Be Your Own Editor

I’m back after a lengthy hiatus during which I moved into a new home, which I am gradually turning into a writing/blogging sanctuary for those brief snippets of time I find now and then to write/blog. Will let you know how that goes.

Meanwhile, I was inspired to return to the airwaves when I learned of a very useful Google search tool that I can’t believe I didn’t know about before.

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As the number of fabricated or semi-fabricated memoir scandals has continued to build post–James Frey, I have seen more and more articles, blog posts, comments, etc., work themselves into a frenzy making claims about the complete lack of fact-checking in the book business. Let the ignorance end here.

First, it might help to make some sort of distinction between fact-checking and story-checking. The reason, I think, that aforementioned ignorant essays have proliferated is, in part, is that the people writing them are used to the culture of magazines and newspapers, in which (especially in newspapers) no such distinction is made. In a news article, if you’ve got your facts straight, you’ve pretty much got your story straight.

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I’m back! Boy, have I been busy since my last post: adopting a child from Guatemala, ghostwriting a novel for a famous author who must remain unnamed, training for the Boston Marathon… Oh, fine. I’ve just been busy editing. (I knew no one would believe that last one.)

Back to business with an interesting question from Darlene:

How do you handle sentences that could apply to either gender when you’re writing for both? Do you use he or she (or him or her), or they (or their)?

For example: If you meet a stranger in a coffee shop, do you notice their (or his or her) smile?

There’s no one right answer, Darlene. But a little guidance and good sense will help you handle a tricky issue.

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A quick (and overdue) congrats to my friend W, who did, in fact, complete her National Novel Writing Month word-count goal in November. Yay! Is it a finished, publishable work? No. But she’s feeling good about producing some material she can work with, whether it becomes a novel or a few stories or whatever. You rock, W.

As for myself, I am officially designating January “National Chapter-Writing Month,” and I plan to complete the first chapter of my own novel by month’s end. I wrote several chapters during the “Finish a Draft of Your Novel in Three Months” class I took last summer, but, well, they sucked and need to be completely rewritten. Wish me luck! I’ll need it, especially since my Christmas stocking was filled with Barnes & Noble gift cards, so it’ll be hard not to spend the whole month reading.

By the way, sorry I’ve been lax in answering reader questions recently… I’ll get caught up soon, I promise!

If you read this website regularly, you know few things annoy me more in writing than unnecessary words that add no meaning to a sentence (see previous posts on “would,” “that,” etc.). I’m currently reading a recently published novel and have recognized in it the overuse of a major offender in this category: “actually.”

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You may have heard of an endeavor called National Novel Writing Month, affectionately referred to by its creators and participants as NaNoWriMo (unless they want to avoid sounding really goofy, in which case they refer to it as National Novel Writing Month).

The project is gaining popularity and notoriety every year, and since my friend W. is participating this year (the month in question, by the way, is November), I thought I’d take a closer look and think about how such exercises can help the struggling novelist.

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