Or

Do they try to read and catch grammar errors at the same time?

I try my best, though I am sure there will be grammar errors in my work. I used to be good at catching such things. Maybe I can be again, it has been many years since I purposely practiced catching grammar errors. I have to admit; I have been known to catch errors in other author’s works. I never know if it is the author's or the publisher's error.

If my errors are mostly grammar, I do not catch, will the editor still read it and work with me for the opportunity to get it published, or just toss it into the slush pile?

I will keep working, and hope it turns out good.

 

I'm no editor, but if I came across a story with several errors, I'd stop reading. It's too distracting. If you can't fix it easily yourself -- and maybe you can! -- get a dedicated reader? Or use MS Word's grammar checker?
 

However, after I sent the first two chapters to be critiqued by someone, I realized I had changed tenses some in those two chapters. First chapter should be present, second past, then rest of the book in present.

Some of these errors I will catch when I re-read it, grammar check won't catch them. There are others that have been discussed on here recently that I am sure I have made, and might not catch myself.

Thanks for responding,
Abby
 

Read "The First Five Pages", by Noah Lukeman,and buy a copy of "The Elements of Style", by Strunk and White, if you do not already own it.

mikemunsil

[This message has been edited by mikemunsil (edited July 17, 2005).]
 

A story came in that had two typos in the first paragraph. That tells me that the author didn't reread his/her own work and further, didn't have anyone else read it. As much as I'd like to say that they will work with you it has to be an exceptional story.

Here are some interesting links at Nightshade books, which is frequented by editors from some of the top SF magazines.

What Editors Hate
What Editors Don't Want (pretty funny and sad)
What DON'T Editors want to see, ever again?
What DON'T editors want to see, ever again? 2
Editorial Assistant John Joseph Adams and Fast Rejections(This talks a bit about the process of reading stories and then descends into a flame war, but if you scroll through you can spot the actual editors talking and it's worth reading.)
 

This is why I don't take writers who can't write seriously. Problems with story can be worked with, fixed, and shaped up. Problems with language can be fixed, but not by me. If your grammar is poor, you need to take step 1: learn how to write. What you write is meaningless if you don't know how. Ideas are a dimee a dozen.

[small side note: if you misspell a single word on page ten, the editor, if they notice, and if they like the story, will simply allow the fix. I tell you this so you don't get so scared that you never send your work out, but alternately I can't tell you how many errors are "acceptable." Find every one you can. If you don't know if its right or not -- find out.]

[This message has been edited by Christine (edited July 17, 2005).]
 

Problems (and skills) tend to flock together. By doing enough study and practice and editing to improve one problem (say, grammar) you tend to improve your other skills (say, dialog, POV, diction) at the same time, even if you are not deliberately focusing on them.

 

I really do need the feedback. My concern, I guess is that the editor will toss it back and say no good, not giving me a reason why. It reads well, I am just not sure about some of the more obscure rules of today.

Of course, there are few people around where I live who would read it and not think it great. I live in one of the three states where the literacy rate is lower than the illiteracy rate. So to most people here, even college graduates, just getting sentences with a subject and a verb is a amazing in itself.

What else dose not help me are my less abilities. I will not think of myself as disabled. Some things are just more difficult for me. I am not one who can hear "it isn't good enough” then am able to go back and figure out why by myself. I would need a concrete example. What I am trying to learn is if book publishers will give useful feedback, or just a flat out no without any constructive feedback. I don’t want to be pitied. I just want a chance.

[This message has been edited by abby (edited July 17, 2005).]
 

Here's how I make my decisions:

First, I read the first page (that famous first 13 lines that we talk about so fondly here at Hatrack). I can tell a lot from that first 13.

Next, I ask myself a few quick questions about it, like: Is it interesting me enough that I want to find out what happens next? Is it written clearly so I understand what's going on? This second question includes spelling and grammar and such things that I really shouldn't have to be noticing by the time the author submits it.

Third, IF it passes these first two tests, I continue reading until I don't want to read anymore. If that doesn't happen and I reach the end of the story, that's a good sign. If it's not, that means I will recommend to my senior editor that the story be rejected. Period.

While I'm reading, I'm conscious of all those elements of good story-telling and writing that we discuss here at length. Sometimes I blue-pencil. Sometimes I don't. Sometimes I don't have to. And THOSE are the stories that will get a, "This is a great story! Buy it!" from me.

The rules of grammar have not changed in the last 20 years. If you write the way you learned to write 20 year ago, you will be fine. What has happened, that you might be confusing as a change, is that we have become more lax in fiction writing. From time to time, we are allowed an incomplete sentence, for example. This is technically grammatically incorrect but the emphasis can work when well-placed. We start sentences with ands and buts now, though that is technically wrong.

