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Peace Writer’s Handbook
to
Common Misstakes
(oops, should’ve proofread that!)
Contents: Use Ctrl-F to skip to a particular section
1. Introduction
2. Spelling
3. Homonyms
4. Agreement
5. The Comma
6. The Colons
7. The Passive Voice
8. Redundancy
9. Abusing Words
10. Miscellaneous Errors
11. Finishing Touches
1. Introduction
Good morning, or evening, or whenever you’re reading this. I’m Peace Writer, and I’m here to alert you of the most common mistakes I see in writing. This is not a guide to writing the best manga fic, nor is it a list of the best punch lines for your humor fic needs, nor is it a key to making a romance story so moving that readers in front of their computers will cry Niagara falls. This handbook is for reference when you think your latest chapter is finished.
First off, let me say this; writing mistakes are very common. Only through years and years of experience will you ever reach that level where you can write and not make a mistake the first time around. So, since writing mistakes are so common, what do we do about it?
Well, mistakes are easy to spot, right? One check over proofreading the chapter is enough, right?
WRONG!!!!!!
You can proofread your chapter as many times as you want; there is still a high probability that a couple of errors will slip through your prying eyes. So, how can you be rid of them? Well, it all depends on how much effort you put into your piece.
However, therein lies the problem.
A high percentage of people don’t give it their all when the time is needed. Don’t believe me? Try this test:
Get up, and raise your hands. I’m serious now. Your goal is to get as close to the sky/ceiling as possible, so stretch as far as you can. All done? Hold it.
Now, reach one inch higher.
HOW DID YOU DO THAT?!?!?!?!?
Know what just happened? You lied to yourself. You made yourself believe that that was all you could give, when really you were stowing away the rest of your effort. In fact, you could’ve stood on your chair and add an extra two feet to your height. Shame on you, shame on you.
The same principle can be said for writing. I’ve seen too many stories where there were so many errors that the piece was virtually unreadable. And yet, they’re there because the author didn’t take the proper care in writing the piece, and decided to post it anyway.
So, now that you know you’re capable of stowing away extra effort, let’s bring it out, shall we?
Now, writing mistakes can come in many different forms; grammar and spelling are the most common. But then, grammar mistakes can be broken down into verb usages, punctuation misplacement, word usage errors, agreement, it’s enough to make your head spin. Like I said before: this handbook is a reference when you’re ‘done’ with your chapter. This handbook is here to eliminate all errors that can be spotted by a reader. Why? Because even one mistake, no matter how small, will leave a mark on your story and your reputation, no matter how trivial.
Let’s begin.
Ah yes; spelling. I hate spelling errors because they’re more or less unavoidable. I remember when I wrote by hand in elementary school; my works were full of them. Thank goodness for spell check. Unfortunately, not all of you have that feature in your writing program. (I have a friend who doesn’t, and I always berate him on how many spelling errors he has in his works.) And even if you do use spell check, it makes you overconfident. I see too many mistakes like this:
“Sally went to the shop than just opened last week.”
Aha, the word ‘that’ was misspelled by one letter, and the spell checker didn’t catch it. Uh oh; now we know the spell checker is only useful to a point. You will be surprised at how many times I’ve seen single letters that have been misplaced and left in the final draft. Watch out for those. To avoid this, I suggest the following: After finishing your chapter/story, take a break for five-fifteen minutes, get a drink, go to the bathroom, whatever. When you get back, reread the chapter/story from the top, aloud. By now, you should be more alert, and your eyes will be able to catch more errors than before. By reading aloud, your ears also become a tool for catching errors. Repeat the process once more, just to make sure.
For those of you without spell check, I propose using a dictionary (online is good), read a lot to expand your spelling knowledge (as a bonus, you also expand your vocabulary), or just write slower than usual, looking up every once in a while to see what you’ve written. If you spot a word you’re just not sure how to spell, replace it with another word.
But of course, there’s always going to be a common word used that has a spelling everyone spells wrong without experience. Here is a short list of these words. (you can also find this list on my bio):
restaurant
definitely
unnecessary
exercise
watch
which
witch
weird
schedule
lose (as opposed to 'loose')
surprised
especially
professionally
successfully
consistently
particularly
labeled
conveniently
coming
usually
rhetorical
length
strength
muscle
meant
noticeable
There are many, many others. Just be really careful with your writing. After you’re done, take a break for about ten minutes, and filter your work via dictionary, online buddy, or even your parents. By the end of this, 99 percent of all spelling errors should be eliminated from your story.
