Get Published: The Nuts and Bolts of Good English, and How to Impress a Publisher (1) By Andrew John
Not all writers write good grammar. That's a fact. It's no big deal. Well, mostly it's no big deal. As a freelance books editor, I've seen hundreds of books whose authors cannot produce decent grammar and punctuation. I do it for them. I'm paid to do that -- mostly by the hour.
So why bother to write good grammar? you ask. What does it matter if I can't tell a colon from a semicolon, or when to use double quote marks and single quote marks? Is it such a sin to use inappropriate or downright wrong words if someone is going to correct them for me? Who cares if my syntax isn't logical? If there are copy editors and proofreaders to ensure my book looks good, why is it so important to go to the trouble of ensuring my grammar and punctuation are tiptop?
Well, it might just help you to sell your book, that's why. And I don't mean sell it to the buyer in the bookstore: I mean sell it to the commissioning editor who is on the point of deciding whether your life is about to change.
When you're a would-be first-time author -- and many of us have been in that position -- a well-presented approach letter and sample chapter might be the thing that tips it for you. Look at it this way: you're an unknown; the commissioning editor likes your ideas, but has seen a couple of other approach letters and sample chapters recently that say much the same; of those other two, one is so well presented that it won't need much copy-editing. Which writer is that commissioning editor going to choose?
In reality, that editor will probably not see your full manuscript till you've been accepted, but will get a good idea of your writing skills from that approach letter and the sample chapter or two that you may be asked to submit, along with a breakdown of the book's structure.
Copy editors such as me are freelance. Mostly, we're paid by the hour. Sometimes a publisher will pay a flat rate for a particular editing job, but will assess it first and say, "Hmm, I'll offer nine hundred dollars" (or, say, four hundred pounds, depending on where you're working). That commissioning editor has just done a quick calculation and has decided that, by accepting the manuscript from the author who's submitted a near-perfect approach letter and samples, the company will save some money.
But I'm writing a novel, a big stream-of-consciousness thing, you argue. I don't want good grammar. It will spoil the whole thing.
Fine. If your terms of reference are that this is the type of manuscript you're producing, you'll have agreed this with your in-house editor, who will have taken note of it and will brief me -- or another copy editor -- to treat the text accordingly.
Most books, however, are not stream-of-consciousness novels. Many are told in a straightforward way (that's not to say they're dull, but merely that their authors have chosen to adhere to the conventions); and, anyway, many are not novels. Most books are nonfiction. If you can find a subject that will interest a publisher and you're suitably expert in it, you may get published.
But the publisher will look more kindly on you if, in your approach letter and accompanying material, you present yourself well.
The good news is that the basics -- what I refer to as "the nuts and bolts of English" -- are not too difficult to learn. Most of them are logical. Once you've seen them in action and passed that eureka! moment, you won't forget them.
I hope this short article has made you realize that you'll have to bite the bullet sometime soon, and get to grips with these basics. If you're already an expert, of course, you won't have read this far, so probably won't be reading this sentence!
But there are many writers who, for whatever reason, need to brush up a little. It's nothing to be ashamed of. Maybe they've had better things to do with their lives so far.
The important thing to know is that there are people like me, writing articles such as this one, to help. Call me a nerd if you will, but I actually like working on text at the level I do. As writer and co-writer of 14 print titles, I've also been copy-edited a lot, so I know what it's like from both sides.
Getting published isn't always easy, but attention to detail can sometimes be the deciding factor. I wrote a downloadable book recently with my co-writer Stephen Blake, called You Can Write Books (at www.youcanwritebooks.com), which, although its main topic is actually getting published, contains some tips on the nuts and bolts of writing. This is already selling quite well, which is gratifying.
To sum up: don't neglect good grammar, because (a) it could make the difference between acceptance and rejection; (b) it's satisfying to know that you can do it; and (c) once you've learned a few basic stylistic points, that dread word grammar may not sound so bad after all.
Good luck with your writing.
Andrew John is co-author of You Can Write Books, a no-nonsense downloadable book from http://www.youcanwritebooks.com that will get you into print if you follow its advice. He and his co-author, Stephen Blake, have written more than a dozen print titles (details on http://www.youcanwritebooks.com). Both are writers and editors, and You Can Write Books is crammed with advice you can trust.
Get Published: The Nuts and Bolts of English, and How to Impress a Publisher (2) By Andrew John
The tiniest things can be so useful when you come to consider the nuts and bolts of writing. The comma is one of them. No, don't go away: it's a useful device that's often used badly -- or ignored altogether.
As an editor of books, I am forever sticking commas into other people's prose, having first of all had to work out what their sentence is trying to say. Many people are slapdash about comma use, and it can go down badly with a commissioning editor who is, say, looking at your approach letter and sample chapter and thinking, "Uh, oh. This one's going to give us problems. Where's that equally promising but better-presented proposal that will cost us far less in copy-editing fees?"
There are many useful punctuation and grammar tips in a downloadable book I co-wrote on how you can get yourself published very quickly, You Can Write Books (at www.youcanwritebooks.com), although its main focus is on how to get your work before a publisher. But here I'll deal with this one useful but sometimes overlooked little squiggle, and a few things that many writers neglect.
First, should be used in a list of items to break them up: pens, pencils, books, and paper. Should you use a comma before and in that list, though? Well, yes if you're, say, a North American; yes and no if you're British. This is called the list comma or serial comma (it is often called the Oxford comma, and is still used by Oxford University Press).
