The Subversive Copy Editor Blog

“Had had”? Flashbacks and the Past Perfect

My post today at Fiction+ (for The Chicago Manual of Style):

Novelists are sometimes urged to eliminate the past-perfect tense from their sentences, and copyeditors are sometimes trained to search out those auxiliary “hads” and lop them off from their verbs. What exactly is the past perfect? And what’s wrong with using it?

(Continue reading at Fiction+)

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Image: Nested laptops by Tumisu (Pixabay).

Sure, You Got A’s in English—But Do You Know Where Commas Go?

My post today at Fiction+ (for The Chicago Manual of Style):

A few months ago in a conference session, a group of novelists digressed into good-natured complaints about being copyedited. One writer drew a lot of laughs saying, “I mean, I got A’s in English! I know where the freaking commas go!”* Others nodded in recognition and comradery.

I bit my tongue. I really wanted to say—as gently as possible—I’m sorry dear, but you freaking don’t.

(Continue reading at Fiction+)

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Image: : Graduation Cake Guy by David Goehring, licensed under CC BY 2.0.

 

“Hazel and I’s puppy”? When Fiction Meets Bad Grammar

 

 

Today at Fiction+ (The Chicago Manual of Style’s Shop Talk blog), I write about the trending compound possessive pronoun “I’s,” as in

“Hazel and I’s Puppy. The. Cutest. Ever.”

(Go to post at Fiction+)

 

 

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Photo: Old English Sheepdog by Meredith Bannan, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

 

Fiction+ for Creative Writers and Their Editors

Although I officially retired from my work at the Chicago Manual in December, I couldn’t say no to an opportunity to continue hanging around the CMOS Online Shop Talk blog when Russell Harper—the new editor—invited me to share a new corner of the blog with him called Fiction+. There we’ll focus on how to cope when Chicago style rules don’t quite seem to fit the creative context of a novel, story, poem, or play.

Russell kicked things off last week with a post on comma splices; today I interview Janet Burroway, author of the classic textbook Writing Fiction, a staple in creative writing classes that has just been issued in a new 10th edition.

If you’re interested in creative writing or editing, be sure to check out Fiction+. You can sign up for alerts if you want to be sure to catch new posts, and I’ll continue to give you a heads-up here.

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Photo: Woman Writing, by August Macke (1887–1914), courtesy Wikimedia Commons

 

Who’s a “Lazy” Copyeditor?

I’m blogging today at The Chicago Manual of Style Shop Talk blog:

Like all professional copyeditors, I try to keep up with news in my field, which means browsing the posts and articles of editors, grammarians, linguists, and lexicographers online. I do this through RSS feed subscriptions—Feedly is my reader of choice—and by bookmarking posts of interest into an “unread” folder, which I . . .

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Photo courtesy of Clker-Free-Vector-Images.

But Is It Wrong?

I’m blogging today at The Chicago Manual of Style Shop Talk blog:

One of the primal joys in life is to do good work. When the suit fits, the accounts balance, or the pie crust is flakey, someone takes pride in it.

In editing, it feels good to make corrections, tidy things up, and serve the reader. It feels good to put knowledge into practice. And—admit it—it feels good to spot an error! . . . Problems arise when

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Photo: Deliberate Mistake, courtesy of Neil Turner.

3 Rookie Goofs You Can Stop Making Right Now

I’m blogging today at The Chicago Manual of Style Shop Talk blog!

Some lessons are harder to learn than others. Unfortunately for new copyeditors, sometimes the only way to recognize bad habits is to get slammed a few times by writers pushing back or by supervisors writing stet all over the copy.

So let me save you some grief and humiliation! Here are three bad habits I identified the hard way as a young editor . . .

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Photo: Ooops!, courtesy of Sten Dueland.

“Dos and Don’ts”: Just Don’t

I’m blogging today at The Chicago Manual of Style Shop Talk blog!

We’ve all read those bossy directives from advice mongers: “Do rock a ripped T with a bright floral skirt.” “Don’t chew gum during an interview.” “Do practice blending eyeshadow with your brush.” “Don’t yank electrical cords from the wall.” Aside from being either fatuous and trendy or obvious and unhelpful, such lists actually pose some editorial dangers . . .

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Photo: Don’t, by Todd Slagter.

Are You a Grammar Troll?

I'm blogging today at The Chicago Manual of Style Shop Talk blog!

For years, it seems, it’s been impossible to find a language-related post or article online without a stickler making trouble in the comments section. Even on political, social, and retail sites, outraged commenters love to point out a  a missplaced apostrophe as a way to challenge the . . .

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Photo: Esther Lee, Freemont Troll, Seattle

 

 

Random Advice for Copyeditor Newbies

If you’re new to copyediting, consider these snippets of advice. (Be sure to check with your supervisor if any of them contradict your usual instructions.)

• Don’t query a word or spelling or locution without looking it up. If a writer uses an unfamiliar word or spelling more than once, it’s very possibly intended. It’s easy to paste “eat one’s cake and have it, too” into a search engine and learn that the writer doesn’t have it backward.
• Don’t waste a writer’s time by continually asking for approval. (“Okay? If you don’t like this, I can put it back.”) Rather, indicate your flexibility in the cover letter. On the manuscript, use queries for giving or asking for information.
• Save grief later by e-mailing the author before you make editing decisions that are hard to undo. (“Re romantic/Romantic: do you have a system for capping? Should I meddle?”)
• Don’t track changes that will be invisible or confusing on a black-and-white printout, such as deletions of hyphens.* If the editing is difficult to read, the writer won’t easily see that the results read well.
• Be conservative in editing until you have more experience. You should be ready to explain every mark you put on the page.
• Remember the copyeditor’s creed: First, do no harm.

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*My workaround is to explain in the cover letter that I have edited common compounds silently in accordance with CMOS and Webster’s 11th Collegiate, and that otherwise I track the opening or closing of compounds respectively like this: right_wing or home-townhometown.

Photo by Jamey Boelhower from Pixabay