his dream-reasoning for saying it. So I've still no idea where on earth it came from. Baffling.
What does "bolt upright" even mean? Like a bolt? Quickly, like "bolting" (I mean, of horses, not of doors)? I feel silly for not knowing this, now. Dead bits of language, though, like those huge growth things on trees, all gnarled (like the rough hardworking hands of yer gardener/cook/stout yeoman with 1 x heart of gold) and stuck-on.
Or something.
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Oh, I could tell you stories about a certain gentleman of our mutual acquaintance and his gnomic utterances in sleep. I don't remember him ever doing the bolt upright thing as such, though.
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