random fanfic pet peeve...

[ratcreature]

I don't think of myself as a particularly picky reader, but sometimes I'm thrown out of a story by random mistakes in details that don't even matter much for the story. For example I was just reading a HP story, set around Christmas, as so many of them are around this time of year, and quite enjoyed it, only to come across a line where the POV character remarked that is was "past five and getting dark" or something to that effect. But the story takes place in London in the middle of December, so obviously it would already be dark by then, seeing how sunset there would be a bit before four in the afternoon and even with some remaining twilight after sunset that still means it's plain dark after five. And it's not as if you couldn't look up sunrise and sunset times on the net either, if you're unfamiliar with just how little daylight you get in Northern Europe during winter.

I have no idea why errors that aren't even particularly relevant bother me in written fiction, when I can completely overlook things like that places don't look "correct" on tv, like because they filmed in a different location or things like that. I guess it could be that with tv I just accept some built-in limitations, but written words don't have that excuse.