Now we reach the second most common of all writing blunders; grammar errors. Oh sure; you probably have a grammar checker along with your spell checker. But, as before, this device makes you overconfident. The grammar checker cannot catch everything. In fact, I seldom remember a time when it was useful. As a result, grammar errors ensue. The most frequent mistake that I absolutely hate seeing in a final draft is this type:
“Sally wanted too buy to bags, but there shop was closed.”
This error was made due to homonyms: words that sound the same, but have different meanings. And guess what? The grammar checker cannot catch this type of a mistake. Homonyms are as annoying as a younger sibling because it’s such an easy mistake to make, and they can make your writing seem amateurish. Here’s a list of the most common homonyms and their usages:
To: toward
Too: also
Two: number
Their: possessive
They’re: They are
There: Not here, but
Your: possessive
You’re: You are
Yore: the past (less common, but hey: spell checker won’t catch this)
Write: oh, come on
Right: not left, but/correct
Rite: ritual
Hole: a pit
Whole: all
Lets: allow
Let’s: let us
Its: possessive
It’s: it is
Who’s: who is
Whose: possessive
Which: question pronoun
Witch: pagan woman
Effect: as a result…
Affect: to change
I could go on, but you really should be able to spot them on a thorough read-through. Just go real slowly when you’re looking for these mistakes; they may not seem clear the first time around. Whenever you reach a homonym, make sure it’s the right one. Refer to this chart, or search online if you’re confused about which homonym to use: You’ll be surprised at how many writing guides there are on the net.
Now, we come to agreement. I remember when agreement was simply a compromise at the end of an argument. Now that I’ve learned about grammar agreement, I almost wish I had skipped that particular class.
Verb agreement is basically the pairing of a singular/plural noun with a singular/plural verb, respectively. You’d think this would be simple.
And then you get to this:
“The group of students is/are going to school.”
And your mind gets confused. Should the verb be plural or singular? Well, you could get rid of ‘of students’, right? This turns the sentence into this:
“The group is going to school.”
‘Group’ is singular. Therefore, the verb is singular, and the whole sentence would look like this:
“The group of students is going to school.”
It may seem weird, but it’s correct.
Something else weird: singular forms of verbs usually have an ‘s’ at the end. Examples include: want/s, have/has, decide/s. However, some subjects are singular/plural when they’re really plural/singular. Examples include data (plural), news (plural), anyone (singular), and everyone (singular).
Watch for sentences that have the verb first; you may get confused as to what form of the verb to use. For example:
“There was/were a lot of people at the meeting.”
The subject is ‘people’, a plural noun. Therefore, the plural form of the verb, ‘were’, should be used.
“There were a lot of people at the meeting.”
If the conjunction ‘or’ or ‘nor’ is used to connect two subjects, the verb agrees with the closest subject;
“Either the coach or the players are coming here.”
“Either the players or the coach is coming here.”
As before, the second example might seem weird, but it is correct.
Subject/pronoun agreement can also spawn errors more often than one would think. The rule is that if there is a singular/plural subject in the sentence, it must be referred to as a single/plural subject. Study this common error:
“Sally placed a fishbowl at the door so if anyone comes to the party, they can leave their keys in the bowl.”
The singular subject ‘anyone’ has a plural pronoun ‘they’ referring to it. This is incorrect, and also a very common mistake. The only way to deal with this mistake is to write around it (unless you want to deal with the ‘he/she’ tool in your writing).
Now, people with the grammar check function are probably lucky enough to have it spot most of their agreement errors. Unfortunately, those without them will just have to make do with their eyes and ears. Like before, read it over once aloud, the cardinal rule being “If it sounds wrong, it probably is.”
Punctuation is pretty much anything that’s not a letter in writing. Of course, just because they can’t make up words doesn’t mean they aren’t important. Misuse of punctuation can either put a scratch or a pothole in your story depending on your audience and the type of mistake. So, let’s get to teaching, shall we?
The comma; the most common type of punctuation error there is. Why? I mean, it’s used to link phrases and clauses, right? Well, yes. However, pretty much everyone either neglects the proper usage of the comma, or overuses it. This is because the comma has the most rules attached to its usage.
First off, commas can be used in a series. You know:
“Sally ran towards the car, got in, and drove away.”
