Owner: Editing & Proofreading Hints & Tips URL:http://edit-proofread-hints-tips.blogspot.com/ Join Date: Tue, 11 Nov 2008 20:34:34 -0600 Rating:0 Site Description: If you're looking to improve your writing, whether for work or school or fiction publication, this blog gives hints and tips for editing and proofreading to make your writing the best it can be. Site statistics:Click here
2008 Accentuate Writers Poetry Contest 2008-11-06 06:28:00 The Accentuate Writers
Anthology will be a trade fiction paperback book, of approximately 400 pages, separated into four or five sections. Between each section, and at the beginning and end of the book, we would like to include filler poetry, around which we will put black and white vector image designs as section breaks, so the poetry will be very highly featured and easy to see by just flipping Read more:Contest
, Poetry
Just Don't use Just 2008-10-19 18:18:00 Just is a great word, when used as a legal term to mean 'fair and just'.
Just is not a great word when used to me 'only' or something else other than a legal term. Yes, you can probably show instances where it's been used incorrectly, but just because you can show me it was used incorrectly by someone else, doesn't mean it's okay for you to use it incorrectly in your descriptive text.
Examples:
As If! - Overuse and Misuse of the Word 'as' 2008-10-13 22:20:00 Ah, the catchphrase from the movie Clueless, "As if!"
Today I want to talk about the word 'as' and how it is weakening your writing, particularly your fiction writing.
"As" is one of the most frequently overused and misused words I edit when I'm editing fiction. So let's start with this list of 'shouldn'ts'...
'As' shouldn't be used to mean 'because'.
'As' shouldn't be used to mean 'while'.
Fiction Writing: Direct the Mind Movie of Your Reader 2008-10-09 10:43:00 When readers read our fiction writing, we hope they are going to picture the story in their head, much like watching a movie playing out before their eyes. We need to write in such a way that the movie in their head flows well. If we write in such a way that the reader will picture something and then have to 'rewind' and change the picture they've drawn in their head, the reader will eventually Read more:Direct
, Fiction
, Reader
It's NaNoWriMo Time! 2008-10-06 08:07:00 Every year in October, while everyone else is out celebrating Halloween or working on parties or getting ready for Thanksgiving, I am at home getting myself prepared for the NaNoWriMo
Challenge in November. That link will show you how to prepare for NaNoWriMo, but let me tell you a little bit about what NaNo is.
Na - National
No - Novel
Wri - Writing
Mo - Month.
NaNoWriMo is National Novel
Don't Tell Your Story in the Dialogue 2008-10-01 12:15:00 I'm currently reading story called The Face of Death, by Cody McFayden. It's a good story. I mean, it's a really good story. There is one problem with it that bugs me though. The author has chosen to have the main character, in dialogue, tell the readers things they need to know. This is fine, except, this main character is an FBI agent who is talking to other law enforcement officials, most of
Overusing Prepositions 2008-09-29 08:25:00 It's important to remember when writing that the way we write is different from the way we speak, and dialogue and descriptive text should reflect those differences. I'm going to talk about dialogue versus descriptive text in a future blog post on this editing hints and tips blog, so keep looking for it, but today, I point it out because I think this mistake of overusing prepositions is because
Don't Begin or Start to Do Something - DO IT! 2008-09-29 08:14:00 I've written about this before, but after editing this book I did for LBF, I had to mention it again.
Don't have a character start to do something unless you intend for them to be interrupted and not get to do. Otherwise, just have them do it.
For example, "Cathy started to cry."
That's okay as long as you add another sentence to it that says, "Cathy started to cry, but when she saw the other Read more:Start
Hyphenated Two-Word Phrases 2008-09-26 12:17:00 I received a question the other day in email about when to use a hyphen between two words, and why sometimes a hyphen is used with the same two-word phrase while other times it is not. That's what today's post will be about: when you hyphenate two words and when not to hyphenate.
Generally speaking, you're going to hyphenate two words that come together before a noun and act together as 'one' Read more:Phrases
Graduation Day 2008-09-18 20:06:00 Just a shorty today, something that bugs me.
I see people write or speak this phrase, "When I graduated college..."
In this instance, graduated is a verb, and college is the direct object, meaning the action of the verb is performed directly on the object, 'college'.
What you really mean to say is that you, "...graduated FROM college."
The verb form of 'graduate' has to be used with the
Superflous Thats 2008-09-06 15:19:00 The word 'that' is, from what I can tell in my editing, the single most overused word in the English language. Sometimes necessary, but often overused, taking 'that' out of a sentence usually makes the sentence stronger, more concise, and at least one word less wordy.
Some examples:
How can I show you that I want you to smile?Can be rewritten:
How can I show you I want you to smile?
And the
Addressing Names, Nicknames and Pet Names in Writing 2008-09-05 14:46:00 When you're addressing someone, that is, calling them by name (pet name, nick name, title as a name, etc), the person's name must be offset with a comma - always.
See, there is this thing with commas that any part of the sentence that could be lifted out of the sentence without changing the meaning of the sentence must be offset with a comma or set of commas.
Names
are included in that.
Michy, Read more:Addressing
Suspension of Disbelief 2008-09-05 11:38:00 This has been hashed around in a lot of writing forums and there is much debate about what this really means and how necessary it really is in a story.
Before I get into my belief on how necessary it is, let me see if I can explain what suspension of disbelief is first, in easy to understand terms, I hope.
