I know I've heard this term used before, but I'm not sure if it's right here. Context is just that, someone is thrown roughly to the ground face down, semi-conscious so their body is pretty much limp like a rag doll. "She was thrown to the ground, painfully landing on her stomach as the side of her face buried itself in the dirt."
I think it sounds fine. If there's anything technically wrong with a face that has a life of its own, I think literary license takes care of it.
I think if I were reading it in a book, I may skip over it and not notice. But thinking about it here, it does sound really, really odd... but can't think of a better way of saying it lol.
It seems like one of those odd colloquials that actually makes no sense but is used anyway. Logically, a face could not bury itself, but the idea comes through in a very striking way that works well with the image of someone smacking their face into the ground. Language is an interesting thing.
cant you just say she was thrown, and that dirt covered her face? At any rate, I'm iffy about how she lands because I've seen someone get thrown the way you described your MC getting thrown, and for the most part, when people fall forward, their face hits first, not the stomach. And depending on what they fall on(in this case dirt) I can expect some scrapes or cuts, but her face wouldn't be buried in the dirt. It would be against the dirt's surface.
I'm sure he could write it any number of ways, Blackstar. I think "landing on her stomach" means face down, not stomach first. But I can't imagine hitting your face before your body? And you would eat dirt depending on the consistency of the ground.
