Welcome to Writers Talkback. If you are a new user, your account will have to be approved manually to prevent spam. Please bear with us in the meantime
Can anybody help with a B&B?
I don't want to stay in one; I have two characters in my current story staying in a B&B and I'm not sure how to refer to it.
Is it:
- Bed and breakfast
- Bed-and-breakfast
- Bed & breakfast
I originally thought it would be the first version, but the sentence: "We arrived at the bed and breakfast at six" - just doesn't look right.
Any ideas? I could take the coward's way out and call it a guest house, but I'm keen to know if there is a 'correct' form!
Comments
I've no idea tbh. I think there are style guides that advise on this kind of thing.
The one with the hyphens is actually a stock exchange term for selling shares and buying them back the next day!
I think I might go for bed & breakfast - it's rare to get an excuse to use an ampersand in a story :-)
*slaps forehead*
I've always said "B and B" but then I'm not posh!
I don't think that's right, IG - you wouldn't call a hotel a Hotel. If you were referring to it by name, i.e. Park View Bed & Breakfast, that would be right, but I don't think you'd capitalise the generic description like that.
[quote=Betsie]Google a B&B website and see what they call themselves[/quote]
I tried that initially; it's partly what led to my confusion!
[quote=Stan2]Wouldn't someone stuffy stay in a hotel?[/quote]
He'd much rather be in a hotel.
[quote=Lou Treleaven]I wouldn't use an ampersand in speech - if he says bed and breakfast it needs to be written bed and breakfast, even if he's narrating rather than speaking in speech marks.[/quote]
I'm going to do it that way. It doesn't look quite right, and I like the way the ampersand 'binds' the two words together, but I'm sure that's the correct way to do it, grammatically speaking.