Category: Ramblings

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Guilty

It’s a typo! They happen.

If there is one constant within the world of publishing, it would be that typos happen. It doesn't matter how many times you go through a piece of written work, there will always be something that's missed. You could have six different sets of eyes on it, and things still slip through. And the longer that piece of writing is, the more likely that errors get missed.

To complicate matters, you might have the cleanest copy on the planet, but errors creep in during typesetting too. At every stage of the writing/editing/publishing process, there is an opportunity for an error to be introduced—and for that error to get missed.

It happens.

I'll be the first to grant you that when a piece of writing is riddled with typos and grammatical errors, it's frustrating to read. However, I have said it time and time again: if a story is gripping, most readers will be willing to overlook the odd typo or grammatical error.

As writers, we need to accept that typos WILL happen.

As editors, we need to accept that we're NOT perfect.

However, there are some people out there who are Grammar Nazis from hell and will publicly shame you for making innocent typographical errors. It's because of these jerks (and that's what they are) that many writers and editors despise the idea of blogging. They're afraid that their writing might be torn to shreds because of those innocent mistakes. But what the Grammar Nazis forget is that mistakes happen.

The production schedules for a blog are tight. Certain steps within the editing process are sometimes missed. The thorough care that we give our novel writing is not given to this short piece that is going to go up on the web within hours. Newspaper articles are much the same in that respect. Mistakes creep in, it's the nature of the beast. But when the public shaming starts…

***Breathe… Just breathe…***

I think it's time to put reality back into the blogging world and remind a few editors that we're only human.

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Is the next generation really that disconnected?

There is no doubt about it: the world that I grew up in is gone. It was filled with kids having water fights in the streets, our house being the place where all the hoses seemed to converge. It was bikes and bells, and doing what we could to get the ball away from the dog. It was riding the Tonka toy fashioned to look like a Jeep down the driveway (mom rode that toy down the driveway too). And it was pen pals with snail mail and waiting for the postman to come.

Pay phone
Who remembers these? They used to be on every street corner. Now, you don't seem them at all. At least, that's the case in Christchurch, New Zealand.

You were at the mercy of whatever the TV networks decided to air. You didn’t like what was on, you either lumped it or read a book. Phone conversations were scratchy at best and, in some areas, party lines were still a thing. There were phone boxes on every street corner, and cash paid for everything.

The concept of cell phones didn’t exist in my youth. Car phones were for the rich only. The internet was this unheard-of thing, and modems required you to place the handset from the phone onto this chunky device with pulses and high-pitched noises going down the phone line.

Video calls and streaming your favorite show to a handheld device wirelessly was something seen only in science fiction. Genetic modification of human embryos was the source of freaky war storylines from Star Trek. Yet, here we are.

Science fiction has become science fact. (And yes, genetic modification of human embryos is now science fact.)

Yeah, the world I grew up in is definitely gone, but there will always be those who wish we could go back to the way things were. Their reasoning is often linked to some comment as to how out of touch with the rest of the world the next generation has become—how the next generation is so caught up in an internet world that they're missing the life in the local neighborhoods. In some aspects, I agree with them. But while I would love to cling to those go-outside aspects of the world that have vanished without me even noticing, there are other aspects of this new internet-based world that I have openly embraced and would never look back.

But these changes that I see in my world and in myself, was it really just technology that brought them on? Have we, as a society, really changed all that much?

Has our new level of technology brought about a level of disconnect between the generations that wasn't there before?

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How much control do you have over your goals?

We're coming to the end of the year, which means that people around the world are going to start reflecting on the year that has just past and are going to start making those New Year's resolutions. It's only nature. A new year. A new start.

Many writers will start their year with new goals too. Some writers decide to finally get their names out there, building their online presence. Others will set the goal of publishing that book. Others just want to finish the dreaded manuscript. Whatever the goal, there will be common threads among writers.

You have likely seen a few messages or posts on other sites regarding SMART goals. This is important, because they do make the goals attainable and a little less daunting. However, there is an additional aspect to goal setting that I want my fellow writers to think about.

How much of your goal is in YOUR control?

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Police, Death, and Writing

On December 27, 2017, I started penning my crime thriller where a writer encounters a sinister website that leads to a game of cat-and-mouse with a serial killer. The idea was bouncing around in my head for two full years before I eventually started writing anything. All I had was the opening scene and the closing scene. Now, for obvious reasons, I have so much more.

However, as part of writing this novel, I've had to do extensive research into how Atlanta PD does things, how they're structured, as well as getting my head around some interesting aspects of US law and criminal investigations. It's been a testimonial to my mad research skills, because I live in New Zealand, and almost all of my research has been via the internet, and the occasional reference book. My research led me to police department websites, FBI public pages, state department documents, forensics magazines, YouTube channels for various cops, and a whole range of other resources. In some cases, I had to make generalizations, using what only made logical sense. In other cases, I was able to pull on specifics. Regardless, I was learning something new every day.

Stories need to contain that element of real, and I think I got there. However, as every writer knows (or at least they should know), not all research will find a manuscript. Sometimes, the writer needs to know that little detail just to add the realism, but the reader doesn't get all the knowledge.

Below is just some of the interesting facts that I've discovered along the way. Some of them have found the manuscript; some have not. 

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Assassins, Spies and SAS. Oh My…

In a recent post, Fight Scenes: Instinct & Perspectives, I spoke about emotional engagement and the perspectives used for writing fight scenes. I touched on fight-or-flight, and how a writer can use that to their advantage. However, I also spoke about believability. If elements of your fight scene delve into the unbelievable, you will lose your reader.

While most people are able to easily visualize how the average Joe will respond in a fight, what their actions would be, and their capabilities, there is one type of fighter that is often used within fight scenes that majority of people can't truly relate to.

I'm talking about those characters who are highly trained to be assassins, spies and special forces soldiers (or SAS, as they are known in some countries). While all of these characters will have different backgrounds and different skill sets, there will be commonalities to the way they behave. Their reactions to a given situation can almost be predicted.

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