Judy Hagey Editor
Write Justified
You know you need an editor to make sure your manuscript is as clean as it can be before you submit to a publisher or agent. But you’re concerned that an editor won’t respect your voice. Will he hold you to a rigid set of rules that you may not be totally familiar with? Will your manuscript be returned bathed in red ink?
Last weekend I attended my second PENCON - Proofreaders and Editors Network Conference. Billed as the only such conference for editors in Christian publishing, the conference is an opportunity to network and hone our editing skills. By our own admission, many editors are introverts, so you may be surprised that we’re into networking. Despite my own preference for anonymity, connecting with others who share my interest in accurate punctuation, grammar, and usage energizes me. It’s always reassuring to know that other editors struggle with the same insecurities and uncertainties that I do.
Today is Flag Day in the U.S. Betsy Ross is credited with creating our national emblem despite little historical evidence. But that hasn’t stopped us from setting aside a day to honor the Stars and Stripes—representing the shared ideals and values of disparate states.
If you live in one of the early caucus or primary states, I’d wager you’re growing irritated with the number and tenor of the political ads. If you’re a political junkie, maybe you’re just annoyed by them. If you’ve begun muting them, they’ve clearly become an aggravation.
Not every question requires a question mark. Trust me.
I recently edited a paper that included an inordinate number of scare quotes. The writer may have thought he was doing readers a favor by placing quotation marks around a word he was introducing or using in an unusual or nontraditional way. But really, it was just plain scary the number of times they were used.
Homonyms trip up many a writer. You know, those pairs of words that sound alike but have different spellings and often vastly different meanings. Occasionally they come in threes—like to, two, and too.
Repetition is a great learning device and a useful literary tool, when used judiciously. Redundancy, on the other hand, is essential in situations where a backup system prevents complete failure, but it should be avoided in your writing.
Parallel structure is as essential for good writing as it is for railroad tracks. Just as railroad tracks must be level and equally spaced to insure a safe ride, elements within a sentence that are alike in function should also be alike in construction. Failure to do so results in faulty parallelism.
