writers when they’re proofreading their works for the 34th time *find zero mistakes, there’s no typo, no grammatical error. everything looks good. hit the post button*
writers when they’re reading said works after they’ve been published like proud parents *find 52 mistakes at first glance, 38 typos and 14 grammatical errors with a bunch of inconsistencies and plot holes*
What’s the best editing tip you have?
Retype the whole thing.
Seriously.
Like open a fresh doc, put it side by side with the first draft, and start retyping every sentence.
At first you are writing it word for word, but eventually you start to see how clunky a paragraph is, what its missing, what would sound better, and boom. Before you know it you've got a solid 2nd draft to work from.
After that, edits get a lot easier.
(This is my experience anyway. It has helped me so much)
editing your own writing is like woah you really like commas........ maybe ease up on those commas there, pal........ maybe Fewer commas would be nice
and then the second pass of editing is like hey you know what this thing needs? some commas!
starting a support group for ppl who proofread their chapters and still find typos years later after they've been posted
what people think is hard about writing: describing the joy, love, beauty, grief, loss and hope that form the richness of human experience
what is actually hard about writing: describing basic actions such as turning, leaning over, reclining, gesturing, saying something in a quiet voice, breathing, getting up from chairs, and walking across rooms
The small laugh that someone makes where they basically just exhale quickly from their nose?? It’s not a snort, just like, basically exhaling a little more quickly and loudly?? What is it called????!?!!??
“This is your daily, friendly reminder to use commas instead of periods during the dialogue of your story,” she said with a smile.
“Unless you are following the dialogue with an action and not a dialogue tag.” He took a deep breath and sat back down after making the clarifying statement.
“However,” she added, shifting in her seat, “it’s appropriate to use a comma if there’s action in the middle of a sentence.”
“True.” She glanced at the others. “You can also end with a period if you include an action between two separate statements.”
Things I didn’t know
“And–” she waved a pen as though to underline her statement–“if you’re interrupting a sentence with an action, you need to type two hyphens to make an en-dash.”
You guys have no idea how many students in my advanced fiction workshop didn’t know any of this when writing their stories.
Reblog to save a life
Reblog to save a beta’s sanity.
Reblog this to save a beta-less author’s sanity.
Reblog because I see this issue ALL THE TIME.
Whelp, now I have to re-edit all my stories again.
Editing? Oh you mean fic patching.
