Somewhat Flexible
Lately I did a long marathon of Protector of the Faith line edits (and the very next week, the copy edits – which consisted of answering about 16 questions) and cutting/fixing stuff. Now that’s my Luna book, but as I put “STET” (leave like it is), I thought of the Heart Quest edits.
My editor had a new assistant for Heart Quest and I think I got some cover pages I wasn’t supposed to see that went to the copy editor. On one form was a box that asked how “flexible” a writer was (like how much the writer would let you mess with his/her work). Mine read. “Somewhat.”
I was both insulted and amused. What do you mean “somewhat?” Don’t I take direction? If my editor wants someone to exclaim (a word I don’t use), doesn’t that person exclaim? Well, I found a paragraph structure pattern in the Luna books that my editor corrected every time. And I studied it every time, and I let her do it for a while. But if it was at a BIG point (and I usually used this paragraph structure during intense moments), I put STET.
And then there’s the Cat/dog thing. Cats, when speaking, always speak of other Cats as Capitalized, and Me, Mine, We. Cats, speaking of dogs, always speak in lower case, even at the beginning of a sentence. “dog is stupid. puppy is silly.” My friend said that the copy editor wouldn’t “get” that, but from the very first, they have. And they correct me if I screw up now. And, yeah, attached to the cover sheet was a two page list of my made up words….
May you take yourself lightly today.
Robin
My editor had a new assistant for Heart Quest and I think I got some cover pages I wasn’t supposed to see that went to the copy editor. On one form was a box that asked how “flexible” a writer was (like how much the writer would let you mess with his/her work). Mine read. “Somewhat.”
I was both insulted and amused. What do you mean “somewhat?” Don’t I take direction? If my editor wants someone to exclaim (a word I don’t use), doesn’t that person exclaim? Well, I found a paragraph structure pattern in the Luna books that my editor corrected every time. And I studied it every time, and I let her do it for a while. But if it was at a BIG point (and I usually used this paragraph structure during intense moments), I put STET.
And then there’s the Cat/dog thing. Cats, when speaking, always speak of other Cats as Capitalized, and Me, Mine, We. Cats, speaking of dogs, always speak in lower case, even at the beginning of a sentence. “dog is stupid. puppy is silly.” My friend said that the copy editor wouldn’t “get” that, but from the very first, they have. And they correct me if I screw up now. And, yeah, attached to the cover sheet was a two page list of my made up words….
May you take yourself lightly today.
Robin
posted by FantasyAuthor RobinDOwens | 8:51 AM
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