Posts by Cyn
Behold! The Mighty Ellipses! The demon...she? he?...gestured towards the supply wagons. Ultimately, it's a matter of personal style. Dashes, parentheses, ellipses are all correct. Part of ...
Your example doesn't look ugly, it's just something that ought to be saved for dialogue. I wouldn't use it in non-fiction, for example. Another method is to italicize the word. This example i...
There are two other common options. Italics. Murder, she said. And nothing at all. Murder, she said. Or more likely set up as narration. She said murder. I prefer anything to the...
The answer is two fold: Ask your teacher. Google it. I can't ask your teacher for you, but I did a quick Google search. Since you added the mla tag, I assume that's the format required. So he...
What you describe in the question sounds perfectly fine to me. So if other people are telling you (or you're telling yourself) that it's not quite right, the problem isn't what you're doing, it's ...
More than words, toddlers remember actions. What is science boiled down to its core? It's the idea that you can form hypotheses about how the world works, test them, then come to a conclusion. S...
I think what's tripping you up is the idea that your male characters need to be characters that could not possibly be female. This probably comes from traditions of valuing what men do and devalui...
There are multiple ways to write a song. Sometimes a composer will pick up already written lyrics. Sometimes a lyricist will work off of an already written melody and arrangement (less common for...
Use an appendix The appendix is the perfect spot for longer documents you wish to include within a work (not just for a memoir). You can have as many as you want. Name each appendix. Appendix A...
The example you give in your question is all about age and gender. And age is the one category you need to be mindful of while you write. Most people know in advance the age group they are writin...
The publisher decides everything. If there is payment. What money is available for payment. How that money is divided up. If the money is per unit, what the units are and how to count them. If th...
The Writer's Market books will give you the lists of agents (with what they're looking for, contact info, etc) and articles (also in their Writer's Digest magazines and websites) on how to write th...
You sign a contract with the copyright owner. The contract specifies the arrangement. Permission to use the quote in your work. Permission to use the quote in derivative works (electronic, tran...
Your student worker sounds like a valuable assistant. But he is not a translator. Even if he were doing actual translation work, a co-translator indicates someone doing work at the same level tha...
On-again/off-again relationships don't usually have smooth transitions. Especially not for outside observers (and often not for the participants). Add in that this is a teen relationship, and for...
Writer's Digest is still chugging away with their Writer's Market series. With more specialities than ever. I found the 2018 (though the 2019 one is out) Poet's Market on Hoopla. (Hoopla is a re...
Let it be awkward. I see you already got this advice, and there's a reason for it. People in general go through machinations of all sorts just to keep things from "being awkward" between them and...
There is a difference between stereotypes and simply not fleshing a character out. For example, your main character goes into a coffeeshop, orders, and sits down to read. At the next table are tw...
If you want to avoid showing a character as "not like other girls" then make sure your "other girls" aren't stereotypical. The trope shows up with female characters who don't fit in. They don't h...
It's fine to shorten but only when the reader can fill in the blank. So far, you have: Managing a lot of people is a very difficult problem to Lot of people, difficult problem In this exam...
Do nothing. When you create a contract with a traditional publisher, they will tell you what to do. Almost certainly they'll want to use their own ISBNs. As for the ISBN itself, it's done with. ...
Is it okay? Well, it's likely legal (if the person is long dead anyway, and probably even if they're alive). You can do it. You might even get it published. For a large number of readers, the...
Most publishers are fine with simultaneous submissions and understand that it could otherwise take years for a manuscript to be accepted. What's important is to read the publisher's guidelines bef...
Do any of them have a confessor? The most literal interpretation of this is that they're Catholic and confessing to an actual Priest who is sworn to secrecy. I don't know what real life Catholics...
Lack of proofreading has been the bane of writing in many locations over the last few years. Do you remember back when newspapers came to your house and you paid to subscribe? Okay, maybe you don...
