#editortips for 07.23.12

@smoulderingsea: Think of people who've made an instant impression. Most compelling trait? Probably not their eyes. Give your characters more.  #editortips

@smoulderingsea: Publishing industry professionals are individuals with different tastes and preferences. Don't lump them in under one blanket. #editortips

@smoulderingsea: If confused about the verb forms with groups, ask if you can replace the group of things with "they." If so, use plural form. #editortips

@smoulderingsea: If an action can attribute a speaker to dialogue immediately after, you don't need a speech tag. The action makes it clear. #editortips

@smoulderingsea: If you withdraw a sub a publisher wanted, then later come back with it--don't be surprised if they've moved on. Markets change. #editortips

@smoulderingsea: Do not abuse Twitter DM to ask querying questions or try to pre-query an agent or editor to gauge interest. It's just bad form. #editortips

@smoulderingsea: Lose: verb. To misplace, or to fail in a competition, wager, etc. Loose: adjective. Not tight, or free. There's a difference. #editortips

@smoulderingsea: Same with choose and chose, only in this case the difference is between past and present tense. Choose=present, chose=past. #editortips

@smoulderingsea: A bear cannot bear people saying "bare with me," and will bare his teeth unless you can bear with his homonym nitpicking. #editortips

@smoulderingsea: Do not mess with the mighty Alot. It could hurt. A lot. http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2010/04/alot-is-better-than-you-at-everything.html #editortips

@smoulderingsea: Everyone who's ever upset you with a negative comment about your book moved on. You're only hurting yourself by dwelling. Stop. #editortips

About #editortips:
#editortips is a daily rash of tweets from an only partially crazy editor, chock full of random chocolatey morsels about writing, editing, and querying vaguely disguised as helpful pointers and/or really bad humor. I tweet as @smoulderingsea, and try to post with some consistency every weekday at 6PM CST. Weekends optional, depending on if I’m spending yet another Saturday night editing because my social life consists of Netflix and trying to see how much popcorn I can get stuck in my husband's hair before he'll actually look away from the TV.