Blog Schedule

I post on Monday with an occasional random blog thrown in for good measure. I do my best to answer all comments via email and visit around on the days I post.

Monday, March 13, 2017

#InkRipples, Tropes, C. Lee McKenzie, and Being Thankful

#InkRipples is a monthly meme created by Kai StrandMary Waibel, and Katie L. Carroll.
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The idea of #InkRipples is to toss a word, idea, image, whatever into the inkwell and see what kind of ripples it makes. We provide the topics and will be blogging about them on the first Monday of the month. You can spread your own ripples by blogging about the topic any day of the month that fits your schedule, just be sure to include links back to the three of us please (KatieKai, and Mary).

This month the subject is: TROPES

A trope is literally a figure of speech, or cliche, which means it's often overused. Here are a few examples of types of tropes. You can go HERE for more.

If I've heard it once, I've heard it a hundred times. (exaggeration)
Her explanation was clear as a bell. (irony, sarcasm)
His not the brightest bulb in the room. (understatement)
She's a witch. (metaphor)
Man of the cloth. (metonymy: where a word or phrase is substituted for another)
Turned up missing. (oxymoron: where two words or phrases contradict each other)
The old rocking chair complained when I sat in it. (personification of an inanimate object)
I struggled to understand lightening, then it struck me. (pun)
Does a bear poop in the woods? (rhetorical question: a question you don't expect to have answered)
She's as American as apple pie. (simile)
Boots on the ground. (synecdoche: when a part of something is use to represent the whole)
She opened her home and heart to the orphan. (zeugma: when a verb is used with two others words and each has a different meaning)

Of course in literature, movies, and TV there are many overused tropes.

The main character viewing him/herself in a mirror and describing him/herself
Having an incredible adventure only to wake up and discover it was a dream
Using a magical devise or element (wand, stone, ring, weather etc.)
The hero being in a horrific fight and minutes later jumping up to say, make mad passionate love to the heroine

It's hard, in this day and age to come up with something new.

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This month I'm honored to be the Featured Follower on C. Lee McKenzie's blog The Write Game. At the end of the month a lucky person will win an ecopy of one my books, winner's choice! Be sure to drop by and say hello.

Anansi and Company                           A Lizard's Tail                       The Bowl and the Stone

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Being Thankful
Today I'm thankful for continued good health!

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What are you thankful for? Care to share a favorite or hated trope? Do you have difficulty avoiding them?

15 comments:

  1. Awesome that you're featured on Lee's blog. And glad your health is good. You're right. It's something to really be thankful for.

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    1. I'm glad my health is good too, considering I have *issues.* :)

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  2. I've never heard of a zeugma before.

    We never appreciate that good health until we're sick or hurt.

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    1. I'd never heard of a zeugma be either! Learn something new every day.

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  3. Hi Bish - my grammar knowledge is pretty appalling (an oxymoron?) ... and I definitely wouldn't get these if asked, yet would happily use them at times. I'm just grateful for what I can do ... and for some sun today! Cheers ... I do love your cover illustrations - and those stories I'm sure entrance ... good luck- Hilary

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    1. I love oxymorons! ...little big man, giant miniature fairies...

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  4. There are so many tropes it's hard to avoid them.
    Cool you are Lee's featured author.

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  5. We're all guilty. Which I guess means we're in good company!

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  6. Hi Bish, I had no idea what TROPES were before I read your post! I’m thankful for visiting you and learning something new.
    I spotted you over at C. Lee McKenzie’s Blog, and I’m pretty sure I left a comment.
    Have a good week. x

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  7. Thanks for education in unknown names for these word usage. I try to avoid them, but sometimes it happens.

    Keep recovering.

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  8. Love those tropes! And when I find them in books I cheer. At least I'm not the only one who falls into those trope traps. :-)

    Great to have you as my Featured Follower this month. Next Email Connect is supposed to go out on the 15th with another Bish Denham post. Yikes. I'd better get busy.

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  9. I'm thankful you joined our meme. I love how specific your examples are.

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  10. It's easy to think you're above the tropes until you read them being used a hundred times in other people's books. =) Ah the joy of naivete.

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  11. Tropes are all around us for sure! I don't mind some here and there. :)

    I agree that good health is definitely something to be thankful for!
    ~Jess

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Your Random Thoughts are most welcome!