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Editing Rant: Commas
Commas. Way back in February 2016, Beginnings as side note included “Actually it was ‘I sat down, and hired me.'” … but that is a different editing rant entirely.
Here is that rant.
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Many times I’ve mentioned my love of the Oxford, or serial, comma. The Oxford comma deals with lists. Lists of two do not need a comma to clearly point out each option, but lists of three do need the addition.
Example with no serial comma needed: I love ice cream and chocolate.
How the serial comma works
Serial comma needed: I had a choice of ice cream, chocolate, or cookie dough.
Without the serial comma: I had a choice of ice cream, chocolate or cookie dough.
Without the serial comma, it seems that the choice was two types of ice cream, with a serial comma the choice is between three types of deserts.
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Now the comma has an additional duty in pausing the eye to notice groups of words and options beyond the Oxford comma. I’m not going to go into all that independent, dependent clause, conjunction, fused sentence, comma splice stuff English teachers love so much. I’m just going to cover the most simple way to see how a comma should be used with conjunctions.
First, as a writer, you going to need to know some basic vocabulary describing words.
Verb – action
Noun – person, place, or thing
Conjunction – joins things, especially, but not limited to “and, but, or, nor, yet, so, for”
If you don’t know what these are, watch the following School House Rock youtube videos:
Got the basic vocab now?
Moving on.
The simplest of sentences have a Subject (noun), Verb, and a little bit of something more to complete the thought. A conjoined sentence has two complete simple sentences connected by a conjunction.
Example: I love ice cream, and I adore chocolate.
When two complete thoughts are presented (in English-teacher-speak two independent clauses), they are connected with a comma.
On the other hand, phrases are not complete thoughts. The most common usage are two phrases using the same subject.
Example: I love ice cream and adore chocolate.
50% or more of my comma proofreading while editing is either marking an Oxford comma (nearly every publishing house prefers them for clarity) or correcting a conjunction phrase/clause connection.
If you are a writer and working on your second (or sixth) draft, review the conjunction sentences. If a subject is used by the phrases either side of the conjunction and is only in the first phrase, then no comma is needed. If a subject noun appears either side of the conjunction, then two independent clauses appear and a comma is needed.
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Where the Oxford comma meets the conjunction comma.
So what happens when several phrases appear in a list, then the Oxford comma rules.
Example:
I went to the store, I bought cookie dough ice cream, and I forgot my change when I left the store. Afterward, I returned home, and I chowed down on the ice cream.
I went to the store, bought cookie dough ice cream, and forgot my change when I left the store. Afterward, I returned home and chowed down on the ice cream.
As you can see, when three clauses or phrases were used, the Oxford comma was needed for the list, but when only two clauses or phrases were used, only the conjunction comma rule needs to be applied. Since the second example did not have the subject after the “and”, no comma was used.
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Think you got it? Then try these from some of my edits in 2014:
He turned on his heel and stormed out of the computer research lab, slamming the door behind him. (okay)
He was surprised, but ecstatically happy. (remove comma)
His head pounded and his shoulder burned like the fires of hell. (add comma before “and”)
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Back to the original rant: ‘I sat down, and hired me.’
Since there is no second subject, the “I” applies to both the “sat down” and “hired me” phrases, so the comma needs to be removed. Afterward, the point-of-view character hired himself which is just wrong.
Flash: Popsicle
(unknown origin)
She couldn’t keep her eyes off his lips. Each pass in and out drove her nuts. He knew how much she wanted it, how much she needed it. The scent on his breath just made the cravings worse. She could taste the bitter sweet flavor when she kissed him.
How dare he finish the fudgesicle without her! It took every last bit of her diet willpower not to steal the stick out of his mouth and suck the last of the ice cream off. The jerk had better find a way to repay her.
(words 94 – originally appearing at Breathless Press 5/19/2013 for the 2/26/12 Sunday Fun – Kept the picture this time – I do not know the copyright permissions. If you know the origin or the copyright, I would like to know. – Thanks!; republished new blog format 9/9/2018)
Other Cool Blogs: Magical Words August 18, 2015
Image courtesy of gubgib at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Style Sheets
I’ve been hunting around for a blog with details about what is needed for style sheets to share with you, my fellow writers, and lo and behold the amazing Melissa McArthur addresses them in her Magical Words “Copy and Line Editing” post.
