OMG!!! You can't ever use exclamation points!!! Ever!!!
Exclamation points are a troublesome beast. Like adverbs, we get lots of advice to cut them out of our books. But like so many nevers, it's more about proper usage than the exclamation point itself. They do have uses and are valuable tools to show emphasis. But too many become visually distracting. If readers are yanked away from the story by punctuation, that's a problem.
She was so lost! She couldn't believe how stupid she was, leaving her compass in the tent! What an idiot! A total idiot! Arrgghhh!Multiple exclamation points like this dilute the exclamation. Did you keep reading the sentences as exclamations, or did you just read them all the same intensity after the first few? If everything being said is exclaimed--and thus emphasized--then nothing stands out. If nothing stands out, what's the point of the exclamation point in the first place? Periods would achieve the same result.
