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    A Copyediting Checklist for Novelists
    A Copyediting Checklist for Novelists
    A Copyediting Checklist for Novelists
    Ebook57 pages52 minutes

    A Copyediting Checklist for Novelists

    By Denise Barker

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    About this ebook

    There is only One Rule to copyediting. However, there are more than two dozen tasks set forth on the Checklist herein to implement the One Rule.

    This book was written for the hands-on author who either does it all or knows how to do it all--the research, the typing, finding or creating the cover, preparing front and back matter, jacket blurbs, etc.

    I began my copyediting career in 2008, freelancing for the first 5.5 years for one of the well-known traditional publishing houses in New York City, then freelancing directly with Indie-published authors, and have loved copyediting the hundreds of manuscripts I have had the pleasure to work on to date.

    My tools of the trade are Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, Eleventh Edition (Web11) and The Chicago Manual of Style, Seventeenth Edition (17CMS).

    Although the 17CMS contains 973 pages of actual rules, the first 616 pages deal with novelists. Read them along with A Copyediting Checklist for Novelists.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDenise Barker
    Release dateJun 3, 2012
    ISBN9781476426778
    A Copyediting Checklist for Novelists
    Author

    Denise Barker

    A Deep South all-Indie author + freelance copy editor for NYC publisher. See my tips for fellow authors at LivingTheDreamPublishing.blogspot.com and my e-books at online stores like Smashwords.com.

    Read more from Denise Barker

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      Book preview

      A Copyediting Checklist for Novelists - Denise Barker

      A Copyediting Checklist for Novelists

      By

      Denise Barker

      Freelance US Copy Editor

      All rights reserved.

      © 2011 by Denise Barker, First Edition

      © 2019 by Denise Barker, Second Edition

      Artwork © 1981 by Michael Chad Barker

      SMASHWORDS EDITION

      No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher and author.

      EXCEPTION: Feel free to copy the QUICK CHECKLIST FOR COPYEDITING YOUR OWN NOVELS at the end of this book for your personal use with each novel you finish. Congrats!

      DISCLAIMER

      I am a novelist, although the book you now read is nonfiction. It is based on my ongoing experience as a freelance copy editor of hundreds of manuscripts and counting for a well-known traditional New York publishing house for the first 5.5 years of my freelancing life, begun 2007/2008.

      Whether novelist or copy editor, one of my reference guides (at the time I initially wrote this e-book) is the 956-page Chicago Manual of Style, Fifteenth Edition (15CMS). The 16CMS and 17CMS has since been published (the 17CMS released in September 2017), but all the common issues noted herein remain unchanged, except for maybe the actual rule number.

      My usage of the latest 17CMS guidelines does not make me an expert on all things contained therein, but I am an expert nonetheless. Still, you should not accept my word willy-nilly but should take the time to read the most-current edition of the 17CMS and to make your own decisions.

      Within the 17CMS itself, you’ll find many more exceptions to each rule than the general rules themselves. The general 17CMS rule in each section of that grammar manual is then followed by numerous exceptions to the rules, so read them all. Yep. That means read the first 616 pages of the 17CMS, dealing mostly with issues regarding novels and not technical publications, aka white papers (for the math and science fields). The onus is on you.

      I am not an entertainment attorney or a copyright lawyer or any kind of attorney/lawyer. Consult with those and other experts as needed. Consult each publishing house’s Submission Guidelines or other materials for details regarding any submissions thereto. For online e-publishing, consult the respective e-publisher’s guidelines.

      After consulting the US guidelines (Web11 and the current edition of 17CMS), make an informed decision, as the author and creator of your particular works. Do what feels right to you, what gives you peace, what communicates with the most clarity and consistency to your reader so as not to jar them from your story.

      After all, it is your name that will be on the cover of your book

      Table of Contents

      DISCLAIMER

      Chapter 1: INTRODUCTION

      My Background

      My Reference Materials

      Chapter 2: CAVEATS

      Beliefs

      Passage of Time

      Definitions

      Acquisitions/Marketing/Managing/Lind Editor versus Copy Editor

      And Beyond

      Default Gender

      Chapter 3: THE BASIC PROCESS

      One Rule

      One Final Caution

      Chapter 4: THE SPECIFIC STEPS

      Spelling

      Choose Web11 over Spell-Check

      However, Choose 17CMS over Web11, when in Conflict

      Punctuation

      APOSTROPHES

      BRACKETS and PARENTHESES

      COLONS

      COMMAS

      DIAGONALS or SLASH MARKS

      ELLIPSIS (singular) / ELLIPSES (plural)

      EXCLAMATION POINTS

      HYPHENS versus M-DASHES and N-DASHES

      M-DASHES

      N-DASHES

      PARENTHESES or BRACKETS

      PERIODS

      QUESTION MARKS

      QUOTES, SINGLE versus DOUBLE

      SEMICOLONS

      SLASH MARKS or DIAGONALS

      Grammar

      Short List of Potential Grammar Problems

      Chapter 5: THE NEXT LEVEL

      Time Line Problems: Chronology, Age, Traveling Distances/Times, etc.

      Verbal Dialogue Tags

      Consistency

      Avoid Repetition

      Correct Ambiguous Word Choices

      Fix Awkward Phrasing

      Chapter 6: REALITY CONCERNS

      Fact-Check

      Geography

      Trademarks

      Knowledge in Specialized Fields

      Chapter 7: AUTHOR’S STYLE ELEMENTS

      Use Concrete Nouns

      Avoid LY Adverbs, if Possible

      Replace To Be Verbs with Action Verbs

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