🖊 Crying out for consistency

Blah blah editing, blah blah progress bars, etc. Scroll down to find the exciting stuff.

Editing Tip #5

Find and replace is your friend. Check for consistent spellings, italicizations, capitalizations, and formats in your work. I know, this one’s obvious, but the trick is recognizing WHEN to use find and replace.

Some examples from an excellent manuscript I’m currently editing:

“field hand” vs. “fieldhand”: When I saw this term multiple times, I checked the dictionary to see that “field hand” was correct. Then I searched for instances of “field” and made corrections when necessary. Spell check won’t always catch these things.

“secondborn” vs. “second-born”: I searched for the word “second” and went from there. Different sources use different terms, so I defaulted to the author’s first use of the term with the hyphen.

*P.S. – if anyone gets the lyric reference in the email header, we can definitely be friends.

New Stuff

READ THIS if you like jet packs and astral warfare in the Midwest.

DON'T READ THIS if you get queasy about heights.

Writing Updates

Codename SPOOKY: IT’S ALMOST DONE. I’ve finished the in-depth edit, which included adding and deleting parts of scenes, rewriting an entire sequence at the midpoint, and refining a lot of details. Now I’m proofreading and paring down unnecessary filler.

But that stuff is boring. Here’s the big news: I finally have character art!

Here’s a first look at Safran, the protagonist of Codename SPOOKY.

This image comes courtesy of Frankie Lupo, an excellent digital artist I found on Instagram. I’ve already commissioned more characters, including a rather fun mystical creature who features prominently in the story.

Codename SPOOKY SEQUEL: I’m gonna have to make some changes once I finish Codename SPOOKY. But I’m SO psyched to do that.

Codename SPACEY: Still dreaming, still waiting. Spacing out, you could say.

Something Different

Here’s a picture of our puppy. That’s all.