If, at any time while reading your story, a reader can say, "There is no way that would Read more:Disbelief
How to Punctuate Titles (books, songs, CDs, magazines, articles) When Referred to In Text 2008-08-29 12:02:00 One frequently asked question about grammar is how to punctuate titles, and there are a couple of different aspects to title punctuation. I want to start first with how to punctuate titles in a text, such as whether or not to underline, italics or quote (single or double quotes) the title, or how to do it when there's more than one title, or it's a work of art, etc.
There is a 'big' and 'little' Read more:songs
, Titles
How to Properly Show Emphasis in Professional Writing (Hint: Don't Use ALL CAPS!) 2008-08-20 19:09:00 When I edit manuscripts for writers, I often find things people regularly write online or on a blog or in chats or forums are finding their way into what should be professional writing. One of the common things I see is ALL CAPS to show emphasis on a word or phrase. I also see people using multiple exclamation points, multiple question marks, and the interobang ?! or !?.
None of these are
Weak Writing with Weasel Words 2008-08-07 12:24:00 Ah, a little alliteration in the title this morning!
Okay, you're probably wondering what weasel words are, right?
What are weasel words?
Well, whether you are actively aware of this or not, weasel words are a way of slipping personal opinion into what you are writing, and to do it in such a way that it sounds credible, but isn't exactly verifiable.
For example, if I personally think that Read more:Weasel
, Words
Interjections 2008-07-25 23:55:00
I just had to. It's a part of my childhood. If you watch the video, nowadays, I know parents who would get up in the air about it and scream they'd never let their kids watch that trash - my goodness, they show a cartoon butt, say 'down there' and, gasp, show a woman dating. Amazing how the world changes.
Anyway, the important part of the video is about the interjection. Recently I've noticed
Commas Can Change Meaning! 2008-07-18 19:50:00 Commas are Powerful Punctuation Marks! Just a quickie tonight, because, well, I'm lazy and being indulgent.
Was talking online to a friend on IM.
She was having a rough day - we've all done it, you know, deleted a file we were working on and couldn't recover it, having to do the work over again.
Frustrating stuff.
So she whined to me on IM a little bit, and when she was Read more:Change
, Meaning
How to Write and Punctuate Thoughts in Fiction Writing 2008-07-08 06:58:00 When I was working under a big house editor awhile back, one of the things he told me was that he would toss out any manuscript that said:
... he thought to himself.He said this was a rookie mistake for a writer to make. It marked the writer as someone who had not taken the time to write well.
Why?
Because, unless you are writing a science fiction or fantasy novel in which characters can Read more:Fiction
, Write
A vs. An 2008-07-08 06:56:00 I would have thought most writers knew this one, but I've stumbled upon this error on more than one site recently, and not just in the text of the writing but in the titles sometimes!
It's a quick tip today, because it really doesn't require much in the way of explanation.
When using 'a' or 'an', it's very easy to know which to use when.
'A' is used in front of a word that begins with a
Read Forward, Read Out Loud, Read Backward 2008-06-09 01:07:00 One of the best editing tips I can give anyone when self editing is to read your work out loud, preferably to someone else other than yourself, before you submit it anywhere and after you've done all your editing. You'd be amazed when you read it to someone else how you change the inflection when you read it - the inflection you use when reading to someone else is the same inflection others will Read more:Forward
No title 2008-06-04 22:31:00 Associated Content held an Ultimate Call for Content Contest where everyone who enters submits one 500-word article on a topic of their choice, that had a few other specifications, and then the winner is going to get a $5000 prize.
I don't know if you remember me writing awhile back about entering contests, but entering free writing contests doesn't take anything but time, but winning them can
Try And, Try And, Try And Try.... 2008-05-01 19:47:00 Here's an editing tip that I bet many of you overlook or maybe don't even realize you do.
"I'm going to try and go to the store."
Let's look at this... 'and' is a conjunction that ties two sections of a sentence or two phrases together. 'And' means inclusive - so when you use the word 'and, you are meaning both the first phrase AND the second phrase (as compared to 'or', which means one or the
COMCAST problems.... 2008-04-22 14:53:00 If you are a subscriber to my Accentuate Writers board, and you are a Comcast Subscriber, you should know that Comcast is being way too aggressive and stupid about their spam blocking.
I very rarely will badmouth any company, particularly in public where anyone and everyone can read it, but I am sick and tired of Comcast's aggressive spam filters that block out innocent non-spam emails that YOU Read more:problems
Real Writers Don't Use Semicolons! 2008-04-02 09:33:00 Okay, so the title isn't exactly true.
I DO NOT edit my blog posts as much as I should, usually in too big of a hurry to get the information out and I manage several blogs, so yes, sometimes I make mistakes. We all do.
I say this, because if I didn't say it, sometimes some wise ass will come along and tell me where I dropped a comma or used too many periods in my ellipses - and of course, they Read more:Writers
Fiction Writing: Present Tense Problems 2008-11-17 21:24:00 While I see shifts in this trend recently, with more books being written in first person than ever before, the majority of fiction books are written in third person, past tense. The reason for this is because it's an easy style to write in where omniscient POV or multiple POVs (points of view) can be used, giving the writer more flexibility while allowing the reader to 'see' more in the story.
Read more:Fiction
, Present
, Tense
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