I have a love/hate relationship with copy editors. They don’t know that.
We need them. Lordy how I need them, because no matter how many times the Bride and I read a manuscript, we miss something, and this current work in progress is no different. I thought I’d turned in clean pages, and once again a detail-oriented individual found errors that I’d missed.
One thing I hated as a high school student was to see all those red marks on an assignment. I’d worked so hard to provide what my English teachers required, remembering all the rules of grammar, and the vocabulary necessary to tell a good story.
But when they were returned, passed back down over disinterested shoulders to my seat against the wall, those corrections and questions sent a flush of anger through my body and it was all I could do not to rush up to her desk and point out everything she’d highlighted that was wrong…
…in my opinion.
Today I still feel that same flush at the notes on the right hand side of the screen, but choke it down because they’re usually right.
Usually, I said.
A few years ago a side note in the page proofs raised my ire. The editor questioned the spelling of a pistol carried by one of my characters. The note read, There is no hyphen in a Taurus Ultra-Lite.
In my mind, I called up this individual. “But you’re wrong! There is a hyphen.”
“No there isn’t. I looked it up online.”
“Well, you looked it up wrong, because the pistol I have here in my hand has a Taurus Ultra-Lite stamped into the frame.”
“You have a pistol!!!???”
It really didn’t go down exactly that way, but I do own a Taurus Ultra-Lite (a terrible revolver in my opinion and I wish I hadn’t bought it), and those words and that hyphen really are stamped into the frame, justifying my use of that weapon.
Another copy editor once pointed out to me that my use of “booger-bear” was wrong in a Red River manuscript. Now, I grew up in fear of booger-bears in the night, and often pictured them as a child-chomping monster resembling the Creature From the Black Lagoon, but with longer teeth and claws and red eyes that glowed in the darkness.
Brrrr.
When I read that side note, I laughed out loud.
“According to the Urban Dictionary, a booger-bear is a woman of loose morals.”
A river of comments rushed through my brain, but I resisted. However, I wanted to write back, “Never use the Urban Dictionary to confirm anything I include about rural America.”
These days I include a note to the copy editor which reads:
“Please do not edit the spelling or use of words in my dialogue, nor should you edit for proper grammar inside quotation marks. This dialogue is regional, and therefore written the way us Texans use those words and phrases.”
Booger-bear.
I also do not care about the current grammatical rules that insist on creating these odd-looking names such as Cross’s, Williams’s, or any other possessive. I’m old, and the AP Press Style book says the correct way to write the possessive case of Reavis is Reavis’, not Reavis’s. Reavis’ work will always read as such.
Please do not attempt to correct guns or calibers. If you don’t know that a .410 shotgun is a caliber, then stay out of this discussion.
That really isn’t one of my notes, but I’d like it to be, along with the following:
No, there is not town in Texas called Nashville. I know it’s in Tennessee, and I’ve been there in a fruitless search for real country music. I made it up because I write fiction. If I intend to use a real name, all I have to do is grab one out of the air, because I can’t seem to make up a town name that hasn’t already been used. I wanted to use Hogansville as an example, but when I checked, there really is a Hogansville, TX.
But I don’t hammer them, because these fine editors are simply doing their job to keep me honest, and to ensure that when my book hits the shelves it will contain as few mistakes as possible. Copy editors are essential and they give that final polish to a book.
Don’t be too hard on them.
On another note: Sourcebooks and Goodreads are giving away 25 copies of Hard Country, my first novel in the contemporary Tucker Snow series that will release August 1, 2023. The contest runs from July 8-27th. Follow the link below to enter, and good luck!
Oh, and feel free to pre-order your copy from your favorite online dealer.
A copy editor wanted me to explain that a Glock was a gun.
My first publisher insisted that we look up every product/company name we used in the trademark database and provide a list so they could add it to the front matter in a “we mean no disrespect” kind of disclaimer. Too often, I found names I’d made up really existed.
I had to get permission from the companies to use Knob Creek or Denny’s in one of my books.
But sometimes, saying “Ferrari” instead of “sleek red sports car” brings the image to the reader right away.
In my old job, we retained attorneys who drove me crazy by over analyzing a number of things. I make up towns because I don’t want to endure an endless stream of emails telling me that Main Street in a real town goes north and south.
But you’re right, Ferrari brings to mind a specific picture. I’d use the word, anyway, but then again, that’s me after all those years of fighting with attorneys on what and how to say something.
I used it! 😉
Was it a small press? Paranoia about brand names is really common in small presses. I remember a big publisher who had a deal with some of the ultra-luxury brands of perfume, cars, clothes, etc., for their names to be mentioned in their rich people behaving badly book line. And soda, beer, and candy companies pay a fortune to have their brands in scenes in movies and TV shows.
A good rule of thumb for brand names beyond spelling it right and not using it as a generic term, Kleenex instead of tissue, for example, is that you don’t use it in a negative way. A character can drink a certain brand of whiskey, but he can’t be poisoned with this brand of whiskey.
Most times, I agree with the copy editor’s suggestions. But, like your Taurus Ultra-Lite, sometimes ya gotta speak up.
In my first book, the main character receives a solicitation in the mail from AARP for her 50th birthday, significant b/c she’s struggling with that uncomfortable milestone. One young editor told me quite authoritatively that you can’t join AARP at 50.
That’s shocking news to AARP. Thankfully, I didn’t wind up working with her.
That made me laugh, because when I got back the page edits on Hard Country, a side note said the TSCRA agents, (Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association), did NOT have the authority to arrest, neither in Texas nor Oklahoma.
Oh, I beg to differ.
But it wasn’t insurmountable, and a quick scan of their website doesn’t specifically address that right. We moved on.
I’ve really been blessed with good editors and agree with their corrections…eventually. The only time I thought about arguing with one was in my first book. I had the heroine teaching victimology at a college in her hometown while she worked on her doctorate. The editor said that wasn’t possible. I knew it was–I had a friend who was doing that very thing, but I realized if it took the editor out of the story, it would take other readers out as well. So I gave the heroine her doctorate.
Good copy editors are worth their weight in gold. They have to question what they don’t understand, and we have to explain in the text. It’s good writing, but sometimes I find myself putting in too much detail which slows the pace. They yank me back into the real world, and I always appreciate it.
Oh, the stories I could tell about idiot editors. Having a 25-year-old who has never left NYC tell me I have the South wrong required far more than a “bless your heart.”
Fantasy and science fiction writers will often send a word bible aka a stylesheet to the copy editor. Each character’s name, made-up words with a brief definition, place names, and unusual capitalizations are listed. This is a good idea for other types of writers.
I always get a style sheet, and they’re essential. I loved that “bless your heart!”
Rev, you really made me chuckle with this one!
That note to your editor about not touching the rural and regional details is hilarious and perfect!
Stick to what you know, people. That definitely includes calibres! Heh.
I am also very much a follower of the AP style for possessive with things ending in “s”.
I will die on that hill.
And I second Marilynn’s suggestion of a stylesheet (I write fantasy, so it’s expected for us. *shrug*) But honestly, it’s as necessary for me as for editors! It helps me keep track of the overwhelming amount of terms, names, dialects, etc.
Honored that I could make you smile today!
These are the things no one told us about when we first took this trail to publication. I’ve learned the hard way, but every lesson is valuable. Thanks for weighing in.
The “Urban Dictionary” is trash. More than half the entries are jokes. Anyone who uses it is a pineapple. https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Pineapple