Niggle niggle niggle… AH!

I’ve been poking at and prodding, and returning over and over to this particular tiny section of dialogue in the WiP knowing that something, somehow was just not working. I knew the scene itself worked in terms of the traits it revealed about the characters involved but that somehow the dialogue jarred.

I was turning it over and over in my mind this morning, and finally, I worked it out. In a world where men and women are considered utterly equal – and in which all sexual preferences are acceptable – the sentiments my character was expressing were completely off. I had been placing my own world’s associations and prejudices onto the words ‘man’ and ‘girl’ when in the context of this (imaginary) world those connotations would not even have crossed my characters’ minds. I needed to express jealousy and disdain, yes. But in a way which was reflective of the societal rules which I had established and not those within which I had been raised.

Fixed. At last. And now I can move on.