Adventures in Editing

[r2cagle]

I want to guess what the premise of the book is about - just because I like to judge a book by it's cover:

*Bad stuff happens. Grow up and deal with it*

There. It's edited it too.

I want my acknowledgement on the bottom left of the 2nd page after the cover, and maybe on the top right of the last page.

[JoitheArtist]

As awful and irritating as it is, this is actually now both common and accepted in written English.

It's still no excuse for him switching back and forth between methods. There are ways of doing that well, and he's not using one of them...

*Bad stuff happens. Grow up and deal with it*

There. It's edited it too. ]

LOL! Pretty much--his advice isn't really very good, and it frustrates me, because it should be!! The book is about dealing with depression through faith, and he himself has dealt with some truly atrocious stuff...and this is all he can convey in the writing? SIGH.

[lupo pazzesco]

Ooooooh, that made my brain go squish...and ooze out of my ears.

I like to write, and I have, at times, looked over some of my friends' works. His reminds me of one such (ex!) friend, who, despite my ruthlessly fixing every inch of her grammar to the best of my ability, decided not to make the adjustments. why?

Because, according to her, the message was deep and moving, and as such, it NEEDED to be portrayed that way. She was the type of person who thought she wrote meaningful stuff ALL the time, and heavens help you if you naysayed her. Your friend's paragraphs remind me of her writing.

And of Hawthorne.

I loathed reading Hawthorne in high school. 7 page sentences with endless commas, dashes, semicolons, and colons, all to say something that could've been summed up in 7 words...

"She refused to name her child's father." (Scarlet Letter, in case anyone's wondering.)

[JoitheArtist]

Ooooooh, that made my brain go squish...and ooze out of my ears.

I like to write, and I have, at times, looked over some of my friends' works. His reminds me of one such (ex!) friend, who, despite my ruthlessly fixing every inch of her grammar to the best of my ability, decided not to make the adjustments. why?

Because, according to her, the message was deep and moving, and as such, it NEEDED to be portrayed that way. She was the type of person who thought she wrote meaningful stuff ALL the time, and heavens help you if you naysayed her. Your friend's paragraphs remind me of her writing.

And of Hawthorne.

I loathed reading Hawthorne in high school. 7 page sentences with endless commas, dashes, semicolons, and colons, all to say something that could've been summed up in 7 words...

"She refused to name her child's father." (Scarlet Letter, in case anyone's wondering.)

I am ok with some wordiness in literature, probably because I grew up reading Dickens, and fell in love with The Brothers Karamazov at 16. But even then, those guys know how to do wordiness WELL. (ok, so not Lovecraft, really, but he's fun to read, so I forgive him most of the time)

You wanna know the REALLY funny thing? You'd think my friend would like the works of Dickens, or the Russians, or any of the really wordy authors...but no.

His favorite author?

Ernest freakin' Hemingway.

[CrazedClerkthe2nd]

I feel for you. I am writing my own story at the moment and I'm a hard judge on myself. Everything I've ever read about the publishing industry says editing is a critical phase in the process and the feedback you receive and the way in which it is used can make a good novel a great novel.

[Sparky]

I once had to make a couple of simple changes to a document and I asked my boss (university professor) if I could please, please, please change a line reading something like "if a student ... they should..." to "he or she should." Professor Godcomplex told me that not only was this acceptable, it was actually "more correct" and that he knew better than I did because he has more education.

[r2cagle]

His favorite author?

Ernest freakin' Hemingway.

This is actually not surprising to me.


Had a thought, Joi. How about telling your friend that you've read through twice, and his 'advice' is getting overshadowed by the whole tone of his book? Does he want you to edit out the excess that 'looms incessantly in a murky haze of pillowy shadows' that drags his book down, or does he just want spelling/grammar proofed? Do exactly what he wants, and he can self-publish it. Then when he actually wants to sell more than 5 books, maybe he'll be more open to honest critique. Meh, it's an option anyway, just don't be a doormat.

[Seshat]

Joi,

You're not stuck doing it because you said you would. You can always say something like "maybe I'm not the right editor for what you want".

Or if you're not in a 'let him down gently' mood, "I can't do this. Here's your money back, go find someone else".

If you don't need the money, don't do it. There's absolutely nothing unprofessional about simply saying "I'm not the right person for the job you want done". And he doesn't want the job you would do - so you're not!

[AnaKhouri]

Seriously. I could not even read the samples you provided, no fucking way could I read 330 pages of this shit.

I think you should collect our comments and include them in your analysis.

[TheComputerError]

Is there a person alive who hasn’t, at some point in their life, at some time in their existence, who hasn’t found themselves grappling with those questions as they tried to make sense of it all?

This is where I stopped reading.

My edited version:

Is there a person alive who hasn’t, at some point in their life, at some time in their existence,* who hasn’t** found themselves grappling with those questions as they tried to make sense of it all?

* Redundant as a person's life and existence are identical.
** Redundant as these two words specifically have been duplicated both prior and after the comma-separated clause.

I won't touch the "themselves" and "they" as I am a bit partial to "xyrself" and "xe" in those situations. Sadly, the English language is lacking a proper pronoun for this purpose, so I just move on. Although, if your friend is talking about religion, using the masculine pronoun would be more appropriate as most scripture uses masculine pronouns for the general populace.

[Gravekeeper]

Gah!

Painful read. I mean, I'm not one to talk considering some of my rambling sometimes. But at least I make sense. ....I think.

What's the title anyhow? Metaphor Comma: The Redundancy? >.>

[Chromatix]

I've seen better - much better - from non-native English speakers.

We have several different nationalities in the office here, so believe me I have to deal with some pretty thick accents, but they have something in common: a coherent idea to communicate.

[Pagan]

I loathed reading Hawthorne in high school. 7 page sentences with endless commas, dashes, semicolons, and colons, all to say something that could've been summed up in 7 words...

"She refused to name her child's father." (Scarlet Letter, in case anyone's wondering.)

I'm glad I'm not the only one. I hate that book! To this day, I can't figure out why people get all upset over the sex on TV, yet think kids should read the "Scarlet Letter". The soaps can't do better than that storyline.

At least I never had to read "The Red Badge of Courage".

I feel for you. I am writing my own story at the moment and I'm a hard judge on myself. Everything I've ever read about the publishing industry says editing is a critical phase in the process and the feedback you receive and the way in which it is used can make a good novel a great novel.

Same here. I've got mine in three different parts and am trying to get to the place for them to come together. Things will probably change a great deal. The only thing that I've nailed down for sure is the title.

I wonder how many of us here are writing books?

[Kristev]

Well, I am. But you can't go by me because I'm so dully, it's my only real form of fun.

[TheSHAD0W]

The only thing I've found that makes my writing better is to write it, then set it down and ignore it for several days. (Moving on to another section of the manuscript works.) Then pick it up and re-read it. Then edit it. Then repeat a few times.