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Most books aren't rejected because the stories are "bad."
They're rejected because they're not "ready to read." In short,
minor stuff like typos, grammar, spelling, etc.
I don't mean places where we, as authors, deliberately break the rules. Those are fine. That's part of our job.
Language always changes with use, and we can help it on its way. No, I'm referring
to places where someone
just plain didn't learn the rule or got confused or overlooked it during
the self-edits.
I've been editing novels for over a year. Looking back at my experiences,
I feel like sharing the most common mistakes I've seen. If you'll go
through your manuscript and fix these before you submit it to a publisher,
your odds of publication will increase dramatically.
Once you've found a publisher who publishes what you write, you want to
present yourself in the best way possible. Submitting an unedited
manuscript is a bit like going to a job interview wearing a purple Mohawk,
no shoes, torn jeans, and a dirty T-shirt. Your resume may be perfect, and
your qualifications impeccable, but something tells me you won't get the
job.
The publisher's investing a lot in every book it accepts. E-publishers
tend to invest loads of time, and print publishers tend to invest an
advertising budget and the cost of carrying a large inventory. Why ask
them to invest hours and days of editing time as well? If the publisher
gets two or three or ten nearly identical books, you want yours to be the
one requiring the least editing.
The first thing you need to do, and I hope you've already done it, is use
the spelling and grammar checkers in your word processor. It'll catch many
of the "common mistakes" on my list. But I've been asked to edit
many books where the author obviously didn't do this, and I confess that I
may well have been lazy and let a couple of mine get to my editors
unchecked. Bad Michael!
There are some other valuable lists on-line at the following websites:
Common Errors in English
http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/errors
Words That Are Often Confused
http://lbarker.orcon.net.nz/words.html
Here's a list of the mistakes I see most often.
* Dialogue where everyone speaks in perfect English and never violates any
of the bullet points below. Okay, I made that up. That's not really
a common problem at all. But I have seen it, and it's a terrible thing.
* It's is a contraction for "it is" and its is possessive.
* Who's is a contraction for "who is" and whose is possessive.
* You're is a contraction for "you are" and your is possessive.
* They're is a contraction for "they are," there is a place,
their is possessive.
* There's is a contraction for "there is" and theirs is
possessive.
* If you've been paying attention to the above examples, you've noticed
that possessive pronouns never use apostrophes. Its, whose, your, yours,
their, theirs...
* Let's is a contraction for "let us."
* When making a word plural by adding an s, don't use an apostrophe. (The
cats are asleep.)
* When making a word possessive by adding an s, use an apostrophe. (The
cat's bowl is empty.)
* A bath is a noun, what you take. Bathe is a verb, the action you do when
taking or giving a bath.
* A breath is a noun, what you take. Breathe is a verb, the action you do
when taking a breath.
* You wear clothes. When you put them on, you clothe yourself. They are
made of cloth.
* Whenever you read a sentence with the word "that," ask
yourself if you can delete that word and still achieve clarity. If so,
kill it. The same can be said of all sentences. If you can delete a word
without changing the meaning or sacrificing clarity, do it. "And
then" is a phrase worth using your word processor's search feature to
look for.
* Keep an eye on verb tenses. "He pulled the pin and throws the
grenade" is not a good sentence.
* Keep an eye on making everything agree regarding singular and plural.
"My cat and my wife is sleeping," "My cat sleep on the
sofa," and "My wife is a beautiful women" are not good
sentences. (I exaggerate in these examples, but you know what I mean.)
* I and me, he and him, etc. I hope no editor is rejecting any novels for
this one, because I suspect that most people get confused at times. In
dialogue, do whatever the heck you want because it sounds more
"natural." But for the sake of your narrative, I'll try to
explain the rule and the cheat. The rule involves knowing whether your
pronoun is the subject or object. When Jim Morrison of The Doors sings,
"til the stars fall from the sky for you and I," he's making a
good rhyme but he's using bad grammar. According to the rule, "you
and I" is the object of the preposition "for," thus it
should be "for you and me." The cheat involves pretending
"you and" isn't there, and just instinctively knowing "for
I" just doesn't sound right. (I think only native English speakers
can use my cheat. For the record, I have great admiration for anyone who's
writing in a language that isn't their native tongue.)
* Should of, would of, could of. This one can make me throw things. It's
wrong! What you mean is should have, would have, could have. Or maybe you
mean the contractions. Should've, would've, could've. And maybe 've sounds
a bit like of. But it's not! Of is not a verb. Not now, not ever.
* More, shorter sentences are better. Always. Don't ask a single sentence
to do too much work or advance the action too much, because then you've
got lots of words scattered about like "that" and
"however" and "because" and "or" and
"as" and "and" and "while," much like this
rather pathetic excuse for a sentence
right here.
* On a similar (exaggerated) note: "He laughed a wicked laugh as he
kicked Ralphie in the face while he aimed the gun at Lerod and pulled the
trigger and then laughed maniacally as Lerod twisted in agony because of
the bullet that burned through his face and splattered his brains against
the wall and made the wall look like an overcooked lasagne or an abstract
painting." Now tell me this sentence isn't trying to do too much.
* Too means also, two is a number, to is a preposition.
* He said/she said. Use those only when necessary to establish who's
speaking. They distract the reader, pulling him out of the story and
saying, "Hey look, you're reading a book." Ideally, within the
context of the dialogue, we know who's talking just by the style or the
ideas. When a new speaker arrives on the scene, identify him or her immediately. Beyond that, keep it to a minimum. Oh
yeah, and give every speaker his/her own paragraph.
* Billy-Bob smiled his most winning smile and said, "What's a nice
girl like you doing in a place like this?" I don't like this. Use two
shorter sentences in the same paragraph. Billy-Bob smiled his most winning
smile. "What's a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?"
Same effect, fewer words, no dialogue tag (he said).
* In the previous example, I don't like "smiled his most winning
smile," because it's redundant, but I'd probably let it slide. But
please, if you find yourself writing something like that, try to find a
better way to express it before you just give up and leave it like it is.
During the self-edit, I mean, not during the initial writing.
* "The glow-in-the-dark poster of Jesus glowed in the dark."
This editor won't let that one go. Much too redundant, and it appeared in
a published novel.
* Lie is what you do when you lie down on the bed, lay is what you do to
another object that you lay on the table. Just to confuse matters, the
past tense of lie is lay. Whenever I hit a lay/lie word in reading, I stop
and think. Do that when you self-edit. (Note: Don't fix this one in
dialogue unless your character is quite well-educated, because most people
say it wrong. I do.)
* Beware of the dangling modifier. "Rushing into the room, the
exploding bombs dropped seven of the soldiers." Wait a minute! The
bombs didn't rush into the room. The soldiers did. To get all technical
about it, the first part is the "dependent clause," and it must
have the same subject as the "independent clause" which
follows. Otherwise it's amateur, distracting, and a real pain for your
poor overworked editor.
* If you are able (many readers are not), keep an eye out for missing
periods, weird commas, closing quotes, opening quotes, etc. When I read a
book, be it an e-book or a printed book, I can't help but spot every
single one that's missing. They slap me upside the head, which makes me a
great editor but a lousy reader. If you are like me, use that to your
advantage. If not, that's what editors are for!
Michael LaRocca is the author of four published novels and an EPPIE 2002
Award finalist. He is an American living in Hong Kong, and he's been a
full-time author and editor since December 2000. His website is designed
to help you find the best free & low-cost quality reads, and to help
you improve/publish/promote your own writing free and avoiding scams. http://free_reads.tripod.com
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