What is a style sheet? In the old publishing houses, the style sheet provides information about the standards and practices of the publisher. In the editing cycle, the style sheet is created by the author to provide the content (line, copy, and proofreading) editor guidance on spelling of places, capitalization, and the like. An expanded version may be referred to as a “series bible”, aiding in the tracking of characters, locations, and history.
Specific things for a style sheet:
- WORDS/GRAMMAR
- English or American spelling and words? (color/colour; elevator/lift)
- Spelling of names and nicknames. (Kassandra, Troy)
- Specialized language – foreign phrases used by characters, contractions (can’t).
- Created words – for locations, names, and objects.
- Punctuation and capitalization practices.
- CHARACTER INFORMATION
- Physical: Hair, skin, and eye color; weight and height (and if it changes, when).
- Body movement: stances, walking style, sitting.
- What people can see immediately: Preferred clothing, occupation, weapons of choice.
- Dialogue impacts: Verbal tics, education, voice (cracks, deep, etc.).
- For a Series Bible – who has met whom.
- LOCATION INFORMATION
- Important locations (for a Series Bible, who has been where).
- Room layouts (especially for fights).
Starting with a style sheet can slow things down when writing the first draft. But when you start sharing your baby with other people, giving the editors a starting point can bypass at least one round of questions.
Posts which fed into this:
Melissa McArthurs post (and the middle of a three-part series on the levels of editing): http://www.magicalwords.net/melissa-gilbert/copy-and-line-editing/
The Editor Blog, Fiction Editor Beth Hill, “Style Sheets – The Setup and the Benefits”: http://theeditorsblog.net/2011/07/12/style-sheets-the-setup-and-the-benefits/
Additional Readings:
Lorna Faith. “How to Create a Series Bible for Your Fiction.”: https://www.lornafaith.com/how-to-create-a-series-bible-for-your-fiction/
Book Review: This May Go On Your Permanent Record
Original & New Book Covers from Amazon
This May Go On Your Permanent Record by Kelly Swails
BOOK BLURB ON AMAZON
Sally Clark is curious about how technology works, which would be fine except her experiments tend to be illegal. She’s also a terrible liar, which lands her in court for stealing groceries with nothing but a hacked smart phone. While the judge isn’t impressed that her alcoholic mother had traded the grocery money for booze, she is intrigued by her hacking skills. Given a choice between juvenile detention and something called The School for Extraordinary Youth, she rolls the dice and chooses the latter. She’s barely unpacked her bags when she discovers that SEY is a prep school for world domination.
MY REVIEW
A quick, but full read, which took me about five hours one night, this Young Adult (YA) story follows a fourteen-year-old girl from August to October of her freshman year in high school. Wow that sounds boring, but this book is anything but.
I picked it up thinking it sounded a lot like a superhero academy story, “a school for world domination” is the tag line, and it reads like one too. Only instead of superpowers, the students are all children of world leaders except for a few potentials brought in to shake things up. Sally comes from trailer trash but determined to rise above it – or at least stay out of juvie where the judge says she will go if she flunks out of this school. Thrust into the world of movers and shakers, she proves to be a true shaker. The class president goes after her with blood in her eye; maybe the daughter of leaders should have blinked first to clear the eye so she could see Sally clearly because this girl doesn’t back down from nobody. The two duke it out for class domination in a school teaching them how to take over the world and giving them the tools to do it.
The story follows the present YA formula of two love interests – one helpful and like a buddy – and the other intriguing, strong, and handsome, but not a close friend yet. She doesn’t go for either in this book but knows she has a crush on one and gets flashes of interest in the other.
We don’t see much personal growth of the character in this book as it more concentrates on setting up the world and defining the characters. Plus the overall story arc with the class president. Lots of little things happening keeping the story moving – I didn’t have any interest in taking a break while I read it.
I do enjoy all the name dropping – the leadership of the school also comes from old, powerful families. If you like history, this book makes you want to break out a “who’s who” to see what Easter eggs the author is writing in the series – names like Custard, Curie, and Bush tease the reader.
This manuscript is a very nice read. Plus I think the series will rock – for example book two, now that we know everyone and the world, should blow this one out of the water. The writing is tight and I expect Ms. Swails to only improve in the future.