What I'm trying to say is you can't go wrong following the rules you learned. There is no extra study except to read recently published works and find out what has become acceptable. But you don't have to use that information at all.
 

When I read silently what I've typed, I see only what I meant. And when I read aloud works not written by me, I end up reading it how my mind processed it, adding a word here, dropping one there. It never fails...

[This message has been edited by ChrisOwens (edited July 19, 2005).]
 

If it's a little thing, like a semicolon gone bad, then I can ignore it if the story is good.

And if there are loads of typos and other basic errors, I'll actually comment about that in my rejection letter, usually suggesting to have story read by fresh eyes or critiqued at a workshop, etc. (We try to be helpful.)

And absolutely there does have to be something on the first page to grab me. We've seen plenty of stories with good grammar, precise punctuation, and the only trouble is that it didn't hook us, or work for us.

Also, ensuring your manuscript meets the submission and formatting guidelines is an excellent start. You'd think this would be a no-brainer, but...
 

Since then, a Hatrack group member sent me instructions on how to REALLY use MS Word's tracking feature and other features in critiquing Word document manuscripts.

I have put a link to those instructions in the Ways to Critique section. And you can get there from here using

http://www.hatrack.com/forums/writers/forum/Forum21/HTML/000007.html

This information is not exactly on topic, but it is sort of the way one editor (yours truly) reviewed an author's work.
 

I was going to say, "Please."
I was going to say: "Please."
I was going to say "Please."

To me, these are all OK. (Or ok, for that matter.) So are sentence fragments, like the previous clause, and this one.

But sometimes it's a paragraph like this one, comma splices are not alright with me. I want to know that the writer knows the rules friends and violates them only intentionally.
 

I tend to be absolutist about grammar, and if I encounter non-standard grammar when reading a story, I tend to stop reading, verify that the sentence is non-standard, wonder if the author doesn't understand grammar or if it was a deliberate style choice, and if I decide it was most likely deliberate, I wonder if it was an effective choice. (Note: Dialog often uses non-standard grammar to express the way people speak, and I'm comfortable with that.) I'd rather be inside the story than outside of it, pondering the author's grammatical choices.

Nevertheless, one or two grammatical oddities isn't going to kill a story for me. And if there are numerous grammatical problems, there are certain to be numerous other problems as well.

"The merging of all and right to form the one-word spelling alright is not recorded until the end of the 19th century (unlike other similar merged spellings such as altogether and already, which date from much earlier). There is no logical reason for insisting on all right as two words, when other single-word forms such as altogether have long been accepted. Nevertheless it is still considered by many people to be unacceptable in formal writing. In the British National Corpus around 5 per cent of citations for the two forms are for the one-word form alright."
 

FYI, I just rejected a story because the author used "alright." I stopped reading immediately.

You didn't have to wonder with her, and as frustrating as it may have been at times, it could be useful information.

I submit that most, if not all, editors are every bit as idiosyncratic (and arbitrary) in some cases, but they aren't as blatant about it as MZB was.

I also submit that knowing an editor's buttons up front is something worth knowing. I think it made it possible for me to sell two stories to MZB after having tried (and learned from my "mistakes") for quite a long time.
 

In fact, the word "ain't" also appears in the dictionary, but unless you throw it in the dialogue of some uneducated character, you won't find an editor liking it either.

To be perfectly honest, I nevre realized that some people spelled all right as one word until I read the guidelines for the mag Beth, Mary, and HSO started up. Now that I've seen arguments on both sides, I see that this would be a fine route for the language to take, simplifying the commonly joined expression in much the same way that altogether and already have, but until such time as it has reached a level of full acceptance I will continue to go with what I have been taught and what looks more natural. When in doubt, it is always best to go traditional. In fact, if you spell out all together it is still considered correct. Why take chances?
 

"All together now!" the instructor said.

"We have twenty-two dollars, fifty cents, two buttons, one paper clip, and one... whatever this is altogether."

----------
Wellington
 

But with "alright", there is only one usage that is even distinguishable from literally meaning "all right", when it is used as less than total assent to a proposition introduced under exterior pressure. But since "fine" and "okay" are both used in this same sense, and both are more usually regarded as synonymous with "all right" than not, I'd say that usage isn't sufficiently different, particularly since you can use "all right" in such a case without any breakdown of meaning.

That is, I have to agree that "alright" is still just a way of reproducing a common mispronounciation of the term "all right" than a real new word with new usages.