A warm welcome to author Kate Sherwood who stops by Love Bytes on her blog tour for book 2 in the Common Law series ” Embers”.
Kate talks about writing a specific language and brought a grand prize giveaway!
Welcome Kate 🙂
Writing While Canadian
One of the challenges of writing for the American market as a Canadian is that it’s hard to know what I don’t know.
There are so many little things that can trip me up, so many areas where I honestly don’t know I’m using a Canadianism until an American points it out. I think it’s because Canadians are effectively bilingual. No, not Canadian and French, but British and American English. And then every now and then we throw in our own words, just to make it all that much more confusing.
Are the kids in my story in grade two, or second grade? We’d use either of those interchangeably in Canada, but only one of them works in the US. I can’t remember which one. Will the students receive marks or grades? Again, they might get either in Canada, but apparently one of them (which one?!?) is more commonly used in the US.
If they went on a school trip, would it be a round trip or a return trip? Would they take a break in the bathroom, washroom, or rest room? Will they draw with pencil crayons or coloured pencils? If they made a mistake would they use an eraser or a rubber? Wear runners, sneakers, or trainers? Snack on candy bars or chocolate bars? In Canada, we could use any of those words, but I need to remember which ones are best for the US.
And let’s not even get started on the words that mean something similar but not quite the same in the US—college, track pants, brown bread, dish cloth, etc.
In the Common Law series, I know I got caught on “hydro lines”. That was sloppy—my editor didn’t even know what I was talking about. I also got caught on eaves trough, which I had no idea was a Canadianism. It seems much more precise than “gutter”, but I guess precision doesn’t really count if your readers have no idea what you’re talking about!
Do you guys get confused about what words come from where, or is it easier to keep track of these things when you’re not stuck between two cultures like Canada is?
About Embers
Small town—big problems. Jericho Crewe is back in Mosely, Montana, trying to deal with police corruption, interfering feds, his newly discovered family members, and, of course, Wade Granger.
He doesn’t really need a biker war on top of it all, but as the bodies start to pile up, it becomes pretty clear that’s what he’s got. Not only that, but Wade’s involved somehow, and as soon as Wade is a part of something, things that seemed clear become cloudy.
With the feds breathing down his neck, Jericho has to find his way through Wade’s maze of half truths and manipulations. It would all be so much easier if Jericho could think straight in the other man’s presence. So much easier if their passionate past could be forgotten, and if he could be sure he’s strong enough to resist the temptation of a passionate present.
Now available from:
About Kate Sherwood
Kate Sherwood started writing about the same time she got back on a horse after almost twenty years away from riding. She’d like to think she was too young for it to be a midlife crisis, but apparently she was ready for some changes!
Kate grew up near Toronto, Ontario (Canada) and went to school in Montreal, then Vancouver. But for the last decade or so she’s been a country girl. Sure, she misses some of the conveniences of the city, but living close to nature makes up for those lacks. She’s living in Ontario’s “cottage country”–other people save up their time and come to spend their vacations in her neighborhood, but she gets to live there all year round!
Since her first book was published in 2010, she’s kept herself busy with novels, novellas, and short stories in almost all the sub-genres of m/m romance. Contemporary, suspense, scifi or fantasy–the settings are just the backdrop for her characters to answer the important questions. How much can they share, and what do they need to keep? Can they bring themselves to trust someone, after being disappointed so many times? Are they brave enough to take a chance on love?
Kate’s books balance drama with humor, angst with optimism. They feature strong, damaged men who fight themselves harder than they fight anyone else. And, wherever possible, there are animals: horses, dogs, cats ferrets, squirrels… sometimes it’s easier to bond with a non-human, and most of Kate’s men need all the help they can get.
After five years of writing, Kate is still learning, still stretching herself, and still enjoying what she does. She’s looking forward to sharing a lot more stories in the future.
Twitter: @kate_sherwood
To celebrate the release of all four books in the Common Law series, we’re giving away one four-tour-wide GRAND PRIZE of $100 in Riptide credit! Enter at each stop on each tour (once they go live) to maximize your chances to win! Leave a comment with your contact info to enter the contest. Entries close at midnight, Eastern time, on April 8, 2017. Contest is NOT restricted to U.S. entries. Thanks for following the Embers tour, and don’t forget to leave your contact info!
