Dead giveaway

 

There appears to be a current trend for American authors to write books set in the UK, such as Agatha Christie-style mysteries or Regency novels. Some of these books have glaring mistakes which are a dead giveaway of the lack of even basic research into English customs, language and places etc., but some of them are very well written and it is hard to tell the writer is not from the UK.

There is one word, however, which always gives the game away. In England when you are eating you take a mouthful, spoonful or forkful of food whereas in America it is a bite of food, even when no actual biting is involved, such as in the case of scrambled eggs etc. It is only a minor difference and I guess most people wouldn´t notice it, but that is how my mind works (lol). Maybe I should have been a detective?

Photo by James Giddins on Unsplash