Tag: editing

Highlight to Success

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[by Billi Joy Carson, Senior Editor/ Editing Addict]

Editor Tip: Highlight to Success

Every writer—no matter how strong a wordsmith—has at least one crutch word. To the author, the words remain hidden, and unseen, but to the reader, the words become machine-gun weapon rounds every time they read them.

The words are different for each author, just as style and genre differ. The impact of the words on the readers, however, remains the same. The more crutch words you have, the greater the possibility you will lose your readership. The pain of hitting word after word after word becomes greater than the desire to keep reading.

Have you noticed the number of times a variation of word has been used in these two paragraphs? Ten times in a ninety-five word count. A deft killer of writing, hiding in plain sight. Crutch words.

What are the most popular crutch words?

They are the small ones. Innocuous. Overlooked in read-throughs, and missed in proofing: and, had, that, my, he, she, it, her, him, said, looked, saw, turned, smiled, be, is, was, were, been.

Steps to becoming crutch-free:

1. Search [Edit/Find All] your manuscript for each crutch word listed above. You might be surprised how many times they pop up in your book.

2. Highlight all occurrences of the word you’re searching for (e.g. that)

a. How many highlights are clustered together?

b. If you feel annoyed seeing all the highlights…

(1) …guess how your readers feel?

(2) Time to fix it.

3. Rework the areas where the highlights show up clustered together

a. Many can simply be deleted without changing the meaning

(1) The man that was sitting at the table, told her that she was beautiful.

(2) The man, sitting at the table, told her she was beautiful.

b. Some can be reworded, or reordered, to strengthen the writing.

First paragraphs with highlight method:

Every writer—no matter how strong a wordsmith—has at least one crutch word. To the author, the words remain hidden, and unseen, but to the reader, the words become machine-gun weapon rounds every time they read them.

The words are different for each author, just as style and genre differ. The impact of the words on the readers, however, remains the same. The more crutch words you have, the greater the possibility you will lose your readership. The pain of hitting word after word after word becomes greater than the desire to keep reading.

First paragraphs reworded:

Every writer—no matter how strong a wordsmith—has at least one crutch word. To the author, it remains hidden, and unseen, but to the reader, the writing becomes machine-gun weapon rounds every time they read them.

The weaknesses are different for each author, just as style and genre differ. The impact on the readers, however, remains the same. The more crutches you have, the greater the possibility you will lose your readership. The pain of hitting word after word becomes greater than the desire to keep reading.

Once you master this, you will keep your writing alive, and retain your readership. It’s a tedious task the first two or three times, but it will eventually be second nature to you.

Questions for the editor to answer next time:

Go back

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[by Billi Joy Carson, Senior Editor / Editing Addict] 

Punctuate That Title

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[found on thepunctuationguide.com]

“Titles of works

The titles of certain works are indicated with quotation marks, others with italics, and yet others with regular type.

The style presented here is consistent with The Chicago Manual of Style (16th ed.) and the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers (7th ed.), and is appropriate for most academic and professional writing. Newspapers tend to favor quotation marks in place of italics for most titles.”

Click image:

1)   To see entire list

2)   To read more important tools from

thepunctuationguide.com

 

Screen Shot 2014-06-30 at 3.39.18 PM

 

[found on http://www.thepunctuationguide.com/titles-of-works.html]

 

Guest Bloggers

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Editing Addict is teaming up with bloggers all around the world.

 

Our goal is to bring new tips, tricks, and techniques to our writers and readers. Categories for Guest Blogs include:

 

PUBLISHING

WRITING

EDITING

MARKETING

 

Want to be a Guest Blogger? Let us know, and review our Guidelines and Information Needed For Guest Bloggers.

 

Be Thou Funny; Nay, Hilarious!

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[found on thewritepractice.com; by Joe Bunting]

Joe Bunting’s Commandments to Writing Funny”

“1. Thou Shalt Not Worry About Offending

First and most important, if you’re overly concerned about what others will think, don’t try your hand at funny . . . . stay true to your voice and integrity.

2. Thou Shalt Pay Attention to the Mundane

Jerry Seinfield wasn’t funny because he could do impersonations, or was overly animated or creative. He was funny because he told the truth about the mundane….

3. Thou Shalt Take Clichés to Extremes

…when there was report after report about the Occupy Movement marching on streets all over the nation, I wrote Occupy Marches on Sesame Street—twentysomething angst taking on the puppets who lied to them first.

Taking cliches to the extreme is the bedrock to satire.

4. Thou Shalt Use Metaphors and Similes Like the Bubonic Plague

(First, see Commandments 1 and 3.) Metaphors and similes are to funny as Hugh Grant is to romantic comedy.”

To read the entire article by Joe Bunting, click here.

[found on http://thewritepractice.com/four-commandments-to-writing-funny/]

Research How-To…and Why

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[found on copyblogger.com; by  ]

“I’m going to talk about research. No, research is not very fun, and it’s never glamorous, but it matters. A lot.

