I was reading this particular book, one of those free ones I pick up in promotions. The book had numerous flaws (such as you routinely find in self-published works), but it also showed signs of promise. Not enough research had been done on the historical period in which it was set, but the author seemed to do a good job establishing atmosphere. And I was interested in what would happen to the characters.

But I could not finish the book. I tried. I held out for about a third of its length, and then I had to give it up.

The main problem was punctuation. The author got punctuation wrong in various ways, but particularly in the area of quotation marks. Let me remind you of the rules:

“The rules for quotation marks in dialogue,” said the lecturer, “are as follows. First of all, you start all direct quotations with the aforementioned marks. If the speech involves more than one paragraph, the first paragraph will end with a simple period. The lack of ‘close quotes’ here signals to the reader that more of the same speech is coming up.

“Then you start the next paragraph, once again, with opening quotation marks,” he went on. “And when the speech is done, you finish with ‘close quotes’ to signal that fact.”

The author of this book did not understand these rules. In fact, he got them precisely backwards. It was like driving in a town where some trickster has turned all the street signs 90 degrees. In every patch of dialogue, I had to stop and figure out who was talking now. Finally, I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to give up reading, even though the story interested me. The author was trying to make me do his work for him.

I don’t entirely blame him. No doubt he’s young and publicly educated, which means he’s been taught little about English. I salute the perseverance with which he must have struggled to do a job (writing a book) for which school had not prepared him in any way.

But it isn’t fair to the reader.

Punctuation has a bad reputation nowadays. It takes work to learn the rules. And rules are unpopular in their own right.

But like Chesterton’s Fence, rules exist for a reason. This author’s inability to deploy quotation marks in a useful way lost him, in my case, both a reader and a review.

This brings semicolons to mind. Semicolons aren’t as vital to comprehension as quotation marks, but they have their proper uses. They too are unpopular today. Many writers have sworn off them. They say that semicolons don’t do anything you can’t do with a period.

But that’s not true. As a reader with a history of reading aloud, radio announcing, and acting, I can tell you that a semicolon serves a subtle but useful purpose. A semicolon indicates a brief pause – perhaps a slight intake of breath — before the speaker goes on to a further – but related – thought.

A period indicates a full stop (indeed, they call them full stops in England). The speaker’s voice tone drops in a way that sounds final. A full breath may be taken.

For a writer, such distinctions can be very useful. I treasure my semicolons; you’ll have to pry them from my cold, dead hands.