So, Copy Editing

So, I just volunteered to copy edit / proofread a book for someone from BVC, because he paid someone to do it and they did (apparently) a crappy job. So I don’t think I’m the best in the world at this, but I’ll take a stab at it.

Meanwhile, here is an abruptly relevant recent post at Kill Zone Blog: Copy Edits

The most egregious copy edit ever–and I’m sure I’ve written of it here–came from Rosemary, who changed “Jonathan looked at the door the the kid came through” to “Jonathan looked at the door whence the kid had come.” Whence. In a thriller. 

This post is by John Gilstrap. Now, I think I could use “whence” in a thriller and have it work fine, but I do see what Gilstrap means here. So, if you’re copy editing for somebody, don’t do this.

Also, why would you do this? There are other examples at the linked post, and while they aren’t all this bad, they’re all annoying because they hit the “But why would you even do that?” button, at least for me. As far as I’m concerned, it’s not the copy editor’s job to change the sentences because she doesn’t like the style. It’s the copy editor’s job to suggest potential changes to avoid the sentence being misread, and to say things like, “You’ve used very” 712 times in this book; do you want to trim those back?”

Let me see … here’s a post: The Dreaded Copy-Edits

The copy editor’s job is to eliminate errors and inconsistencies in the text and to resolve ambiguities or quirks that could interfere with reader comprehension and enjoyment.

I would say: awkwardness and repetition as well.

My goodness, look at this:

If you look at your copy editor as someone who is there to help you and remove a burden from you, rather than someone who is there to correct you and make you feel bad about all the mistakes you made, you’ll hopefully experience working with a copy editor much differently.

Bold in original, which is what took me aback. Yes? Obviously?

You know what, if you’re making ALLLLLLLL the mistakes, maybe you should fix those first. I mean: once you find out that you tend not to put in the comma after the introductory clause and decide that this is a mistake you care about, then you can quite easily learn to recognize intro clauses. Here’s what I tell students: As a rule of thumb, if you did NOT start the sentence with a noun, then you DID start with an intro clause, so put a comma somewhere. Don’t fuss about where, just stick it in there wherever you feel like it ought to go. Native English speakers will usually (not always, but usually) put the comma in the correct place. Therefore, they don’t have to figure out which word is the grammatical subject. They throw the common into the sentence, and LO! It is in front of the grammatical subject, just as it should be.

AND, if you’re making SOME mistakes that make you look like you’re illiterate, join the club. This, as far as I can tell, is part of the universal human experience, so there’s no need to worry about it.

Oh, here’s a good post: What copyediting is, and what it isn’t

In this post, the author shares a bit of copyedited text, which is interesting to see.

A good copyeditor suggests changes to make meaning clearer.  They work to align a manuscript with the publisher’s style …

Or, if you’re self-publishing novels, with YOUR style. I can’t guess how often someone, an early reader, has said, “This sounds like something Character B might say, not Character A.” Usually these comments are correct.

 A good copyeditor finds factual errors, and also what I’d call “continuity errors” 

Hi, Mike! (Several early readers catch factual or continuity errors, but Mike S. is CERTAIN to catch errors, as well as say things such as, “Did you realize most houses in Las Vegas don’t have a basement?”

And here’s a fun bit from this post that should be titled: How Not To Copy Edit, What Are You Even Thinking?

The bad copyedit made changes to the text that:

introduced grammatical errors (yes, really)introduced typographical errors (for example, missing or extra spaces caused by careless deletions of words, or misspellings caused by sloppy changes to verb tense and so on).changed the meaning of what we wrote (not just subtly!), sometimes by substituting words that aren’t actually synonymous, sometimes by tinkering with technical words and phrases, and sometimes by rewriting entire sentences to leave something quite different than we started with.produced text with meaning unclear. removed information that was necessary for reader understanding. flattened authorial voice without improvement in clarity.

This is astonishing. I’m glad to say that I’ve never had anybody do any of this. But it neatly wraps back around to Gilstrap’s examples from the Kill Zone Blog post.

Also, if this BVC author experienced this kind of bad copy editing / proofing job, well, at least I can fix basically all of this. I just know my eye isn’t as keen as some of yours.

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