One of the dead giveaways of a non-professional book is misusing the poor hyphen instead of a dash. Let’s clear something up right away: a hyphen is not the same thing as a short dash, which is distinct from a long dash. They are three different punctuation marks, each with their own uses and rules. […]
To many, 2016 has been a horrible year. The war in Syria, the loss of refugees from that conflict and others, the record number of celebrity passings, record homicide numbers in my home town, Brexit, the election of Donald Trump to the U.S. Presidency … I won’t go on. It’s too painful. For me, it’s […]
Last week, I wrote about the benefits of using Styles in your word processing program to make your writing more consistent, efficient and professional. This week, I explain some of the resulting efficiencies that come from understanding how to use Styles. I am using Microsoft Word as the example, but the same concepts apply to […]
Want to publish your writing more efficiently? Make sure you use the Styles function built into your word processor when you write your manuscript. I have just finished editing or proofreading two manuscripts by fellow authors in Independent Authors International. And while both are excellent novels, both were just typed in, with all formatting applied […]
Finding the funds to cover editing, design and production of a book is a challenge every independent author must work out. This week, the award-winning Roger Eschbacher describes his solution. This post originally appeared on the old Scott’s Written Words blog. As just about any “indie” author will admit one of the biggest knocks against our […]
I don’t like to rant about little things, but I’ve seen too many instances where supposedly professional writers and editors use “you’re” when they mean “your” and “it’s” instead of “its.” So, I’m dedicating this post to my quasi-regular “grammar tips” feature in hopes of clearing up the confusion. Most writers, editors and readers I know are […]
I’m a writer, a speaker, and an editor. Some consider the combination to be some super being but, in reality, I am just a regular man. In other words, I write, I talk and I correct. I began life as a writer, the proverbial newbie, who felt he knew it all and had the best […]