If you want to be able to make compelling case for something — whether it’s in a book, on a blog, or in a multi-million dollar VC pitch — you need stories that frame your arguments, rich anecdotes to compliment tangible examples, and impressive data so you can empirically crush counter arguments.

But good research doesn’t just magically appear. Stories, anecdotes and data have to be found before you can use them.

You have to hunt them down like a shark, chasing the scent of blood across the vast ocean of information. The bad news is that this is an unenviable task … but the good news is that it’s not impossible.

It’s not even that hard … once you learn what you’re doing — and I’m going to teach you those skills.

By the time I was 21, my research had been used by #1 New York Times Bestselling authors like Robert Greene, Tim Ferriss, and Tucker Max. Was I a slave to study? Did I have to become a library hermit to accomplish this? No, I did it all in my spare time–on the side, with just a few hours of work a week.

Here’s how I did it …

Step 1: Prepare long before gameday [sic]

…This is the mark you must aim for as a researcher, to not only have enough material — and to know where the rest of what you haven’t read will be located — on hand to do your work….

Step 2: Learn to search (Google) like a pro

…How do you find a needle in haystack? Get rid of the extra hay….

Step 3: Go down the rabbit hole (embrace serendipity)

…One of my rules as a reader is to read one book mentioned in or cited in every book that I read. It not only solves the problem of ‘what to read next’ but it sends you on a journey down the rabbit hole….

Step 4: When in doubt, turn to the classics

…The Classics are “classic” for a reason. They’ve survived the test of time….

Step 5: Keep a commonplace book

…a book of quotes, sentences, metaphors and  miscellany that he could use at a moment’s notice….”

To read the entire article from , click here.

[found on http://www.copyblogger.com/content-marketing-research/]

A Writer’s Time Management

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[found on wrwdc.com; By Joan Whetzel]

“Many writers find time management at least a minor issue, while for others it may be a major issue, especially those who can never seem to find the time to write. The following tips may not completely get rid of all writing time management issues, but hopefully they will reduce the time management problems to a minimum.

1. Track Your Time. If you find you simply have no idea where the time went on a consistent basis, then it’s time to start tracking your time. Take a week or two to record how you spend your time from the time you get up in the morning until you go to bed. Use a spiral notebook, split into columns: left hand column for the start and end time, middle column for a brief description of each activity, and the right hand column for the amount of time to complete that activity. Record the day and date at the top of each page. Then go through the journal to determine where you can shave time off activities (or remove them from your routine) in order to create more time for writing.

2. Set Goals. Goals give writers something to aim for. It could be a minimum word or paragraph count per day, a minimum word or page count per week, or a minimum article count per month. Meeting your goals will keep your writing progress moving forward.

3. Set Aside Time Just for Research. Having to keep stopping to research facts that you don’t know disrupts any writing schedule, cuts down on the available writing time, and distracts writers from their writing goals. Set aside a regular time to research the information you need to do your writing for the week. Then your writing time will be available for writing only….”

To read the complete article by Joan Whetzel, click here.

[found on http://wrwdc.com/15-time-management-tips-for-writers/]

Two Words? Oops, One Word

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[found on quickanddirtytips.com; by Bonnie Trenga Mills]

“Do you want to get ahead (one word) or are you cooking an esoteric dish and want to get a head (two words)? That one little space can make a big difference in meaning: Either you are moving past others in business or you are purchasing a skull…..

When it comes to pairs such as “apart” with no space and “a part” with a space, the spelling doesn’t matter when you’re talking; both sound the same. When you write the words, however, you might forget to add a space, or you might add an unnecessary one. This problem crops up with all kinds of words, but in this episode we’re focusing on words beginning with the letter “a.”

Words That Start With “A”

Here’s a short list of pairs like “ahead” and “a head”: “alight” and “a light,” “abuzz” and “a buzz,” “apart” and “a part,” and, lastly, “ahold” and “a hold.” As you can see from this list, the one-worders beginning with “a” can be various parts of speech: “ahead” is an adverb, “alight” is a verb,” and “abuzz” is an adjective. The two-worders, on the other hand, consist of an article—the word “a”—and a noun: “light,” “buzz,” “part,” and “hold.” True, these words can sometimes be verbs, but when something follows the article “a,” it’s a noun (unless something such as an adjective comes between the article and the noun, as in “a delicious cake”).

“Alight” Versus “A Light”

Let’s see these four pairs in action. The first two—“alight”/“a light” and “abuzz”/“a buzz”—are the easy ones. You could say, “That annoying bee wants to alight on my nose.” This means the bee wants to land on your nose, and there’s no space in “alight.” If you say, “He turned on a light”—with a space—that means he was no longer enveloped in darkness.

“Abuzz” Versus “A Buzz”

In keeping with the bee theme, here’s our next example: “I heard a buzz.” A quick test for those listening: Is there a space or not? Well, yes, there is! “A buzz” with a space means “a buzzing noise.” “Abuzz” with no space is an adjective that means alive with activity, as in “The room became abuzz when the grammarian entered.”

To read the entire article from Grammar Girl, click here.

[found on http://www.quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/a-hold-or-ahold]