The Evil Sentence

In the world of literature, sometimes authors really all love a particular concept, and you can find it in just about every book. On its own, this is not inspiring, since authors are working in a creative field, and seeing almost the exact same sentence in 50% of the books one reads does not scream originality. Even worse when the sentence does not make much sense in the first place. There are several of these, but we'll talk about my personal favorite:
 

"I released a breath I didn't realize I was holding." 

Can we take a moment to think about what that means? Has this ever happened to anyone? Personally, when I hold my breath, I know I'm doing it. I'll grant that maybe, just maybe, this does happen to some people occasionally, but does it really happen to everyone all the time? Breathing should pretty much just happen, but people in literature apparently need to remember to breathe at all times. Maybe the air is thicker in literature.

A group of my blogger friends and I started talking about how much we hate this sentence, and I certainly knew that I'd seen it around with regularity. However, a few of us began tweeting one another whenever we found the sentence in our books, and the results have been pretty terrifying. Don't believe me? Here's a sampling of books that use this phrase/idea.

First, here are the ones Jenni of Alluring Reads noticed. Obviously, this post would not exist without her diligence.

Renegade by J. A. Souders

"and the breath I didn't know I was holding releases in a hiss"

V Is for Virgin by Kelly Oram

"I blew out a breath I'd been holding in my lungs without realizing it."

Easy by Tammara Webber

"I released the breath I hadn't realized I was holding"

Derailed by Alyssa Rose Ivy

"I let out a breath I hadn't realized I was holding."

Mila 2.0 by Debra Driza

"like I'd suddenly released a breath I hadn't known I'd been holding"

Mind Games by Kiersten White

"I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding."

The Rules by Stacey Kade

"I let out a breath I hadn't realized I'd been holding."

Taken by Erin Bowman

"I release a breath I didn't realize I was holding."

 

And here's Bekka of Pretty Deadly Reviews:

Never Let You Go by Emma Carlson Berne

"Megan let out a breath she didn't realize she'd been holding."

And one from Giselle of Xpresso Reads:

Prodigy by Marie Lu

"I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding."

And Ashleigh Paige, now of Birth of a New Witch:

Chantress by Amy Butler Greenfield

"I let out a breath I hadn't known I was holding."

And Renae of Respiring Thoughts:

Orleans by Sherri L. Smith

"Daniel released a breath he hadn't known he'd been holding."

 

Starglass by Phoebe North

"I let out a gasp of breath, one I hadn't even realized I was holding"

Finally, here are the ones I found, and I'm sorry for how crappy the camera is on my iPod touch:

Everneath by Brodi Ashton

"'You don't have to hold your breath, Nik.'
I hadn't realized I was."

Me Before You by Jojo Moyes

"I let out a breath I hadn't realized I had been holding."

Ashes of Twilight by Kassy Tayler

"I did not even realize I'd been holding my breath"

Mothership by Martin Leicht & Isla Neal

"I let out a breath I didn't realize I was holding."

The Darkest Minds by Alexandra Bracken

"it wasn't until he...handed it to me that I remembered to start breathing."

The Cats of Tanglewood Forest by Charles de Lint

"She let out a breath she hadn't been aware she was holding."

Pretty Girl-13 by Liz Coley

"Breath exploded out of Angie, breath she didn't know she'd been holding"

These photos shown here were used with permission by the photographers. I know you are jelly of our photographic talents. This list does not even include all of the instances of MCs hearing screaming or crying and realizing the sounds are coming from them, additional popular phrases in which the heroine or hero has no knowledge of their own bodily functions. To be fair, these are largely from ARCs and could have been removed pre-publication, but there's still an epidemic of breathing-forgetfulness on our hands.

So, authors, when you're editing your book and looking for words to cut, these need to go first. There are so many better ways of conveying that your MC is startled or afraid, ones that won't leave them seeming literally TSTL. You could remove this from any of these scenes, and I suspect they would play just as well. Can we stop with this now?

Update 4/12: Various people have reported realizing they've held their breath without meaning too, due either to stress conditions or focusing too hard on a particular task, like a workout or knitting. Still, these aren't generally what's going on in the scenes in question, nor does it invalidate the fact that this sentence is overused and not creative. I wasn't opposed to the sentence strongly when I first saw it, and it even seemed plausible; I've exaggerated that for comedic effect, but the point is that this has been done to death.

Have you spotted the evil sentence? Have you ever held your breath by accident? Have you noticed any other overused sentences like this in your reading?