Writer, Editor, Helper

When Your Novel Quotes a Real Source

 

Careless quoting is a writing crime. Fiction or nonfiction, a writer must be scrupulous in quoting words precisely and crediting their source. Most publishing contracts hold the author liable for misrepresentations and plagiarism, but even without that legal pressure, a writer, of all people, should naturally respect the intellectual property of others.

Writers of historical fiction, memoir, creative nonfiction, and books for children often handle source materials that provide background and authenticity to their stories. Sometimes they quote from published or unpublished writings; sometimes they quote from speeches or interviews or online videos. But the way they credit their sources ranges from providing pages of detailed citations to providing—nothing.

Let’s take a closer look at the writer’s challenges and responsibilities.

3 Easy E-Tricks for Writers, and 1 for Fun

Almost every writer I know has a love-hate relationship with their writing program, whether it’s Microsoft Word, Google Docs, Scrivener, or a yellow legal pad. It’s clear there’s no single perfect choice for drafting, editing, and formatting your work for publication.

Scrivener is great for drafting but has limited formatting capabilities. Docs is great for collaborations, and it can handle basic formatting, but it lacks compatibility with professional formatting and editing tools like PerfectIt and the add-ins from the Editorium. MS Word is the publishing workhorse, more or less required for submitting to agents and editors and publishers, but it’s pricey and not always friendly.

Getting to know your word processor better will help you love it more. Here are some moves you can use in Word and Docs and sometimes Scrivener.

How to Mention a Real Newspaper, Book, or Song in Fiction

Narrators and characters in novels and other creative writing can talk about whatever they want. A character might read the Chicago Sun-Times; they might say they like to sing “Drivers License” while brushing their teeth. A narrator might mention a famous poem or novel or TV show: “The host didn’t mention that he’d heard the same joke on The Simpsons.”*

Writers often ask how to style such titles. With italics? Quotation marks? Title caps?

Crediting Images at an Author Website

Your author website probably has a nice banner image, and if you blog, you probably look online for eye-catching artwork to illustrate or decorate your posts or pages. Maybe your About page features a professional headshot or images from book signings or other events. When you borrow images from another creator, whether you found them in printed form, online, or crumpled in your mother’s coat pocket, there will be times when you’re obliged to acknowledge that the work isn’t yours.

In printed books, such credits can appear in captions, footnotes, endnotes, and bibliographies. Sometimes credits are gathered on the copyright page or in a list of illustrations. But those options weren’t exactly invented with your website vibe in mind. Here, I’ll explain how you can easily adapt several of these traditional crediting methods for website use.

Can I Put an iPhone in My Novel?

Short answer: Yes.

Now and then, a writer or editor asks our online Q&A whether mentioning a brand name in a work of fiction requires permission or the addition of the trademark (™) or registered (^®) symbol.

Fortunately, in works published in the United States there’s no need to sidetrack readers with unsightly sentences like “Her iPhone^® slipped from her fingers and into the lake.” Anyone who reads fiction regularly already knows this. Mentioning a brand name in a work of fiction is generally considered fair use* unless it goes so far as to infringe on the rights of the owner. (More on that below.)

This freedom of mention in fiction is basically the same as for nonfiction, journalism, blog posts, and other published prose, but there are reasons to take care when using the names of real products in any work.

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 . . .

Continue reading

Photo courtesy of Clker-Free-Vector-Images.

When the Privacy You LoseIsn’t Even Yours

Some time ago I discovered by Googling myself (no, I’m not ashamed of that) that my phone number is 773-633-671, that I created the website for the Chicago Manual of Style, and—most surprising of all—that I am the author of a book about ferrets. Being naive and optimistic, I tried to get the information removed or corrected, which, I’m sure you know, is much more difficult than putting toothpaste back in the tube (which is not that hard).*

The most effective way to deal with misinformation about oneself is not to care. And over time, I truly have come not to care whether people believe that I wrote a book about ferrets. But I do continue to care about accuracy in published media. It’s something copyeditors are in a position to support.

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*V-e-r-y carefully and slowly squeeze as much air from the tube as you can without letting any more toothpaste out. Then put the mouth of the tube against the escaped toothpaste and stop squeezing. The toothpaste should slurp right on in. Repeat five hundred times.

Photo: Black Footed Ferrets, by skeeze from Pixabay.