As I wait for an editor I haven’t worked with before to yay or nay my copy, I thought I’d take this time in between commissions to write my blog and have a rant. I know it’s been a while between posts, but things have been crazy here. My saying that the stress would be less following coursework was a lie, vicious lie … I find myself remaining in this constant state of stress, hovering somewhere over certain oh-my-gosh-so-much-stressness. And then there's the worst ailment for writers’ headache, editing the copy of a writer who can’t write.
While pork is, and remains, the centre of my working world — particularly with National Diabetes Week upon us, and the news of research into the benefits of pork for diabetics (see a teaser of the puppy below, which has been my baby for the last week) — there comes a time in every overworked-underpaid-junior-journalist-slash-PR-consultant-slash-slave-to-the-every-whim-of-a-boss-from-the-mezzanine-floor’s life when the promise of a new project lights up his inbox.
And this one was a goodie, a book publisher. All my budding-novelist-dreams-come-true, that is until I put aside my ‘overworked-underp…’ hat in favour of my editing cap and realised, first, this person cannot write (at all), second, I have a whole book to edit written by ‘this person cannot write (at all)’ and third, proofs are due Monday, that is, proofs for the book written by ‘this person cannot write (at all)’. And so I power through, remembering my editing teachers and their warning for the tone of my interactions with the writer, as I punch in my 567th author query.
AQ567: Are you sure you want to abbreviate BodySculpt to BS in your promotion of the product? “Following on from the BT weight loss phase, I would now like to introduce you to our BS program!”
Any writer who uses more exclamation makes than full stops and describes weight loss as a ‘phase’ should be sent to the ‘this person cannot write (at all)’ naughty corner. But I soldier on, gripping my invisible pen, holding true to my Strunk and White editing bible, and “omitting needless words” — and so the novel becomes the novella.
As for the cute kitty piccies, I have a little one on the way to help waste away those winter nights. So I'm allowed.
Until next time, [don't] study [too] hard,
Joe.
