Does anyone find that, when reading, they see a new word and instead of thinking - “oh! A new word! What’s the definition?”
You think - “…you totally used a thesaurus for that word…”
Then the author will use that word at LEAST 3 times throughout the book and it pings in your head everytime.
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I know I’m being way critical. Considering I don’t write nor am I published. And I should be grateful I learned a new word today!
But I’ve gone 33yrs without seeing “Maudlin” and now I’ve seen this used 3 times to describe the same character.
Other words occurr of course but “Maudlin” is what made me roll my eyes this morning.
And “Disgorged”
The definition is clear from the word itself but c’mon… you don’t need to use it twice in the same chapter to describe both a Carriage uploading passengers and a microwave opening up for food.
It just feels fake 😅
I would not find it to be too critical to care about good word choice, though I would disagree with using uncommon words as a major problem and it somehow making the writing fake.
For me it is far more often a problem that the author clearly didn’t use a thesaurus and use words with the wrong connotations and ends up using a word which somewhat similar meaning to the concept they are trying to express and therefore could express themselves better by using a different word.
Languages don’t have true synonyms and good writing uses the right word even if the word isn’t the most commonly used synonym in the english language.
For disgorge the first one is probably one of the most commonly used constructions and the second one also seems fine. What are the connotations of the second as disgorge has connotations of violent movement, lack of control and general negative associations?