totally understand but i can't spell or write so well. they make it worth reading.
yea I've been there not with stories but with my poetry.
Hi Cat, It's a difficult one, because a good edit can make all the difference to how well a story reads. But there's the point, "a good edit." If he/she is changing the sense and meaning of your stories, then I'd say that that's not good editing. All an editor should be doing is tidying up the style of your writing, not reworking the content. I know this because I edit material myself, and I know that it's a fine line between ruining someone's work and improving it. Only you can make the judgement as to whether your work has been improved by an edit. Cx
Oh thank heavens for that, I thought this was about someone else complaining about our verification process being too strict (not that it is).
LOL hell no. we are just discussing the role of editors
Its not easy when writing, reading or even speaking doesn't come naturally and is a struggle through out someones life! The key is not to give up but to keep trying and accept the help! But as I have learnt as I struggled to join the creative lush authors, I was taking it personally and feeling incompetent which is is just part of my who I am makeup.
Good luck to everyone!
Run
Well, after my first period of despair and big problems with feeling molested through my story. I am now happy to (when I have changed two things) present my new story.
I have come to the conclusion that... My dear firend did a good job, in taking my harsh words and all. I am certain I will feel the same next time he helps me edit something but I am sure to learn in the process.
Nicola, I wouldn't complain about that.
(my first story got through... that says a lot :P)
Glad it all worked out for you, Cat. Cx
I think we all get frustrated, but can you imagine the editors. I have been rejected more times then most...but it's also a learning lesson.
"Easy reading is damned hard writing."
~ Nathaniel Hawthorne
Catnip, I have "proofread" or "edited" stories for a few people here and the way I do it is when I see a correction that needs to be made I do it in red so that the writer can see their work AND the correction needed. It makes it easy for them to read through what they wrote, see My suggestion, and either accept it or not. I've found that to be the best way of doing it and once the author has gone through the story and made whatever changes they needed to, changing the text color is a simple thing.
Master J, Catnip,
An objective review and an informed edit are both critical to producing a good, not to mention great result. Lush's editors/reviewers provide both, for which I am grateful.
An uninformed edit is a catastrophe, of course. I recall decades ago filing an intelligence report on the aftermath of a nuclear accident. "Every oncology patient also presented with (DELETED) cancer." That was changed by a nincompoop to "Every oncology patient was also presented with (DELETED) cancer." At the national level the report was thrown away as garbage because I obviously did not know what I was talking about.
I had an early lush submission rejected for "typos and punctuation mistakes" and mixing both narrative and speech in a single paragraph. The criticisms were all incorrect, but I got the important advice. I rewrote the chapter from its freshman college reading level down to eighth grade. Worked like a charm.
Abigail,
We are in violent agreement about the necessity of making text easier to read. Sometimes actions occur directly related to a speech, and sometimes they occur simultaneous with the speech.
"You're a cocksucker," Naomi said. Despite Rick's denials and protests, she stood her ground. "You're a cocksucker."
Separating this into three paragraphs would be done were the material written for a fifth grade reading level. Above that level, the flow often improves by including related statements and actions in a single paragraph. Comprehension also improves so long as the paragraph is relatively short. My sample paragraph could go on for 87 more sentences and cover eleven pages while remaining properly structured. Structured, yes; understood, no.
Lush only accepts stories in English, which is fine. Most of my hundreds of thousands of pages of writing have been business documents and presentations, about half in a language other than the reader's/viewer's native language. In those cases, an additional issue must be addressed.
When reading in a non-native language, white space is pure gold. Crowded pages with lengthy paragraphs are intimidating.
Thanks for your verifier work.
The Moderators generally do a fab job and I really don't mind punctuation being corrected as well as typos etc, but I had a Moderator change "take away" to "take out". It must have been an American Moderator who changed it. I was really annoyed. They both mean the same thing, so I thought it was a pretty petty change. I have nothing against the American usage of English and the terms that are common there, but I'm British and that's how we say it. I felt that one change, in a way, spoilt the whole story.
I had a story declined because the person that read it didn't like the title. I'm not bsing you. I had one Editors not give me any reason for why the story was declined. But said they liked the story and would like to read other stories of mine. And his name-o was B-u-z-z. I in so many words told Buzz he would not be able to write like me no matter how of my stories he read. I've had some some odd experiences with trying to post things. I told my dad about that and he urged me to stop giving away stories for free. I took his advice.
This thread leaves me scratching my head. Although I have five stories posted at Lush Stories, and another currently awaiting verification, I am very much a 'newbie' here. I have been a member for less than one month and am very confused by what has been said here.
At least three different terms have been used for someone who might review a story: editor, moderator and verifier. My understanding of these terms is as follows: (These are related to on-line story submission at Lush Stories. Stories submitted for traditional publishing, ePublishing, or other story sites, would likely go through a different process.)
An editor is someone you ask to review your story before its submission. This would be someone of the author's own choosing who would be expected to correct spelling and grammar. In some case they might also be expected to improve the readability.
A moderator is someone who follows forum threads or chat sessions to ascertain that participants post or chat according to established rules. They have no function in the submission, review or posting of a story.
A verifier is someone who reviews a story that has been formally submitted to the site, and either accepts it, (as written), for posting, rejects it with a commentary as to what needs to be changed before resubmission, or rejects it without the possibility for resubmission. This person never makes a change, (punctuation, spelling or otherwise), to the submission itself, but only points out those things he or she sees as unacceptable.
Depending upon their qualifications, as well as authority granted by the site operators, a single individual might perform more than one of these functions, but not at the same time.
Am I understanding this correctly?
