- I use commas the way the B29 dropped bombs: let them loose to fall where they may, and hope they land where you want them.
- I can’t spell names I invented.
- I string together sentences longer than some short stories.
This is why we have editors.
- I overuse ellipses like I bought them on sale in bulk.
- I hyphenate words that should be a single word.
- I run together words that should be hyphenated or separate.
This is why we have editors.
- I type ‘and’ instead of ‘an’ and reverse ‘me’ and ‘my’ with no discernible pattern.
- I put the backs of my sentences at the front.
- I add redundant words when I’ve already made my point clear.
This is why we have editors.
Share your own in the comments, or on Twitter with the hashtag #WhyWeHaveEditors
For the life of me Don’t know when to use a semi-colon and when to use a hyphen. The main character in my WIP is named Will; about half the time I call him Rick. I use ‘ly’ words to describe how a character said something (she said quietly, wistfully, loudly, sadly, stupidly, tiredly…) way too much.
Is that semi-colon above used correctly or should it have been a hyphen?
Brian Switzer This is one of those things I bet could go any of three ways. You could leave it as is. You could switch to an em-dash (which when you get really, really technical, isn’t quite a hyphen). I think you could even just capitalize “about” and start a new sentence there. In this particular instance, how you handle it is more about style and flow than right or wrong.
…but I’d still change it if my editor said I was wrong.