However, too many writers do this:
“Sally ran towards the car, got in, and drove off, and after she stopped, she met her best friend Bill, and exchanged greetings, and Bill went on his way, leaving Sally alone to fiddle with her keys at the door, and finally entering her apartment after she found the right one.”
No, just, no. When another idea happens, that’s when you use the period to end the sentence and split them up:
“Sally ran towards the car, got in, and drove off. After she stopped, she met her best friend Bill. They exchanged hellos, and then he left Sally alone in front of her apartment. She fiddled with the keys before finding the right one. Finally spotting it, she entered her humble abode.”
You see? Having more sentences allows you to be more creative anyway.
In addition, commas sometimes have to be used before ‘because’ to make an idea clear:
“She knew I was going to the skating rink today, because she looked at my schedule.”
Commas can also be used to connect TWO independent clauses. Not three, not four, and definitely not five; TWO. In other words, do NOT do this:
“Sally started to vacuum, but then the doorbell rang, and Sally sighed in exasperation, and she went to answer it.”
Lazy people do this; they just want to get the boring part of the story over with, so they use commas incorrectly by connecting multiple clauses. That example was a run-on; a very short run-on, but a run-on nonetheless. Run-ons will put your audience to sleep because they speed up the action faster than it needs to be. When you’re watching a movie, you don’t put it on fast forward first, right?
Commas don’t always have to be used to connect clauses: You can also use commas to separate parenthetical elements, or added information, like so:
“Sally is bringing Horace, her brother, to the party.”
The above is correct. However, some tentative writers hesitate to use the comma. In this case, you have to use two commas to surround the parenthetical element. The below (which too many authors do) is incorrect:
“Sally is bringing Horace, her brother to the party.”
On the other hand, nervous writers like to put too much commas into their work. For instance:
“Exasperated, Sally had to phone for Chinese take-out to serve her guests, because her dog ate the thanksgiving turkey.”
The second comma unnecessarily separates a conjunction, and is a comma splice.
Many writers don’t know how to use commas properly. In fact, I have not met one writer who doesn’t have a comma error in their story (myself included). Don’t feel bad about making comma mistakes, but don’t be careless about them. One solution on correct comma usage would be to read the chapter aloud once again, but this time, pause at every comma, following the cardinal rule: “If it sounds wrong, it probably is.”
The colon and semi-colon; these two useful pieces of punctuation are often neglected for the comma. This makes up for about 40 percent of all comma errors because authors will try to connect two fragments with a simple comma, and move on.
For example:
“Sally didn’t know what to do, because she couldn’t simply say she was sorry.”
The sentence immediately sounds like there’s something wrong with it. And there is: That comma shouldn’t be there. You could just get rid of it, and leave in the conjunction ‘because’, but instead, let’s use a semi-colon.
“Sally didn’t know what to do; she couldn’t simply say she was sorry.”
There, much better, right? Semi-colons separate two closely related clauses. If the first clause sounds incomplete, add a semi-colon and finish your explanation. To spot errors where a semi-colon may be used, read the chapter aloud, and listen for a misplaced comma.
Now, colons are a different story. Colons should be used to connect an independent clause with an explanation. So, how is it different from a semi-colon? Colons connect independent ideas which could end right there, but shouldn’t:
“Sally knew there was only one thing left to do: chain her dog to the fence outside.”
Now, semi-colons and colons can be used for lists, but there are examples where they are not needed:
“Sally wanted to call Marcie, Jake, Bill, Angie, and George.”
See? Colons are used in lists that are being presented:
“The room will be filled by the following people: Marcie, Jake, Bill, Angie, and George.”
And semi-colons are used to separate monster lists (lists with subjects that have affiliations and locations listed with them). However, the colon and semi-colon aren’t used often in writing as introductions to lists. They sure put a nice touch on your writing though. Just don’t use them too often, as they can get pretty annoying to read.
THINK AGAIN!!!
Remember: you’re writing a story, so not only must it be free of spelling and grammar errors; it must also be appealing to the eye of your readers. I said earlier that this handbook will not tell you how to write a good story, but it will tell you how not to write a good story. Sometimes knowing what you shouldn’t do is more valuable than knowing what you have to do.
You may have heard of sentence structure before. When you heard it, you might not have known exactly what it meant. Sentence structure is exactly what it says it is; the structure of a sentence. This can make your readers hooked onto everything you have to say on the page, or bore them into drowsiness.
