Forum: Author Hangout

Even worse is when there's an error or two in the title.

Who's to say it's an error?

Anthony Doerr has a new novel titled, "Cloud Cuckoo Land." Is that grammatically correct? This is from a guy who won a Pulitzer Prize for his last novel.

It's the standard translation of the name of the fictional kingdom in Aristophanes's The Birds. (Well, sometimes it's all one word.) Grammar is kinda irrelevant to names.

Cloud Cuckoo Land

It's a standard expression in British English. I don't see what's supposed to be wrong with it.

AJ

It used to be known in American English, too, but I've seen very few uses in my lifetime that weren't either British or actually referring to the play.

How do you manage to keep your posts so well hidden? There was a very long delay before I could see this one :-(

Unfortunately SOL doesn't offer authors the possibility to add both a synopsis and author notes, but an author note in a description is (to me as a reader) just wrong

The novel I'm pretending to write starts when the protagonist is 13. Later on there are a couple of scenes that 'nudge' the site age limit rules, but management has already okayed them. I want to forewarn readers as much. Since I don't know how to add text to a story page and there isn't an 'Author Note' facility, my first chapter is a minuscule entity entitled 'Foreword'.

AJ

Thanks, but that doesn't put the text on the page listing the chapters, which is what I meant by story page. Some authors have managed it, although I can't give any examples off the top of my head. I suspect I might fall foul of site rules if I tried to use it for my 'foreword': I described it as minuscule, but that's in chapter terms.

AJ

Thank you.

These days I copy and paste text to the wizard. I don't put the story and author names in at all, and I only use the Chapter keyword when the chapters have titles. Come to that, I only leave one blank line between paragraphs.

AJ

Thanks, but that doesn't put the text on the page listing the chapters, which is what I meant by story page. Some authors have managed it, although I can't give any examples off the top of my head. I suspect I might fall foul of site rules if I tried to use it for my 'foreword': I described it as minuscule, but that's in chapter terms.

You're expecting a chapter note to serve the role of a formal Foreward, which traditionally warns readers of an unusual history of the story or any potential issues in it.

So, either write a separate Foreword (which very few readers ever glance at), or post it on the beginning of the first chapter.

either write a separate Foreword

Ah! You didn't read my original post :-(

AJ

Ah! You didn't read my original post :-(

Actually, I did, I was listing the common variants, not specifying a direct answer. There are different ways of handling it, and it's up to each other to select which they'd prefer to use (i.e. "Common Standards").

How do you manage to keep your posts so well hidden? There was a very long delay before I could see this one

I've noted this, as it appears to be a ramification of the recent 'views' account option. If you change the viewer option on the fly, you'll usually see all your missing posts. Hopefully Lazeez will figure this one out soon, but until then, messages will continue disappearing and reappearing.

I want to forewarn readers as much.

There's a 'note' option, as well as a separate end-note option, aside from the usual author's note for the story. That's designed for exactly what you're trying to do.

I've used it a couple of times since it was first introduced, but every time I need it, I can never recall how to format it! Luckily, it's in the authors formatting page.

As a reader those are the two most important items I check in a description: Typos in a description of just a few sentences indicate that the story itself is most likely also riddled with typos. Secondly, a description should give the potential reader a good indication what he can expect from the book/story. It should not be just a teaser.

You'll get no arguments from me. My point, and I did have one somewhere around here, is that it's often difficult getting editors to take the story descriptions seriously.

Thus, you do the best you can, hope you get the help you need, but if not, you do the best you can and hope for the best.

I write my Story Description as a Word Document … Then I cut and paste it when I actually post the story … I am sure others do this too.

I do.

I also do it for my long and short descriptions on Bookapy. It's nice because all the descriptions have character maximums and Word shows the character count.

I write my Story Description as a Word Document, so it is easier to check for spelling errors, and such.

Then I cut and paste it when I actually post the story.

That's what I (and most authors I know) do too.

I inferred it from the person mentioning that their editors don't bother to edit Story Descriptions.

That was more a reflection of just how common the issue is, as the typos aren't typically misspellings as they are improper word choices that were unnoticed by the author and then not caught during the subsequent editing process.

In general, it pretty much happens to all of us, which is why I'll often go back and review/revise my Story Description multiple times during the writing and editing process (as the story evolves), and then again once I get a feel for how the readers perceive the story, as that often change how an author present the story, especially if it wasn't how s/he anticipated they'd take it.