Do You Need a Dictionary?

I was at a button show yesterday and sold the two Archetypes books to one of the dealers. I was glad that she chose them as I think she'll enjoy them. Kelly has labeled them action/adventure and there is that aspect to them- stuff happens pretty fast and frequently, but it is also the story of Benjamin "Beans" Carter and Amanda Pennington- archetypes who were created to love one another. With everything that her mad scientist father did wrong, he got that one thing right- or did he? Benjamin's father and mother are also very passionate about one another. Maybe that gene was inherited while other genes were indeed altered to make Beans an archetype? (There's also the Rex family affinity for early bladed weapons that "Beans" shares with them.)

Anyway- in the board meeting Marie asked if I wrote the kind of books that required the use of a dictionary when reading them? Hmmm...I certainly don't dumb them down to easy reader level. I've always liked language and learning. I have always absorbed things like a sponge. I am influenced by PBS and the BBC. Kelly and I have our own way of talking to one another- trying to use different words other than the easy, common ones. It's sort of like a long standing challenge between us to find unusual words or seldom used words. We like words like provocative and esoteric. I don't think anyone would need to use a dictionary to read anything we write because the meaning of the words is pretty clear in the context of the sentences they're used in. You'd have had to have just recently crawled out of the primordial ooze not to grasp the meaning. We're just like that- we love language with a passion. We're writers! When we play Words With Friends we always try to hit the rare to very rare lines on the scale. She's a geeky, nerdy engineer- she knows way more unusual words than I do!

But, the answer is no. A person would not need a dictionary to read any of my books, however, I am constantly referring to a dictionary and a thesaurus to make sure that I'm using the exact word I want and in the right way- because I don't want to hear about it from Kelly if I'm not! She already hounds me about my excessive use of commas! My bad!