Congratulations on the release of the Common Law Series, Kate. I loved your words on being confused what words to use. I have the same problem. I am not a native English speaker, but I learned British English in School. Nowadays I only read English novels, British or American. It is hard to keep up with the differences, but I consider it a learning curve.
tankie44 at gmail dot com
Thanks for the enlightening post. The one thing that stuck out the most for me & made me laugh was the bit about grade schoolers. Here in the US if you wrote about grade schoolers using rubbers you’d have them participating in sex pretty early! We us rubbers as slang for condoms!
legacylandlisa(at)gmail(dot)com
Thank you for the interesting post! I’m a non-native speaker, so for me it is very difficult to distinguish between Canadian and American usage of words. What I studied was BBC English, so American slang is sometimes difficult for me (Thank you internet for the Urban Dictionary). but I love to learn new terms and usages for words.
Congratulations on the release. I love your books.
susanaperez7140(at)gmail(dot)com
Wow, I feel your pain. I am not a native English speaker. In school we used to learn some generic English that doesn’t really work in real life. When I started studying English at university, I was given the option to choose between British and American English. Apart from literature no one really distinguished between the two. You had to get your facts right yourself, because in tests they checked words and grammar according to your “language” choice.
Now, working in an environment where English is the main language I struggle again, because of the diversity of people. But to be honest, I am at a point where I don’t care anymore.
Of course I see that it is more problematic for an author, who targets a certain audience. So, I wish you all the best for future books and don’t get discouraged, if there’s something you don’t get “right”. Due to cultural and language diversity a lot of people are probably more forgiving than you think.
I don’t know about others, if there’s something I don’t get I look it up. Abbreviations and idioms (love to learn new idioms <3) are on top of my "have to look it up"-list. I'm from Europe btw.
kragthang [at] aim [dot] com
Sometimes no matter what words the author use, if the sentence construction was equipped well, the message will still come across. On my experience as a reader, I barely get caught in this confusion thing. Maybe it’s my vocabulary that’s speaking on behalf of me or maybe I haven’t come across an author who use otherworldly words.
And when I do get confused, I’ll just go to Google & the problem goes away.
Thanks for this awesome post & for coming by here on Love Bytes, Kate! <3I'm
mushyvince(at)gmail(dot)com
Thanks for the interesting post. As someone whose English is their second language, I have issues to recognize some words but I just look them up and that solves it.
It doesn’t affect my reading though. The differences make it even more interesting.
serena91291@gmail(dot)com
As a teacher, I have used all those phrases. There might be other things that I would not understand but that is the joy of reading. You can learn with everything you read.
debby236 at gmail dot com
I agree with Debby236! I’m an educator and read constantly. Having grown up on a small farm and attended a one room school in South Dakota I’m very familiar with eave troughs, wash rooms, colored pencils, grades and using a wash cloth. I love reading works by non-American authors (such as yourself, Garrett Leigh and Josephine Myles…to name just a few) and everyone who does should expect differences. That’s what makes this world so exciting.
Good luck on the series.
dfair1951@gmail.com
I’ve always had a bit of a Canada fixation, so it all makes me curious. Do you have to worry about big slang differences between provinces (that is, writing a Newfie vs., say, someone from BC)?
vitajex(At)aol(Dot)com
I have had the same problems but with Australian English to British to American. I think it’s interesting that you can write any of those things and a Commonwealth country English speaker will get the busy, but it’s always an American reader who complains they don’t get it. I think that has a lot to do with exposure and multiculturalism.
I think Canadian English and Australian English might have more in common than US English lol
leetee2007(at)hotmail(dot)com
I can’t wait to read this book and the rest of the upcoming ones!
ree.dee.2014 (at) gmail (dot) com
Thanks for your thoughts and congrats. It sounds great. One reason I like reading stories set in a different culture to learn more about it, and it the language differences are done well, then I’m transported.
Great post Kate. Eaves trough is what I learned as a kid – but then it seems like gutters because kind of the “simpler” version as I got older 🙂 I love your writing and can’t wait to dig into this series.