Introduction

What I Do 

1. Mechanical editing, which covers grammar, spelling, punctuation, capitalization and so forth 

2. Substantive editing, which addresses content, organization, effectiveness, style, unity, appropriateness to audience, and the like 

3. Developmental editing, which guides the author through the planning and writing of a manuscript 

4. Seminars on grammar, composition, technical writing, business writing, and fiction 

I accept fiction, nonfiction, articles, and technical, academic, and commercial documents. 

What I Don't Do 

1. Documents on a level of technicality that requires an editor from the field 

2. Manuscripts I consider hateful, libelous, or pornographic   

Introduction  

The internet is easily accessible, and the writing-to-publishing process is lightning-quick, so it is not surprising that so much poor writing ends up on our little screens. Not just from borderline-illiterate social media trolls, but from writers who make a living at it. This is not to say that most social media users are illiterate, but that too many sloppy writers send their assaults on the English language into cyberspace without restraint. Come to think of it, restraint is not necessarily a hallmark of cyber-communication. 

But old-school print or latter-day electronics, a baseline of literacy exists that one should be embarrassed to cross. From misused hyphenation (the child was two-years-old), to tense confusion (when they interviewed him, he had said that he hasn’t been in that part of town), spelling woes (love at first site), or go-nowhere sentence fragments (Jack. Nothing useful ever. You know), nothing deters some of us from displaying our failure to self-edit. 

A step forward is reading what we write. Maybe even out loud. A more revolutionary plan is to look things up, or at least ask someone who may know.

 Questions (Please direct to mjces@gci.net)

A surprising number of missed guesses at a and an pops up even with experienced writers. The rule is easy: Go by pronunciation, not spelling. You use an before a word that is pronounced with an initial vowel, and a when such a word is pronounced with an initial consonant.               

An easy fix—just say the words aloud.

 Grammar Gripes and Style Stumblers

In writing fiction, the formatting or punctuation of a character’s thoughts frequently comes up. The presentation in written text of what someone is thinking is in the form of either direct or indirect thought. Because indirect thought generally requires no particular punctuation, formatting questions usually concern direct thought. 

The choice of format style depends on the writer’s preference, the incidence of direct thought in the document, and the mix of thoughts and dialog. As always, consistency is more important than the technique chosen. 

Direct thought is the actual thought as it exists in someone’s head (Where is that key?), most often in the present tense, although the surrounding text is usually in the past tense. 

Three options are commonly used in formatting the actual, or direct thought: italics, quotation marks, and the do-nothing approach. 

In using italics, the writer clearly tells readers that this is someone’s thought rather than speech (She stomped around the house searching every room. Where is that key? Bet the kids played with it again).  Attribution (he/she/I/you/we/they thought) is rarely necessary. This is a plus, because readers and writers alike get tired of an endless succession of she said/he thought/we stated, and so forth. 

Some writers prefer the second option: using quotation marks instead of italics, even at the obvious risk of leaving the reader wondering whether a character said or thought something. Attribution is helpful here (She stomped around the house searching every room. “Where is that key? I bet the kids played with it again,” she thought). 

A third choice is to do nothing to set the thought apart, and count on the reader to get the right idea. No quotation marks, italics, or any other gimmick. This absence of format usually screams for a he-thought/she-thought. (She stomped around the house searching every room. Where is that key? she thought. Bet the kids played with it again). Especially in first-person text, and in other documents that contain a lot of direct thought, option 3 may serve the reader well. 

Indirect thought is a thought as reported by the author (She wandered around the house looking everywhere. Where could that key be?) usually in the past tense, and often with a he/she/etc. thought attached (He looked down the street. What a depressing view, he thought). Attribution is often needed here.

 Terrible Twos

This is perhaps a good time to remind ourselves of the differences between pandemic, endemic, and epidemic. They may sound equally threatening, but there are some differences. 

Endemic = native to a particular people or country, or prevalent among or peculiar to a place, field, or environment

The self-adulation endemic in the world of entertainment, where any participant is a “star” 

Epidemic = excessively prevalent or spreading in an area or community; contagious; a suddenly increasing development, such as a fast-spreading outbreak of a disease or behavior

An epidemic of typhoid in India; an epidemic of riots around the country. 

Pandemic = epidemic on grand scale

The pandemic of Covid-19; the pandemic of anti-Semitism throughout Eurasia resulting from conflicts in the Middle East. 

If a phenomenon is contained in or characteristic of a limited area, regardless of size, it is called endemic. If it rapidly spreads through a larger area, it is termed epidemic; if it is out of control in a far larger area than, for instance, national boundaries, it is pandemic. The common denominator appears to be a shared trait, condition, or behavior and in the case of epidemic and pandemic, a rapid dissemination of these phenomena on an increasing scale and/or in an ever-larger space.

 Everybody Does It

A neighbor kid known for her addiction to sweets, asked how she liked her cotton candy at the fair:

“It was totally absolutely amazing!” 

Liking cotton candy, especially for a sugar freak, is not amazing. It is entirely predictable. Inevitable, even. Amazing has been demoted to pleasant, yummy, nice, cool. We have done this with many words that at one time held a great deal of meaning. Awesome comes to mind. See also Media Turkeys above.

Media Turkeys

Internet sites provide many opportunities to practice editing. One such site came up with this little treasure: 

After a young mother saw her sweet 17-month-old child being picked up and swung around by her dog, she was monstrously stunned. Yet, when she looked closer, she discovered a considerably all the more astounding revelation, and the dog was not to blame. 

In keeping with the popular trend of using powerful words in excess and then not finding in your vocabulary an alternative word choice that does the job better than stunned, qualifiers such as very, extremely, considerably, quite, and now monstrously, are attached. The writer thereby demonstrates that stunned is of no more forceful meaning than, say, surprised. Through overuse, the writer has watered down stunned, so that it can now no longer convey the intensity required. Hence monstrously stunned. Isn’t the word stunned by itself monstrous enough? It follows, of course, that if you can be monstrously stunned, it must also be possible to be somewhat stunned, or just a teeny-tiny little bit stunned. Not exactly a style gem. 

Considerably all the more astounding (this writer was on a roll) is yet another example of the weakened impact of a powerful word (astounding) through the use of qualifiers. If you absolutely must write thesaurus-style, use either all the more astounding or considerably more astounding, not considerably all the more. Trimming this verbal pile-up to even more astounding or simply astounding would have been better yet. 

When you get this far in rewriting this sentence, read it again, and you will start questioning the awkward phrase discovered . . . a revelation. Start playing with that, and you may discover a previously undiscovered revelation of astonishingly very much considerably better wording.

Potholes

From news article: Pregnant mom of three killed in crash with professional boxer suspected of drunk driving. 

Is the pregnant mother intoxicated or the professional boxer?