Language & Editing

Variety Is the Spice of Life It's hard to believe that a whole month has gone by since we posted the first part of our Canadian and American spelling list! As before, we're using the Canadian Oxford Dictionary for Canadian spelling and Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary for American spelling. Once again, you'll notice that some words are spelled the same in both systems.   And here a confession: we're relying heavily on the Editors' Association of...

Usage

We have been absolutely inundated with work this week at TEC! Because of our crazy schedules, we're re-posting one of our most useful blogs. Barbara wrote this blog over a year ago, but it's still just as applicable today as it was last year! Hyphens can be confusing and tough to work with, even for more practiced writers. We hope you'll be able to refer back to this...

Language & Editing

It's April Fool's Day, and in lieu of pulling pranks, we've got humour of a more literary nature in mind.  With April being National Poetry Month (and in the spirit of today), we thought we'd post a funny little poem Barbara found and shared around the office! As well, Poem in My Pocket Day is coming to Canada for the first time this year, on April 21—perhaps you'd like to...

Language & Editing

  A 2012 article by Bruce McCall in Vanity Fair attempted to unravel the secret of Canadian humour (or "humor" as the magazine spelled it). The question was raised as to whether such a thing even existed.   Canadian author Terry Fallis had success with his comic novel The Best Laid Plans, an amusing tale of political tomfoolery amongst some honourable MPs in Ottawa. Contrast this with Going Rouge: The...

Language & Editing

  Vive la Différence! We all know that there's a difference between Canadian and American spelling,* and many of us have a basic grasp of the patterns, such as "-our/-or," "-re/er," or "-yse/yze. " But certainty usually ends somewhere around here, and unless you consult a dictionary, you may end up making rather haphazard spelling choices. "Does that look right? Um . I think so . Yeah, whatever. "   To...

Books And Reading

  Oscar season might be over, but the many great movies that were nominated are still just as fantastic today as they were before the Oscars happened. If you're one of those people who are serious about Oscar season, you might still be participating in the annual Oscar challenge: watch every single nominee. In case you're still trying to remember just how many movies that is, the total is...

Office Happenings

  As some of you may know, I am taking a hiatus from editing this spring, as I'm expecting my first baby to arrive any day now.   Although this pregnancy has been no fairy tale – thanks mostly to many months of morning sickness – the past nine months have nonetheless turned out to have quite a literary theme. I've spent this time editing books here at TEC, working...

Writing

  An editor is an expert at revising collections of written words. In fact, one French term for editor is "réviseur. " As a professional editor, revising someone else's text is part of my job. But as a writer, I love revising my own work, and all writers should learn to do this.   The American journalist Ambrose Bierce said that a saint was a just sinner who had been...

Writing

  While drafting the February edition of the TEC newsletter, I found myself flipping through Beth's collection of Editorial Eye back issues, searching for inspiration for our monthly Editors' Tip. I came across an interesting article on transition usage, and there was just too much useful information to fit into one newsletter tip. So, I decided to include the rest of the information in a blog, especially since transitions...

Indexing

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission, established on June 1, 2008, issued its final report on December 15, 2015. In over two thousand pages of text (plus hundreds of pages of notes and references), it documents the horrors of Canada's residential school system. The report is, to put it mildly, a very tough read. To read even more than a few pages of it is a crushing experience....

Writing

When reading a document, there are any number of writing errors or distractions that can take you out of the moment and interrupt the flow of your reading. The error I will discuss today is word repetition: how it occurs, and, more importantly, how to avoid it. Read It Out Loud You may have the memory of former teachers or professors scrawling "Word rep!" on your essays, papers, and reports...

Office Happenings

Happy 2016! The end of the year allowed us to take some time to rest, relax, and recharge. We hope your holidays were great and, like us, you are now getting back into the swing of things.     December marked the publication of our first Academic Newsletter, which contains resources, calls for papers, and a list of our most recent projects, specifically tailored to our academic clients. Look...

