I'm listening to a book that's about an American journalist doing a documentary on the British aristocrasy. Much is made of her American-ness, down to her and the main English guy getting into a game of 'my country is better than your country'. So it's a fairly pivotal plot point.
The book is also broken into two narrations: one by the English guy's dead older brother, and one by the American girl. They go back and forth telling the two sides of the story as it unfolds.
The problem is, as the very American (never been to England before, this is pointed out) girl is telling the story, she uses phrases like "anti-clockwise", "at university", and "holiday snap". And these are just the ones I remember. You might be able to convince me it was okay if she'd been talking to another character, you know, a "when in Rome" type of thing, but these are all from her narration to the reader. The place where she's supposed to be being herself and just talking.
And that makes me not buy into her character at all (okay, it's one of many things, but it'd be enough on its own). Please, if you're going to have a character from another country (even one that speaks the same language, more or less)... have someome from that country tell you if they sound reasonable. Because in America, a typical American would say "counter-clockwise", use the article "the", and would call them "photos" or "pictures" (snaps are fasteners on clothes!).
The book is also broken into two narrations: one by the English guy's dead older brother, and one by the American girl. They go back and forth telling the two sides of the story as it unfolds.
The problem is, as the very American (never been to England before, this is pointed out) girl is telling the story, she uses phrases like "anti-clockwise", "at university", and "holiday snap". And these are just the ones I remember. You might be able to convince me it was okay if she'd been talking to another character, you know, a "when in Rome" type of thing, but these are all from her narration to the reader. The place where she's supposed to be being herself and just talking.
And that makes me not buy into her character at all (okay, it's one of many things, but it'd be enough on its own). Please, if you're going to have a character from another country (even one that speaks the same language, more or less)... have someome from that country tell you if they sound reasonable. Because in America, a typical American would say "counter-clockwise", use the article "the", and would call them "photos" or "pictures" (snaps are fasteners on clothes!).