Excerpts From WHEN ONE IS EXPECTING

Learn From My Mistakes: a Week of Tips (Day 1, The Ellipsis)

This week I'm going to post a series of boo-boos and mistakes I make when I'm writing, bad habits I need to quit, and other tips my editors are constantly getting after me about. Hopefully, if you see yourself doing the same thing, you might save yourself an editing gaff in the process.

Day 1 - The Ellipsis
Yeah, I abuse it. When I think an ellipsis is necessary, my editor says no, it's hanging. When I go back and finish the sentence, I realize she was right. In the majority of cases, I didn't need the . . .

I Heart Great Tips

I love it when I'm reading on the loops or on a blog about a problem an author is having, and then read a very easy and sensible solution.

Take for instance Google alerts.  I have an alert set up for Linda Mooney, but I may get a ton of responses, some for just Linda, some for only Mooney, but not that many with Linda Mooney.

Here's the tip.  Put your alert words in quotation marks like this:  "Linda Mooney".  From then on you will get alerts ONLY for those words, and in that order.

Cool, yes?