Forum: Author Hangout

Pesky characters and other authors

StarFleet Carl 🚫

I thought I had my most recent work, Love Never Changes, all done. I was waiting for the last chapter to come back from the editor and I sat down to re-read it myself.

And did a Control-X on the last half of the last chapter, pasted it into another file so it's around when I need it, and started typing again. I've now finished that chapter and half-way through the next one. I think I'll basically be able to take the original ending, since it was sort of an epilogue anyway, and plug it back in.

But the pesky characters wouldn't let me end their story early like I'd planned. It just felt wrong, when I was reading it, to end it that way. I could almost feel them looking at me, going, hey, asshole, finish this right.

I'm quite sure some of you have run into that before. Just one of those things I wanted to share, as an author on here. I know that's happened to others on here.

Unrelated, I've somehow or other managed to miss the works by D.T. Iverson. Is that a Pen Name of someone else on here? Also Mark Randall. Seriously, who are you guys? Those are fantastic works.

Replies: Keet REP

Keet 🚫

@StarFleet Carl

Mark Randall uses the pen name UtIdArWa on Finestories. That's where the Mountain Man series was posted before it appeared here on SOL. Indeed very good reading.
D.T. Iverson's Beyond Measure is the best I've read from him although all his work is very good. A very original take on Time Travel.

REP 🚫

@StarFleet Carl

I'm quite sure some of you have run into that before.

I know it has happened to me before posting every story I've written. I always reread a story to smooth out the rough spots and correct errors before sending it off to my editor. I invariably change what I wrote by adding, modifying, and deleting content. Which means I have to do another review cycle. It is just one of the things an author who takes pride in their stories does.

ystokes 🚫

I have a question for authors. I understand that proofreaders are used to catch errors like misspelled words, missing words, words that shouldn't be there or using words twice.

Authors always blame any errors are thiers. Is it because the errors are added after the proofreaders had gone through it?

Replies: Ernest Bywater awnlee jawking Uther_Pendragon seanski1969

Ernest Bywater 🚫

@ystokes

Authors always blame any errors are thiers. Is it because the errors are added after the proofreaders had gone through it?

I can't speak for other authors, but I recognize that sometimes the proofreaders miss something the same way I do. However, there are times when correcting something they point out I feel I need to make another change in that section which I triple check and don't send back through the editorial system before posting.

Oddly enough, despite a story being read and check numerous times by me, by up to six editors and proofreaders I still get some errors being reported by readers as everyone involved are all human. I've even had a story with over a million downloads which has undergone a few revisions and been through the editors a few times had a reader report an error that's been there from the initial posting but gone unnoticed and unreported for a few years. That only shows how easy it is to miss some errors.

awnlee jawking 🚫

@ystokes

Is it because the errors are added after the proofreaders had gone through it?

I think it's the convention for authors to put that, because the proofreaders are amateurs and volunteer their services for free and it's not fair to blame them.

While using one or more editors/proofreaders is a way for authors to improve, there doesn't seem to be a comparable path for editors/proofreaders. Certain editors/proofreaders are identifiable by the mistakes that get through.

AJ

Uther_Pendragon 🚫

@ystokes

Authors always blame any errors are thiers. Is it because the errors are added after the proofreaders had gone through it?

Not usually, though I've corrected something minor and seen it add an obvious typo. You want a proofreader to catch mistakes, but the mistakes are the original author's.

seanski1969 🚫

@ystokes

Authors always blame any errors are thiers. Is it because the errors are added after the proofreaders had gone through it?

Can't believe we are talking of proofreaders and blame yet no one has commented on "thiers" yet!!!

Replies: awnlee jawking Ernest Bywater

awnlee jawking 🚫

@seanski1969

Can't believe we are talking of proofreaders and blame yet no one has commented on "thiers" yet!!!

And 'to blame' is a transitive verb.

AJ

Replies: helmut_meukel

helmut_meukel 🚫

@awnlee jawking

Can't believe we are talking of proofreaders and blame yet no one has commented on "thiers" yet!!!

And 'to blame' is a transitive verb.

Ok, English isn't my first language but my dictionary confirms 'blame' is a noun too.
In "... we are talking of proofreaders and blame ..." 'blame' is used as noun, isn't it?

HM.