Let’s start with the passive voice. What is the passive voice? The passive voice is a reversal of word order. Everyday sentences, or active voice, start with a subject, then a verb, and finally another subject the verb acts upon:
“Sally ate the fish.”
Passive voice however starts with the subject that the verb acts upon, then the verb, and finally, the subject that performs the verb:
“The fish was eaten by Sally.”
The passive voice is typically avoided because it sticks the subject at the end of the sentence, or sometimes completely ignores it. Why is that bad do you ask?
Let’s say that you’re home from school. You make your way over to the game system, and turn it on. You were hoping to make your dark knight a level 78, tough enough to take down Lord Dracosis, but when you turn the game on, this appears on your screen:
“There is no memory on game slot A”
Stunned, you suddenly feel angry. You ask one of your siblings “What happened to my game?” And your sibling replies:
“Your game was erased.”
Well, DUH!!!!! That didn’t explain much, did it? That was the passive voice: it can speak its way around details. Wouldn’t it be much better for your sibling to use the active voice, and say:
“John erased your game.”
There; now you know who to strangle.
But, the passive voice can also be used effectively: if you want the object that’s being acted upon to be noticed, you can use the passive voice. For example:
“Sally brought the succulent, aromatic fish to the table. The fish was eaten immediately by everyone.”
Of course, you have to make it sound better than that. It all depends on your writing style when you try to use the passive voice. Maybe poetry writers could use it real effectively, but when you’re writing a paper or story, you should stick with the active voice for the most part.
First rule of word usages: never use unnecessary words. These bore people like foreign language learning tapes. I don’t want to see any of this in your writing:
“Leaving the room, Sally tiptoed quietly from the kitchen, and made her way towards her bedroom which was around the corner and to the left.”
This does not look like story material. It’s good if you want an outline, and even then you had best change it before it hits any kind of draft.
Here’s a well known writer’s rule (here, we’re going to call it the second cardinal rule): never use two words when one will work. When I first began writing, I figured that the more words I had in my story, the better it would look. It wasn’t long before my pieces sounded boring, and took minutes to get to an actual idea. Quality over quantity my friends; you can have a million words in your story, but if it’s dull and dreary, it’s a bad story.
Most ‘two for one’ errors are made through redundancy.
I know: the first time I heard that word I had no idea what it meant either.
Redundancy is the repetition of facts within a sentence or paragraph. It’s the result of the author wanting to get a point across to his/her audience. It often looks like this:
“There were some people in Sally’s party who thought the whole thing was a disaster.”
That was needlessly wordy. Beginning authors and sometimes veteran authors try to make their sentences longer by inserting unnecessary words. For example, the model sentence above could’ve been shortened to this:
“Some people in Sally’s party thought the whole thing was a disaster.”
There; you get the same message across, and it keeps your audience awake.
The more commonly used form of redundancy is adverb usage. Adverbs can modify verbs, adjectives, or other adverbs, and are often found with a ‘ly’ at the end. The problem is that authors often use these to emphasize verbs that have already expressed enough meaning. Consider the following:
“Sally whispered quietly to Bill.”
That adverb is unnecessary, and makes the sentence redundant. This is why adverbs are mostly hated right after an action because the action usually speaks for itself. Coupled with the common sense within the story, and they are rarely used in professional writing. To spot redundancy, keep an eye out for ‘ly’ words when you’re reading through your work. Also, try to pick a time when you’re not tired. Believe me: reading your own work does get boring after a while.
Ah yes, my favorite author plunder. No, abusing words doesn’t refer to four-letter sayings: They refer to the criminal act of using a word over and over and over again in the same paragraph. Sometimes, authors abuse words within a sentence, which is a writing felony.
The most common writing tool used for word abusing is the pronoun. Everyone should know what a pronoun is: A word that takes place of a proper noun. Then, we get to the lazy author. Lazy authors love to skip over the boring parts of their story by writing hasty, small, choppy sentences. Personally, I really, REALLY loathe this type of blunder because it shows that the author put almost no effort to make his/her story look good. Don’t ever let me catch you writing like this:
“Sally said goodbye to all of the guests. She closed the door after the last one, and then she went to the kitchen to clean up. She stood in shock at the giant mess that had to be cleaned up. She saw that her dog had left the entrails of the turkey strewn about the kitchen tile. She sighed in exhaustion, and grabbed the mop from out of the closet. She mopped the floor tiredly, outdone by the events of the evening.”
