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Hyphens!

Love ’em or hate ’em, they do make our lives—or our reading, rather—easier. The tricky thing about hyphens is that some rules about them aren’t set in stone. They depend on preference and that means our usage in those cases change over time.

These days, hyphens aren’t used as much, which leads to a lot of confusion. When do you use a hyphen and when not?

Luckily, some basic rules still exist, especially when it comes to the use of compound adjectives and numbers and fractions. In other cases, the most important rules to adhere to are:

  • Consult and stick with one particular dictionary, whether an online or offline one. (Don’t use both the online and offline version of one dictionary. Really try stick to one version and one version alone.)
  • Be consistent.

Compound nouns

Today, a lot of compound words are no longer spelled with a hyphen (we write website rather than web-site, and writing paper rather than writing-paper).Read More →

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Happy 2020, everyone! May this year bring you everything you need, including the ability to receive it.

I’ve set many goals and intentions for 2020, and one of them is to overhaul this blog. I’ve tried quite a few approaches over the past years, none of which really stuck, so new year, new way of doing things. Or organising things, rather.

The aim for 2020 is to have three posts a month: an interview with someone providing author services; a post with editing tips; and a more personal blogpost about all I’ve learned over the past month/period when it comes to writing, publishing, marketing, and so on.

We’re starting 2020 with an interview 🙂

Bethany Tucker lives in the Puget Sound Area, near Seattle in the U.S.A. Previously, she has lived and worked in China, South Korea, and Japan, as well as Ohio, California, and Chicago. She writes fantasy under two pen names and offers editing services to other creative professionals and hobbyists.

As a kid, she was the weird one reading grammar texts and studying character arcs with books written for adults. She draws inspiration from traveling, studying history, and her varied experiences among the communities she has been fortunate enough to meet. Her personal writing mantra is to leave figurative blood on the page and her readers sometimes hate or love her for what she makes them feel. If I can’t feel it, she says, then my readers won’t either.Read More →

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Let’s talk dialogue tags!

This has to be one of the most discussed topics when talking about the craft, and not everyone agrees on the dos and don’ts. But, as an editor, it’s clear to me that not everyone is up to speed. I set out to list everything I know about dialogue tags and then I found this great article that basically sums up what I was going to say 😉 Instead of inventing the wheel, I’ll just quote the article’s summary and give you the link if you want to read the rest. It’s a really good article with lots of examples.Read More →

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Once upon a time, there was a self-publishing podcast from which sprung the Facebook group The Smarter Artist. To create a platform where indie-writers could meet like-minded editors, a bunch of editors within this group of writers created the spin-off group The Smarter Artist Editors. Long story short, a dedicated few started a weekly thread sharing editing tips with the community, and we’re now ready to share these tips with the world.

Today, I’m sharing a tip from myself.

Hello Smarter Artists!

NaNoWriMo is around the corner, so how about we talk about outlining and plotting for a bit?

My clients often ask me what is the right way to outline their work. I know not every editor or writer will agree with me here, but I always tell them there are many ways to tackle your outline, and it’s about finding the approach that works best for you. Our brains are all wired differently, so what works for your best writing bud or Hemingway or JK Rowling might not work for you.

It also very much depend on whether you are a plotter, a pantser, or something in between. This article discusses 5 different ‘boxes’ in which a writer can fall depending on how they tackle their plots.

If you haven’t found a way that works best for you yet, feel free to experiment, try different methods, or even combine elements from different methods.

The way I go about it is I know where the story begins and where it ends, and then I trace back. First for my MC, then for the other important characters, then for the less important characters. What is it that they want and what obstacles will they have to overcome to get there? As I go through these layers, I look at how what different characters want conflicts or intertwines and how and where I can use that to help the plot along.

At this point, I will also look at the world in which my story is set and see how its elements (geography, customs, historical context, political atmosphere, underlying world views, and so on) could affect the characters and their development to create even more depth and conflict. After this exercise (which takes a long time for me), I am ready to distil the different chapters and the scenes they have to include, and that’s when I’m ready to actually start writing.

Do you have an outlining method that works for you? A handbook you swear by? Or are you still trying to figure out what works best for you?

For a little inspiration, this article discusses 7 different outlining methods.

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Once upon a time, there was a self-publishing podcast from which sprung the Facebook group The Smarter Artist. To create a platform where indie-writers could meet like-minded editors, a bunch of editors within this group of writers created the spin-off group The Smarter Artist Editors. Long story short, a dedicated few started a weekly thread sharing editing tips with the community, and we’re now ready to share these tips with the world.

Today, I’m sharing a tip from Emily Deady. Emily is a freelance editor who loves fantasy and historical fiction, especially if it involves a good romance.

Happy Friday from your friendly neighborhood editing group! Here’s a weekly tip to keep the editing juices alive and well all weekend! 

My current developmental editing obsession is refining the setup payoff moments to keep the reader turning pages.

J.K. Rowling is a master of this, both in her overall plots and in her granular scene development. In the first Harry Potter book, the most satisfactory payoff is when Gryffindor wins the house cup at the end. Thanks to her extensive setup, this emotional close is poignant.

What fascinates me even more, though, is applying this on a granular level. In the early chapters of Half Blood Prince, Harry arrives at the burrow, interrupting a conversation between Tonks and Mrs. Weasley. Tonks is upset about something, but immediately rushes away. This leaves an open question in the mind of the reader, who then pays rapt attention as Harry and Mrs. Weasley have an important conversation containing key exposition. After which, the question about Tonks is answered so the reader is rewarded for their attention. Soon after, Hermione and Ginny walk into the room making fun of an unnamed ‘her’. Again, the characters catch up with the news over the summer, revealing some key exposition. While Harry, in the back of his head is trying to figure out who they were making fun of, which is revealed a few pages later. This keeps the reader engaged because there is always something happening right now that needs to be uncovered.

I’ve been thinking about these tiny setup/payoff moments. It’s so much easier to focus on the big reveal at the end (which yes, should be compelling and setup etc.) but it’s the chapter to chapter moments that make the reader feel smart and engaged. How can we better apply this to our manuscripts?

Here’s a few places to start:

  •  Look for areas that have a direct ‘because’ explanation. “Mary shuddered because she was afraid of heights.” Can you set up the fear of heights in advance so the audience is already teetering with Mary as she looks over the edge? “Mary shuddered as the vertigo sank in.”
  • Comb through your exposition: Can you pull a J.K. Rowling and leave an unopened thread at the beginning of the scene to keep the reader engaged? Just don’t forget to tie it up shortly after. 
  • Comb through your exposition again. Can you withhold information and build it up with clues until the last possible moment? Say you have two characters sharing facts about the villain before a big showdown. “Don’t forget, he can read minds.” Instead, can you leave subtle clues so that the main character doesn’t discover it until the climactic moment of their battle. Then he (along with the reader) suddenly puts the pieces together and realizes he is in big trouble.
  • What is the emotional catharsis moment at the end? This is often not the same as the climax of the plot. Have you properly set up the emotional weight of that moment so that the audience feels it as keenly as the hero?

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