Written by essteemedia | 25 October 2006

One of the things writers do that annoys me (and it is done by professional as well as inexperienced writers) is the construct that goes something like this:

Crossing the floor, Jack opened the fridge.

What's intended here, of course, is that after Jack has crossed the floor he opens the fridge. 

Now, my problem is that the word 'crossing' is the present participle of the verb (the phrase 'crossing the floor' is a participial phrase). To me the sentence reads as if Jack opened the fridge *while* he was crossing the floor. Obviously he has very long arms or a very small floor.

Similarly:

Unlocking the safe, Jack took out his money.

Sorry, that's impossible! You gotta unlock the safe before you open it; you can't take out your money while you are in the process of unlocking the safe. Far better to say:

Jack crossed the floor and opened the fridge.
Jack unlocked the safe then took out his money.

Participial phrases at the beginning of a sentence are not inherently wrong, it's just that they need to make sense physically in time and space. In the above examples there are cause and effect things going on; one is reliant on the other and must be done in a natural sequence.

Crossing the floor, Jack noticed a stain on the fridge.

That's fine, one is not contingent on the other. Jack is quite capable of looking at things while he walks. No problem.

Here's a beauty from a manuscript sent to me last year:

Crossing town on the bus, I opened my front door to find—

Do you see the problem?

Be careful with your participial phrases.

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