Very sadly, I’ve seen this many, many times, and it never looks pretty. Why would you want to have your work look like this? First of all, the sentence structure itself is pretty repetitive: pronoun, verb, and object. Second, the same pronoun is used over and over again, lulling the reader to an eternal slumber. Finally, this is third person speaking, and I’m pretty sure that the whole purpose here is to write a story.
So, let’s fix that paragraph:
“After a successful dinner, Sally said goodbye to all of her guests. After she closed the door behind the last guest, she went to the kitchen to clean up. However, she was stopped by the shocking sight of the mess of turkey remains her dog left behind all over the kitchen tile. “Why me?” she thought as she pulled the mop from out of the closet. Cursing her dog, she started to mop the floor, exhausted by the evening’s events.”
You see? Look at how easy that was. We kept the original idea of the paragraph, and it looks much better than that droning style of repetition that other paragraph had. And all we did was change the word order of some of the sentences and add some more creativity.
The other form of word abusing is repetition. Sometimes it happens when the author is tentative about using pronouns, or it can happen because it’s hard to use a synonym once a certain word is used and you have to use it again. For example:
“Suddenly, Sally slipped on the slippery floor. She quickly grabbed the freezer handle to prop herself back up. Suddenly, her dog ran into the kitchen and slammed into her leg, causing her to crash suddenly to the floor.”
Do you want to know a little trick? What I do is I right click on the offending word, and click on the synonym option. This option shows me a list of words that have more or less the same meaning. For instance, if I perform this operation on the word ‘suddenly’, I get these alternatives:
‘abruptly, rapidly, swiftly, unexpectedly, all of the sudden, out of the blue.’
So, after a few changes, our paragraph looks like this:
“Suddenly, Sally slipped on the slippery floor. She quickly grabbed the freezer handle to prop herself back up. All of the sudden, her dog ran into the kitchen, and slammed into her leg, causing her to crash swiftly to the floor.”
Ahh, much better. Do you see what can be done if you put just a little more effort into your works?
In this section, I will mention a few more errors that haven’t been covered in previous sections. Even though you’ve already learned a lot, there are still some more mistakes that you should be aware of.
First off, we’ll start with pronoun references. As you already know, pronouns take the place of other nouns. However, many authors stick these anywhere in their stories, and often abuse these sentence compactors by misusing them. For example:
“Suzy, Sally’s friend, entered Sally’s house to find an ecstatic Sally. She offered her a chair, and they both sat down to talk about the party.”
Here, the subject the pronoun is making a reference to is not quite clear, as there are two possibilities. For a pronoun to be used effectively, the subject it refers to should be within the same sentence. If a second reference appears within the same sentence, you should drop the pronoun altogether and use the proper noun.
Also, beware of the pronoun ‘it’. The word ‘it’ can take the place of nearly anything. This means that the word ‘it’ more often than not explains nothing. Try not to begin sentences with ‘it’; it looks terrible in writing.
Next, we’ll study words that could be split in half as two separate words. These words mean trouble because most beginning authors use the wrong form of these words. For instance:
“Sally called her friend Bill everyday.”
This is wrong because ‘everyday’ is an adjective, but it’s not describing anything. The correct version is this:
“Sally called her friend Bill every day.”
‘Every’ is an adjective describing the noun ‘day’, and is therefore correct.
So then, how do you use the word ‘everyday’? Well, since ‘everyday’ is an adjective, it has to describe something. Here’s an example of the correct usage:
“Sally would walk to the mailbox each morning: It was an everyday thing.”
The adjective ‘everyday’ is describing the noun ‘thing’, and is also correct. This rule also applies to the words ‘anytime’ and ‘anyplace’.
Many people misuse the word ‘only’. Consider the following:
“Sally only had to call Bill.”
This is incorrect because the word only is an adjective, and needs to describe the object next to it. The correct model is as follows:
“Sally had to call only Bill.”
Finally, we can discuss prepositions and their subjects.
Here’s a simple quiz question: Is the following sentence correct?
“Between you and me, I didn’t have lunch this morning.”
If you thought the above sentence was correct, you’re right. Surprised huh?
Take a look at this sentence:
“She talked to Jerry and I”
This sentence is not correct because the subject ‘I’ is a regular subject form. To fix this sentence easily, pretend that Jerry didn’t exist. This shortens the sentence to:
“She talked to me.”
‘Me’ is the object form. Now, we reinsert Jerry:
“She talked to Jerry and me.”
