Help me Please!!

[Rubytuesdayx]

Hello Everybody,

Hope that you are OK! My story has been rejected on the grounds of punctuation, however the only thing that I can think of is the breaks within the piece to indicate a change in character. How else can I display this? Basically I have flipped between characters throughout the story. Would it be easier just to rewrite it from one perspective? I don't know if this would take away from what I am trying to achieve!

Thanks

xxx

 

[lance gt]

Hello Everybody,

Hope that you are OK! My story has been rejected on the grounds of punctuation, however the only thing that I can think of is the breaks within the piece to indicate a change in character. How else can I display this? Basically I have flipped between characters throughout the story. Would it be easier just to rewrite it from one perspective? I don't know if this would take away from what I am trying to achieve!

Thanks

xxx

Post a link to your story, Ruby, so we can see what you've done.

 

[sr71plt]

The problem doesn't sound like it's section breaks. If you wish, you could PM three or four paragraphs of it to me, and maybe I can see the punctuation problem.

You are folding commas and period inside the close quote marks for dialogue, aren't you?

Section breaks rendered as follows will pass:

(body text)

* * * *

(body text)

 

[Darkniciad]

As SR suggested, scrutinize your punctuation in dialogue. For whatever reason, that gets a great deal more attention than any other element of grammar, resulting in the most rejections.

"Your punctuation should always be inside the quote marks," I say.

A single mistake on this too close to the beginning of the document has been enough to trigger a rejection in the past. That can make it frustrating to find, if you only goofed once and it happened to stick out to Laurel when she was reading it for approval.

 

[sr71plt]

A look-see was made and advice sent back. Some possibles on punctuation, but it's still hard to say what will cause the editor here to reject some stories but pass others on the grounds of grammar and punctuation.

A general comment. The British submitters frequently post that they have no trouble passing British style that disagrees with American style here, but time after time that I look at what has been rejected, I'm coming up with British styles that disagree with American styles. So, I cann't discount this as being a possible source for a percentage of these punctuation/grammar rejections.

 

[Darkniciad]

Maybe when this comes up, we should start suggesting that the "Notes" section of the submission form should be utilized if the author is using British punctuation conventions?

From the reports, Laurel seems to have no problem passing those stories, but if she's not aware of that, it just looks like someone screwed up the American style and it gets rejected.

Those that pass are likely authors she already knows to use the style, or those who use idioms/spelling/etc. so undeniably British that she makes the connection during those speed reads. Anybody else would probably do well to put a note on the submission.

By the same token, if that's what caused the rejection, it could be re-submitted with a note saying it uses the British conventions, and would probably pass on the second round.

Regardless, the author choosing to use British conventions should be aware of the lion's share of users who are in the U.S., and are probably going to see the style as "wrong". They should be prepared for comments about incorrect grammar if they choose to go that route.

 

[lance gt]

I always make a note that it's Canadian, which again, has a few variables that are different than British or American. Since I've done that, I've never had a rejection for spelling/punctuation.