Replies: richardshagrin awnlee jawking

richardshagrin 🚫

@helmut_meukel

"verb
assign responsibility for a fault or wrong.
"the inquiry blamed the engineer for the accident"
Similar:
hold responsible
hold accountable
hold liable
place/lay the blame on
censure
criticize
condemn
accuse of
find/consider guilty of
inculpate
ascribe to
attribute to
impute to
lay at the door of
put down to
set down to
pin
stick
Opposite:
absolve
forgive
noun
responsibility for a fault or wrong.
"his players had to take the blame"
Similar:
responsibility
guilt
accountability
liability
onus"

awnlee jawking 🚫

@helmut_meukel

Authors always blame any errors are thiers.

If blame is a noun in the above, what is the verb?

AJ

Replies: helmut_meukel

helmut_meukel 🚫

@awnlee jawking

AJ,
don't try to wiggle out of this by changing the quote!

In your first posting you quoted another sentence.
Rereading it I realize you quoted seanski1969 but what you wrote was meant for ystokes' comment.

HM.

Replies: awnlee jawking

awnlee jawking 🚫

@helmut_meukel

Rereading it I realize you quoted seanski1969 but what you wrote was meant for ystokes' comment.

Yes, and in retrospect I should not have posted. It's okay to highlight bad grammar in stories, but who meticulously proofreads their forum posts? I don't, and I cringe at some of the schoolboy errors I've made in them.

AJ

Ernest Bywater 🚫

@seanski1969

I did not write that message or send it to my proofreader, that was the responsibility of the message author. I know many people write message in forums without checking them, so typos abound and I ignore them, most of the time.

Ernest Bywater 🚫

BTW: please do not confuse regional spelling or grammar differences for writing errors or typos or editorial errors or proofreader errors.

ystokes 🚫

Any errors I make are indeed mine. It got by my 4 proofreaders also.

ystokes 🚫
Updated:

I think Sean has it right in the first place.

ystokes 🚫

This is one reason I dropped out of High School. English confused the hell out of me. I never could get the difference between noun or verb, i before e except after c, when a letter sounds hard or soft or why ph sounds like f.

Replies: StarFleet Carl

StarFleet Carl 🚫

@ystokes

English confused the hell out of me.

How long before you're through with that rough cough?
And don't feed the pony bologna.
And they're over there with their things.

shaddoth1 🚫

as for the original topic,
I dont always follow my editors or proofreaders suggestions.
sometimes whole paragraphs are returned and in my revision I make further mistakes in my rewrite.
thus they Are all my fault.

My editor and proofreader are aids. they help me, but in the end, I am the one who releases and is responsible for the end product.

Shad

Replies: Dominions Son

Dominions Son 🚫

@shaddoth1

thus they Are all my fault.

It's all San Andreas' fault.

ystokes 🚫

It seems some authors use a speech to text program and never check what was written. So many times I see base spelled bass. Makes you wonder how a fish is related to the story.

Replies: Ernest Bywater

Ernest Bywater 🚫

@ystokes

Makes you wonder how a fish is related to the story.

Fish??? I always thought they were using a musical instrument.

joyR 🚫

I've never understood why bass jumping is considered an extreme sport.

Replies: Dominions Son

Dominions Son 🚫

@joyR

I've never understood why bass jumping is considered an extreme sport.

Try doing it in a river in bear country.

Replies: joyR

joyR 🚫

@Dominions Son

Try doing it in a river in bear country.

Why would anyone take their music instrument into a river anywhere? Let alone in bear country...? Or did you mean bare country, such as a rustic nudist colony?

Replies: StarFleet Carl

StarFleet Carl 🚫

@joyR

bare country, such as a rustic nudist colony

Wouldn't bare cuntry be a close shave?

Replies: joyR

joyR 🚫

@StarFleet Carl

Wouldn't bare cuntry be a close shave?

Would maintaining a landing strip in bare cuntry be plane crazy?

Replies: Ernest Bywater

Ernest Bywater 🚫

@joyR

Would maintaining a landing strip in bare cuntry be plane crazy?

No. You should read Wes Boyd's Spearfishlake stories as just outside of the town is a nudist facility with a golf course and a airfield.

Replies: joyR

joyR 🚫

@Ernest Bywater

You should read Wes Boyd's Spearfishlake stories as just outside of the town is a nudist facility with a golf course and a airfield.

So whilst cumming into land one could planely see nudists playing around on the golf course... My vote is to do so in "Magic Carpet". :)

Forum: Author Hangout

Pesky characters and other authors

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