Well, hullo there, all! Today I've got for you my first of THREE blog tags this month - the Editing Adventures Tag, created by my lovely friend Kristina Hall!
Now, if y'all've been following me for long...or read Held Captive...then you know that I don't do a lot of editing. I mean, I've edited other people's works and I do edit my short stories - but I also edit as I write, per se, and spend three hours perfecting a single sentence before I move on to the next one. So I don't have very many editing adventures...they're rather tangled up in the writing ones. Therefore, my answers to these questions are either vague or drawn from my experiences editing my short stories.
Now, without further ado, the tag!
The Rules
Link back to the original site.
Thank the person who tagged you. (Thanks, Kristina!)
Include the hideous … um … lovely graphic.
Answer the ten questions.
Create ten new editing-related questions of your own or stick with the questions you answered.
Tag however many of your fellow writers you want.
The Questions
What’s the goofiest correction spellcheck has suggest you make (nothing profane, please)?
I’ll be entirely honest. I have no idea. Most of the time, if one of those cursed red lines appears beneath my words, I’ll just correct it myself without looking at the suggestions. And I’ve saved most of the unaccepted words/names I regularly use to my dictionary so that said line won’t appear at all.
What’s your most embarrassing typo?
Man, I just made a really embarrassing typo the other day, but I’ve completely forgotten what it was! Honestly, every typo I make is embarrassing. That said, I once went into Held Captive to correct a mistake I’d made (like adding a comma instead of a period or something like that), and I ended up turning my typo into another typo.
Now, that was embarrassing.
What is your record number of complete edits on one project?
Uh, one? No, seriously. I edit as I write—from copy-editing to developmental edits—so when the project is all finished, I give it a once-over for typos and errors, then fix whatever my alpha/beta readers have pointed out.
Unless, of course, we’re counting all the times I’ve edited/updated HC after I published it...in which case...about four, I think. *wink*
That said, I anticipate having to edit Bound and Determined at least three times, so this is subject to change.
When is a project good enough for you?
Never. Nuff said.
Do you live in fear of finding a typo in your published work (novels, short stories, blog posts, etc.)?
Ha. Ha. Ha. I’m used to it by now, honestly. I’ve been picking out so many typos from my stuff that it’s become accepted to publish a rough draft of something.
What mistakes or writing styles drive you the craziest (when you’re reading)?
Hmm. Honestly, style-wise, I can’t stand threadbare writing. Here, let me give you an example… This is an excerpt from BAD (which I just wrote earlier today...it also doesn’t really make sense, but that’s not the point) exactly as I wrote it:
Keaton had seemed so lonely aboard the Rina, out of place with Billy—who was too young to be a peer and too old to be like a son—always at odds with Julius, and standing apart from the rest of the crew. It was a bit strange, as Keaton had been living with most of them since he was ten and six, but now I knew why.
These were his friends.
Keaton held an adorable towheaded boy by the hand as he spoke with a man who cradled a baby in his arms, his shoulders loose and head thrown back in laughter at something his companion had said. A red-haired woman who looked eerily like Scarlette had risen above deck to greet us, tenderly brushing Keaton’s arm as she came to stand between him and the other man.
Of course, the lines in his brow were still present, and his eyes were as sharp as ever, but I’d not seen him so comfortable since he had left home. Even in such a tense situation, he found peace amongst this small family.
My heart clenched. How precious!
This is what it would look like had it been shredded to little, tiny pieces:
Keaton had seemed so lonely on the Rina, which was strange, since he’d been living with them for so long. I knew why now, though, because he appeared so calm with these people. They must be his friends.
Yes, he did still look a little worried, but he also fit in, which was sweet.
Sure, I know a lot of people would prefer the latter. They just want a vague idea of what’s going on to get them through the story. But me? I want the full, immersive experience, and something that reads like a paper written by a lazy college student is not such a thing.
As for mistakes...the classic your/you’re, its/it’s, and their/they’re/they always get on my nerves. Also I can’t stand run-on sentences like this they either don’t separate individual clauses or they leave out commas or they replace periods with commas or vice versa it’s all annoying.
*cough* Classic grammatical blunders, you know. Don’t fall for them.
Have you ever written in a library book to correct a typo?
Ooh, boy, no siree! I don’t even highlight in my Bible, let alone mark up public property. Not to say I haven’t wanted to...
Can you edit and write in the same day?
Absolutely! Considering my edits are about as threadbare as that writing up there… Seriously, though, I have edited and written in the same day. Or at the same time!
What’s your favorite part of editing?
Hmm. Probably line-editing, restructuring sentences and correcting phrasing. I strangely enjoy that, hence why I mentally do it to a lot of disjointed or stilted sentences I read.
What’s your least favorite part?
I HATE having to go in a correct plot holes, add foreshadowing, fix inconsistencies... developmental stuff like that. I did a TON of it with HC (because I #wingedit...meaning I didn’t come up with the main plot twist until I was writing the main plot twist), and it was no fun.
The Tags
Kristina tagged a gracious plenty of authors in her post, so I’ll stick to just a handful. If you’d like to do this tag yourself, consider yourself tagged! You’re more than welcome to borrow it, as long as you link back here and to Kristina’s post!
And I’m really not that good with editing-related things, so y’all can just use Kristina’s questions!
R. M. Archer @ Scribes & Archers
Issabelle @ Into My Writing Journey
Welp, that's that! I hope y'all enjoy this post and that it was better in y'all's mind than I thought it'd be! Seriously, there's not much I can say about the editing I've done in my own work thus far. (Unless we're talking implementing the suggestions made by my lovely beta readers!) Now, once I finish up Bound and Determined and take it through the estimated three rounds of edits, I may come back to these questions and answer them again!
Because, yes, BAD is...pretty bad. *winks* Pun intended.
Hahaha, "BAD is pretty bad"!!! That was a fun post!!! OH boy, I totally agree with that threadbare writing style pet peeve, like, the excerpt you shared was so much more engaging and vivid than the second quick-overview version one. Like, it has details that bring it to life!!! So, yeah, such an interesting point that I totally agree with but hadn't really thought of before.
Great post! I despise correcting plot holes too ... such a pain! And I have to admit that I'm slightly jealous of your editing method!
"...something that reads like a paper written by a lazy college student is not such a thing."
That cracks me up. Because I'm pretty sure I've had those sentences, mostly because I was an exhausted college kid. But probably lazy, too, hahaha.
And wow, I wish I could edit like you do along the way! Lovely post, Grace! 💜