@ Celina
This is why I emphasized "in my own writing." But I still frequently consider it weak or lazy writing when reading the work of others. When I am tempted to use "suddenly," I take it as a challenge to re-write without the word. And there is a difference between use of "sudden" and "suddenly."
Off the top of my head, Ms. Editor...
I gripped the eyedropper with both hands and put a slight pressure on the bulb. One drop of poison and he wouldn't be able to taste it. Two and he'd know for sure. I could steady my hands to play piano in an auditorium full of strangers, but not to murder my husband?
The doorbell chimed and the full contents of the eyedropper squirted into the coffee.
Footsteps echoed in the hall. "Where's my coffee? And answer the damn doorbell."
Maybe not the best example, but I'm a believer that you make an action sudden through surrounding context and by just writing the action itself. Also, the apparent absurdity of "why not to murder my husband" (hopefully) occupies the writers mind going into the startle event. What would "suddenly" add to this, either to the doorbell or the footsteps?
The cat's head knocked my book upward and stabbing pain radiated in my legs as her claws dug deep.
Again, what would suddenly add to this? In my mind, absolutely nothing. And if I wanted to make it even more sudden, I'd write the prose leading to this action at a slow pace and in a calm tone to emphasize the sudden and drastic nature of this particular action. The next few sentences would be more actively paced to further enhance the transition-producing action.
Nope. Doesn't answer a darn thing, Neuro. However, I would opine as the editor of a lot of authors who write on spec that I can also find no good reason to REMOVE said suddenlys UNLESS the author is overusing the word. Four or five suddenlys in a 100k manuscript is NOTHING compared to the thousand uses of 'it was' as the main subject/predicate--at least in my opinion. As an editor, I tend to leave the author's words intact unless there is a reason not to do so, and the last thing I want to do to a writer who's working to meet a deadline is to get them obsessing over ways to rewrite a sentence to avoid a commonly used adverb.
As a writer, however, I use suddenly upon occasion without conscious thought or remorse.
"Suddenly, she was on her ass at the foot of the steps" works better for my particular narrative style than "She tripped and fell". There's nothing technically
wrong with either sentence if they are true to the narrative style of the story.
So, sure--any writer may make the conscious decision to avoid using suddenly in their work, but in the grand scheme of things it's not going to actively prevent a book from being signed. As long as the use of the adverb is appropriate and works within the narrative style of the story, "suddenly" is fine by me. But usually, if an author is overusing "suddenly" there are other problems with the manuscript that are more serious--telling instead of showing, for example. So it's my thought that "suddenly" is a symptom more than the disease.
*pulls Neuro's manuscript from Delphi to run a search for uses of 'suddenly'*
Hmm...this could be interesting...
If the reader knows she vanishes at will and it is instantaneous there's no need to say suddenly at all because there's no other way to instantly vanish.