Not that you would write that exact sentence anyway, but in similar situations, the above is a correct model.
To spot and correct all of these mistakes, reread the chapter slowly as if you are the reader, reading someone else’s work. If something isn’t clear, or looks weird, fix it.
So, all that you needed to know about common errors have been covered. Now what? Well, you need to be able to spot errors, right? Here’s where the final test comes in. You will be shown a series of paragraphs. These paragraphs are designed to test how well you are able to spot grammar/spelling/presentation errors. Some of the sentences are fine, but most of them have at least one error. You can read these paragraphs as many times as you need in any way you wish. After you’re done, the answers will be revealed shortly after. Remember: pay no relevance to the storyline. You’re only looking for grammar, spelling, and presentation errors. Here we go:
“The party had reached it’s climax; the stereo was on at full blast, the guests were dancing wildly, and Sally was having the time of her life. She danced into the kitchen and spotted Suzy mixing at least six different bottles into a large bowl. Bill was behind Suzy, who was eagerly waiting for the first taste of the mystery draught. When it was finished, she brought the bowl into the living room. From the reaction of the guests, it seemed as if, the party would last all night.”
“The next morning, Sally awoke to the jarring sound of her dog barking loudly from outside. The only thing stopping Sally from going outside and scolding her dog, was the fact that she was to tired to leave her bed. She would need only one more reason to depart from the sanctity of her sheets, and it came in the form of her doorbell. Completely frustrated, she crawled out of bed, and started to make her way towards the door.”
“When Sally opened the door in fatigue the mailman greeted her with a nervous smile. Wondering why he hadn’t used the mailbox, she asked why he had to wake her up. The mailman informed Sally than her dog has broken free of his chain, and has proceeded to bark at him from behind the fence. Furthermore, he was concerned that if anyone were to pass by, the dog could jump over the fence, and attack them. Deafened by weariness, Sally closed the door in his face and went back to bed.”
Compare the number of errors you found with the total number of errors and subtract a point for every proofreading error. A high percentage on your part signifies that you can spot errors pretty easily, which is obviously a good thing. If you find yourself with a low percentage, go back over the handbook and study the types of errors again. Here are the answers:
Paragraph 1: Line 1 has a homonym error: ‘it’s’ is used where ‘its’ should’ve been used. Line 2 is correct. Line 3 contains redundant clauses and subject confusion. Re-write as: ‘Behind Suzy, Bill was eagerly waiting for the first taste of the mystery draught.’ Line 4 has the minor presentation error of having the word ‘it’ as the first subject with no antecedent. Line 5 has a comma splice: The second comma is completely unnecessary.
Paragraph 2: Line 1 contains verb redundancy: The word ‘loudly’ is used to modify the verb ‘barked’, weakly emphasizing the action. Line 2 has a comma splice: This comma separates the subject ‘Sally’ from the verb ‘was’. Line 2 also has a homonym error: ‘she was to tired’. Line 3 is correct. Line 4 contains a comma splice: The second comma interrupts the conjunction ‘and’, which joins to a second verb.
Paragraph 3: Line 1 is missing a comma between ‘fatigue’ and ‘the mailman’. This is an introductory sentence element, and a comma should separate the two parts. Line 2 is correct. Line 3 contains a common spelling error: ‘than’ in place of ‘that’. Line 4 contains a comma splice: The last comma separates the clause from a conjunction before a verb, and hence, it is a comma splice. Line 4 also contains subject/pronoun confusion: The singular subject ‘anyone’ is referred to by the plural pronoun ‘they’. Line 5 is correct.
There were thirteen mistakes in all. If you thought that test was easy, then try reading those three paragraphs again, but this time, speed read. You will be very surprised at how many mistakes can hide from fast eyes. And to let you know, there was only one mistake that the grammar checker caught in the above paragraphs. If that test was proof of anything, it proved that there is only one factor that can fix errors within a story, and that’s the author.
To properly proofread your story, I suggest that you read it over three times; once to make sure the overall story looks great, twice to fix any errors in the story, and a third time to preen through all of the sentences and make sure there are no careless mistakes. This handbook not only showed you all of the common errors to watch for: This handbook was also meant to send a message. It doesn’t matter what genre you like best, or what your schedule looks like, or how badly you want to see the end of your story. You decide how much effort you put into your work. You decide how well your story reads. And most important of all, you decide how great your story is.
Now, get back out there and start writing!