Usage

  Below are a few of the most common punctuation-related errors or inconsistencies that we see here at TEC. Here is what you need to keep in mind to help keep your prose correct and consistent!                 . ...

Books And Reading

Triptych: From the Greek adjective meaning "three-fold": tri = three, ptysso = to fold, or ptyx = fold. Usually a panel painting that is divided into three sections and hinged together to be folded shut or displayed open. The middle panel is typically the largest and is flanked by two smaller related works, although there are triptychs of equal-sized panels.    Margaret Atwood (MA) has been a...

Editing

The holiday season is like a mercifully distant relative who visits only once a year; I am always glad to see her arrive and always gladder to see her go. Now she is indeed gone, leaving behind bloated waistlines, glassy eyes, and pounding heads. And about time, I say. Good riddance to archaic holiday language until next year. How do you troll a Yuletide carol anyway?...

  If you're anything like me, you're likely still scrambling around the city and braving the inevitable crowds in search of the perfect gifts for the people on your list. Having trouble narrowing down a gift for the editorial freelancer in your life who seems to have just about everything? Not to worry—I’ve got you covered. Any item on the following list is sure to please even the nit-pickiest...

Office Happenings

Though winter is not officially upon us until December 22, colder temperatures and frost-laden lawns have already been making appearances in Toronto. This fall has been a busy one here at TEC, and we are looking forward to celebrating our hard work with a Pizza and Prosecco Party during the holiday season. (One bottle of Prosecco is well chilled from the National Boss Day gifting. )   Alanna took advantage...

Editing & Marketing

Here at TEC, we receive calls from potential clients who are new to the writing process. The usual questions are about our services and rates, and about the work we do. In explaining what we do, we naturally ask the caller about their projects. Since we only work on nonfiction content, this is important for us to know. We have noted with some curiosity a rather...

Guest Blogger

    The original drafts of a novel create its structure and determine how the story will unfold. The years and years of editing that follow infuse the book with character, crafting it into the best possible version of itself. And the final edit, when you know in your gut that you are finally done, gives the writing its shine.   At least that's how it appears to me, having...

Books And Reading

    I recently had the pleasure of chatting with Ruth Hood, who looks back on a long life of editing and library science. I asked her to tell me about some of the highlights of her dual careers.   As with many lovers of language, her attraction to books began at an early age and was nurtured at home. “I was always attracted to books,” Ruth told me. “My...

Event

    No Canadian poets were mentioned in any of my high school English classes, and I’m certain that most of my hometown friends would be hard-pressed to rattle off the names of even two or three. They are not, however, entirely to blame: Their interests lie elsewhere, perhaps as a result of our shared high school experience, which did little to foster the consumption of Canadian literature, let alone Canadian...

Books And Reading

    Inside the Big Bookseller In preparation for the upcoming (and costly!) holiday season, I recently picked up a part-time gig at Indigo. After all, I figured, if I'm going to venture back into retail, where I'd spent most of my summers as a teen, I may as well surround myself with what I love most—books!   I've learned a few interesting things about big booksellers during my time at Indigo. One...

Books And Reading

        Ah, reference books! What would we do without them? Whether lined up in neat rows on library shelves or haphazardly stacked on, under, or somewhere near a cluttered desk, they hold glorious promise: more knowledge than we could ever hope to absorb, systematically arranged, and clearly explained.     There are encyclopaedias, thesauruses, almanacs, yearbooks, atlases, chronologies, concordances, and digests. And let's not forget repair manuals, phone directories, and...

Book Reviews

The hype generated around the release of Harper Lee’s Go Set A Watchman (HarperCollins, 2015) made many of us want to read this book. After all, it was Harper Lee, author of To Kill a Mockingbird, a classic in our own time. We, at TEC, were enthusiastic. We bought two copies: one for us to read in-office and one for the first of our Twitter Giveaways. ...