4:00 and as predicted the book is typeset and the laundry is done. Well, I need to package up the files and ftp the book to the client, and I should hang the wet laundry to dry, but the laborious part of both is done ( Read more... )

I've seen this one a little too often lately. It's an intersection of homonym and same-spelling-different-words.

Lead = verb, "to show someone the way," is pronounced with a long E, rhyming with "seed"

Led = past tense of above verb, and is pronounced with a short E, rhyming with "bed" <--THIS IS THE ONE YOU WANT, OKAY? THIS ONE ( Read more... )

Dear author ( Read more... )

Dear writers ( Read more... )

1. Ellipses are not functionally equivalent to periods or commas. Honest. They go in the same sort of places, but they don't have the same effect ( Read more... )

Dear writer of this perfectly normal historical romance*:

"...the blacks of her eyes" are called her irises pupils.** Also, they tend to dilate, not widen.

Love,

The person who wonders just what the heck you were thinking, not to mention what your editor and c/e were thinking

*That is to say, not a romance with nonhuman characters ( Read more... )

Dear Fantasy Novelists:

Unless you are writing comedy, you are hereby forbidden from the following:

"...as was his/her/their wont."

Any descriptions where the adjective comes before [to be] [noun] or [noun] [to be], e.g. "tall was she," "pointy the blade was," or "Yoda you are not."

Just sayin'.

Once again someone used "broach" for "brooch."

I'm beginning to think it's all the same very bad copyeditor.

Same book, a little later:

Dear author,
It doesn't matter if the heroine actually does want to sleep with the "hero." Having him blackmail her into the sack still makes him a complete asshole ( Read more... )

Dear hero lead male character of this book: She is a grown woman with a brain, an education, and a fairly sophisticated upbringing. It is not your place to "save her from herself" until and unless she asks you to. Take your high-handed arrogance and fuck right off.

Dear heroine lead female character of this book: You spend your life abnegating ( Read more... )

I've complained before about authors using eye-dialect.

So now I'm working on a book by the same author I complained about three times several years ago.She is apparently trying to demonstrate every bad writing tic, perhaps under some impression that it's like climbing the highest mountain on every continent ( Read more... )