Many people say it's not necessary, because the word and in that sentence is doing the job the commas were doing earlier in the sentence. However, many writers of English throughout the world -- notably, as I said, in America -- like the serial comma, and insist on it. Most British writers, publishers, and newspapers don't bother with it, and so would write "writers, publishers and newspapers"; "pens, pencils, books and paper."
What should you do? Well, you choose a style and stick to it. Be consistent. Better still, you see which style your potential publisher uses, and go with that. That goes for all stylistic considerations. Don't forget: you're selling an idea to a publishing house, and anything you can do to impress them will go in your favor.
The comma is also very handy to separate two distinct clauses in a sentence, and this is where many writers ignore it. You'll see how I used it in the last sentence, after the word sentence. Not only does it give you a pause for breath (a mental breath if you're not reading aloud, of course), but often it can help the meaning.
Take this: "I passed the ball to Joe and Fred kicked it into the net." I passed the ball to Joe and Fred? No, I passed it to Joe, and then Fred came along and kicked it into the net. You get the meaning eventually, but why should I as writer give you, the reader, pause? If I'd written, "I passed the ball to Joe, and Fred kicked it into the net," you wouldn't even have blinked, because the meaning would have been immediately clear.
Or look at this sentence: "That day I went to the movies ..." could mean that on that particular day I went to the movies ("That day, I went to the movies") or that it was on the day I went to the movies that something else happened ("That day I went to the movies something else happened").
In the first pair of parentheses above, you'll see how the comma has been used to convey the first of the two possible meanings. But, if you miss it out, you're going to have your reader thinking you meant it the other way. If that's not your intention, make sure you use the comma.
A few final brief points, then, about the comma.
Commas come before quoted speech: "Joe said, 'Let's go and see a movie.'"
Commas come after a piece of quoted speech, before you say who's speaking: "'Let's go and see a movie,' said Joe."
Commas can be used in the way brackets are used: "My English teacher, Martha Moonbeam, gave me good marks this week." The commas here are known as bracketing commas, because they do the same work as parentheses (round brackets, like these) but in a "weaker" way.
Another example of bracketing commas would be, "The train, which was late leaving, made up for lost time." Don't miss off the second comma; many people do.
Commas separate adjectives in such sentences as, "It was a cold, damp, dreary sort of day." In this context, they're doing much the same work as in the list of items above, except that here we have adjectives, not nouns.
In one short article, you have, I hope, got to grips with this bit of occasionally troublesome but very useful punctuation. You may have been familiar with some of the things, anyway, but I hope that, if there were one or two concerns you weren't too sure about, this article has been of help.
Andrew John is co-author of You Can Write Books, a no-nonsense downloadable book from http://www.youcanwritebooks.com that will get you into print if you follow its advice. He and his co-author, Stephen Blake, have written more than a dozen print titles (details on http://www.youcanwritebooks.com). Both are writers and editors, and You Can Write Books is crammed with advice you can trust.
APOSTROPHE USAGE MADE SIMPLE Copyright 2005, Michael LaRocca
According to one of my previous articles, whenever a Southerner says "Y'all watch this," get out of the way because those are probably the last words he will ever say.
Well, I'm a Southerner. I used to live in the southeastern United States, but I moved to the southeast of China. And, I'm about to say the magic words:
Y'all watch this.
The word is "week." If I want to talk about more than one week, like what I wrote a few weeks ago, I'll use weeks. No apostrophe. If I want to talk about something belonging to a week, such as "last week's newsletter," I'll use an apostrophe.
That's the rule. If it's a noun, s makes it plural and apostrophe-s makes it possessive. It's just that simple.
If I were still in the US, and I wanted one of those fancy carved signs that are so common on southern lawns, it would not read "The LaRocca's." The LaRocca's what? His lawn? His sign? That apostrophe makes it singular possessive, so The LaRocca (one person) is surely claiming ownership of something. If that wasn't his intent, and he whacked in an apostrophe anyway, he's an idiot.
What about plural possessive? Is it "the LaRoccas' house" or "the LaRoccas's house?" Well, it's neither, since my wife isn't a LaRocca and we don't own a house. But for the sake of this article, pretend she is and we do.
In ON WRITING, Stephen King swears it's LaRoccas's. When I was a student, my teachers swore it was LaRoccas'. As an editor, I've heard the first was US standard and the second was UK standard. And the answer is, I don't care. Just be consistent.
I once met an editor who said that the spelling determines pronunciation. She's an idiot. Spelling isn't all pronunciation. It's also history. I'll say LaRoccas-zz whether it's LaRoccas' or LaRoccas's. So will you.
Jump up five paragraphs and read the seventh word. Noun. Note that I didn't write pronoun. Just for fun, the rule for pronouns and apostrophes is completely different.
It's is a contraction for "it is" and its is possessive. Who's is a contraction for "who is" and whose is possessive. There's is a contraction for "there is" and theirs is possessive. Etc. Possessive pronouns never use apostrophes. Its, whose, your, yours, their, theirs...
And there you have it. Apostrophe usage made simple.
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Michael LaRocca's website at http://www.chinarice.org was chosen by WRITER'S DIGEST as one of The 101 Best Websites For Writers in 2001 and 2002. His response was to throw it out and start over again because he's insane. He teaches English at a university in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province, China, and publishes the free weekly newsletter WHO MOVED MY RICE?
