{"id":247,"date":"2011-12-02T16:22:33","date_gmt":"2011-12-02T23:22:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/martymartins.com\/martysblog\/?p=247"},"modified":"2011-12-02T16:22:33","modified_gmt":"2011-12-02T23:22:33","slug":"notes-on-self-editing-part-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/martymartins.com\/martysblog\/?p=247","title":{"rendered":"Notes on Self-Editing – Part 2"},"content":{"rendered":"

Continuing on with the\u00a0notes I took while reading Evan Marshall’s book, Novel Writing, <\/em>and, as before, with\u00a0my comments in bold italics<\/em><\/strong>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Simplicity and Redundancy<\/strong><\/p>\n

– Delete redundancies.\u00a0 While we’re going after redundancies, can “a point in time” be banned from the language until further notice?<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

– Often you can delete unnecessary possessives.<\/p>\n

– Often you can delete that<\/em>.\u00a0 Hate ’em.\u00a0 I read somewhere that “that” is the most overused unenecessary word in the English language.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

– Clean out qualifiers like a bit, a little, fairly, highly, just, kind of, mostly, sort of<\/em>.\u00a0 They’re all weakeners and almost always unnecessary.<\/p>\n

– For stronger impact, cut unnecessary articles (a\/an, the<\/em>).<\/p>\n

– Delete and<\/em> at the beginning of a sentence.<\/p>\n

– Often you can cut of<\/em>.<\/p>\n

– Don’t use the fact that.<\/em><\/p>\n

– Watch for circumlocution — saying things in an indirect or roundabout way.\u00a0<\/p>\n

– Cut unnecessary words.\u00a0 Not “The smile on his face, but “His smile.”<\/p>\n

– Watch for autonomous body parts.\u00a0 Never have body parts act on their own, except for the eyes.<\/p>\n

– When describing the act of looking, use gaze<\/em> rather than eyes<\/em> to avoid hilarity.<\/p>\n

– Cut began to<\/em> or started to<\/em> unless you are describing a character actually starting a task or activity.<\/p>\n

– Don’t overuse then<\/em>.\u00a0 Remember: In fiction, everything is consecutive; readers expect one thing to follow another.<\/p>\n

– Don’t tell readers something twice.<\/p>\n

– Don’t tell readers more than they need to know.<\/p>\n

– To avoid confusion, refer to each character the same way every time.<\/p>\n

– Don’t overuse characters’ names.\u00a0 Use the name, then switch to he<\/em> or she<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Clarity and Precision<\/strong><\/p>\n

– Seek and destroy clich\u00e9s.\u00a0 I always enjoy Michelle Kern’s<\/a> clever and witty\u00a0pieces in the National Examiner\u00a0in which she battles clich\u00e9s.\u00a0 And while we’re at it, is there\u00a0no “journalist” in the print or broadcast media\u00a0who can’t come up with another way to say “rapidly rising” than the worn-out “skyrocketing?”<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

– To show habitual action, use past tense rather than would.\u00a0 (“Each morning he walked<\/em>,” rather than “Each morning he would walk<\/em>.”)<\/p>\n

– Watch it<\/em>, which should replace the noun that immediately precedes it.<\/p>\n

– Don’t use the weakeners appeared to<\/em> or seemed to<\/em>.<\/p>\n

– Don’t tell readers what you’re showing them.<\/p>\n

– Limit the use of there<\/em> and there were<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Grammar, Usage, and Style<\/strong><\/p>\n

– Watch for and remove inadvertent rhyme.<\/p>\n

– Don’t use the same “important” word twice on the same page.\u00a0 On the other hand, don’t be afraid to repeat “unimportant” words.\u00a0 An important word might also be simply an unusual or at least seldom used word.\u00a0 You totally delete the impact of its specialness if you use it more than once.\u00a0 The English language is too rich for you to have to do that.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

– Watch for misplaced modifiers.<\/p>\n

-Watch for introductory participles that don’t modify the subject of the sentence.<\/p>\n

– Don’t use hopefully<\/em>.<\/p>\n

-Watch for “Morse code.”\u00a0 Do you really need so many unfinished sentences trailing off in ellipses?<\/p>\n

– Restrict your use of the intrusive exclamation point almost exclusively to dialogue and feelings\/thoughts.\u00a0 Otherwise, understatement is best.<\/p>\n

– Avoid long, blocklike paragraphs.\u00a0 Break them up whenever possible.\u00a0 Yes, please!\u00a0 Besides making the text easier to read, it adds white space to the page, making it more attractive.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

– Don’t overload a sentence with too much information.\u00a0 For example, don’t describe how something looks and<\/em> what it does in the same sentence.<\/p>\n

– Make sure pronouns agree with their antecedents.<\/p>\n

Whether you are with a publishing house or are self-publishing, your work will be professionally edited.\u00a0 (If you are a self-published author who omits using a professional editor, I think you should reconsider calling yourself an author.)\u00a0 However, the more self-editing you do, the easier and better job the pro can do.\u00a0 And don’t fool yourself, even the professionals make mistakes.\u00a0 There must have been at least a dozen misspelled words or other errors in Vince Flynn’s (whom I like and respect) last novel, American Assassin<\/em>.<\/p>\n

After I was finished writing The Blizzard<\/em>, probably another six months was spent on editing.\u00a0 I’d bet I re-read it at least 12 times and each time I found a missed close quote, or added a\u00a0comma, or found a\u00a0better word or a tighter way to say something.\u00a0 During the same period I had several other authors or avid readers with good English skills go over it.\u00a0 Interestly,\u00a0each would always find a typo or error that the others (and\u00a0often, I) had missed.\u00a0 After all that, a 13-year-old girl found a misspelled word in the first printing!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Continuing on with the\u00a0notes I took while reading Evan Marshall’s book, Novel Writing, and, as before, with\u00a0my comments in bold italics. Simplicity and Redundancy – Delete redundancies.\u00a0 While we’re going after redundancies, can “a point in time” be banned from … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,7,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-247","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-editing-proofreading","category-interior-design","category-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/martymartins.com\/martysblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/martymartins.com\/martysblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/martymartins.com\/martysblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/martymartins.com\/martysblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/martymartins.com\/martysblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=247"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/martymartins.com\/martysblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/martymartins.com\/martysblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=247"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/martymartins.com\/martysblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=247"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/martymartins.com\/martysblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=247"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}