Editing

So, you’ve decided you want to be an editor. You love books, working with words, and maybe even enjoy all the grammar rules that might drive other people insane. You have visions of working on beautiful manuscripts, possibly while sitting in front of a fire, or at a great big desk stacked with books. I know you’ve had these visions, because I had them too.   Working...

Event

The 16th Berkshire Conference of Women Historians was held in Toronto this past week. It was the first time in its 70-year history that the conference was held outside the United States. The host institution was University College on the University of Toronto campus. Over a four-day period — Thursday to Sunday — 2,000 delegates from around the world met to discuss and explore the dynamic history...

Technology

For months, I’ve been pondering the notion of buying an e-reader: should I buy one, and if so, which? I’m so late to this party, and still, I’m standing outside on the porch, my index finger hovering in front of the doorbell, reluctant to push it. When I mentioned my ponderings to TEC senior editor Beth, she offered to let me borrow TEC’s resident e-readers, a Kindle Touch and a Kobo...

Office Happenings

Finally! Spring has arrived in Toronto, and with it comes a host of professional conferences: the Berkshire Conference on the History of Women runs from May 22 to 25; the Editors’ Association of Canada’s Conference is scheduled for June 6 to 8; the Indexing Society’s annual conference is June 5 and 6; and Book Summit is on June 19. For more info, visit our homepage.   Meanwhile, here at The...

Book Reviews

  Back when I was learning the nuts and bolts of copyediting, one of the tenets our instructor came back to repeatedly was “The Five Cs”: our goal as copy editors should always be to render text that is correct, consistent, clear, concise, and complete.  So when I spotted a slim volume entitled The Subversive Copy Editor on a colleague’s shelf, I was instantly intrigued.   Editorial subterfuge? Track changes turned...

Language & Editing

Why do Canadians persist in spelling certain words the way we do? Is it a Canadian quirk that we keep all of our British “-our”endings but also borrow the “-izes” from our American neighbours? Maybe like the cliché often used to describe us — we’re just too darn nice. Maybe we just want to get along with everybody.   Maybe … but sometimes it is annoying to work with American...

Office Happenings

I call my decision to change careers in mid-life my “second beginning. ” I realize it’s an oxymoron, but for me it defines the place where I now am. It’s also about coming full circle and being a late bloomer. I grew up surrounded by books and newspapers, and I was a secret writer who dreamed of having her first novel published by the age of 21. ...

Office Happenings

It’s hard to believe that the first three months of 2014 are heading into the fourth. Spring for most of us still hasn’t arrived, but hope springs eternal, and won’t it be grand when it arrives? And with it comes some great conferences—The Editors’ Association of Canada’s annual conference is in Toronto this June, and the Berkshire Conference of Women Historians will be at the University of Toronto in...

Editing Numbers

   As TEC’s business editor, I edit a variety of documents containing in-text, tabled, charted, and graphed calculations, statistics, or results. I love working with numbers (I even used to be a math teacher), but through my business editing experience, I’ve learned that some numbers are much nicer to work with than others.   Basically, the easier your numbers are to read, the quicker and more accurate your editor’s check of...

Editing

In the world of editing, the exchange between authors and editors is a conversation, not in spoken words but in written words. It takes place through the editing process when a manuscript exchanges hands at least twice between the editor and the author. It is a conversation that teaches both the editor and the author. The editor learns about the author’s subject, and the author learns how...

Guest Blogger

I wish to share my experience about writing my first book. Picking up my first run of 30 copies, seeing the cover, seeing the barcode, realizing that this is real and that I am now a published author has been a very rewarding experience.     Deciding to Write   I had put writing a book on my bucket list about 10 years ago. I started to write a fiction novel in...

Office Happenings

  It's January 2014! From all of us here at The Editing Company, many good wishes for a prosperous New Year.   We’ve had a busy few weeks — not to mention the ice storm that swept through the City of Toronto on December 20. Many, many of us were without power, some for as long as 10 days. Now that the holidays (and, for the moment, storms) are behind...

Language & Editing

There’s no question that, for better or worse, texting has brought about a whole new kind of written communication. Certainly, the way we speak heavily influences the way we text. But what should we think about our increasing tendency to speak the way we text? Some Examples A former colleague of mine was fond of saying "BRB" when she left the office. While there's absolutely no doubt that she,...

Language & Editing

As editors, we use style guides and resources for particular projects to ensure that we follow consistent guidelines. Every now and then acquaintances ask me for simple answers to questions about grammar and spelling. I often have to say that “there is no right or wrong response; the answer to the question will depend on a few factors. ” Yes, it’s true that sometimes there are clear answers when...

Business

With the advent of self-publishing, authors are seeking out good advice from editors who can help them navigate the process. There is so much to know when setting out to self-publish your own work.   Here at TEC, we have edited the works of several self-published authors. Each one has brought a different set of questions and concerns to our attention. Based on these discussions, I would like...

Guest Blogger

This year, after many years of procrastination, failing, and heartbreak, I decided to give myself one last chance at success: I was going to win NaNoWriMo.   For those unfamiliar with this perilous and crazy endeavour, NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month: www. nanowrimo. org) is a challenge that comes about every November and entails writing 50,000 words in a 30-day period. All these words should amount to a novel, or...

Business

When I launched my small business over five years ago, I took a course at the Toronto Business Development Centre. One of the first things I learned was this: be sure you have three good people in your corner — a good bookkeeper, a good accountant, and a good lawyer.   I have been fortunate to have met and worked with each of these professionals over the past five years....

Language & Editing

 I’d like to take a look at two pairs of words that are increasingly, incorrectly interchanged. No, I’m not talking about your/you’re and it’s/its — not that it doesn’t hurt a little inside every time I read “your welcome” in online correspondence, or when a parking lot sign tells me that “Management is not responsible for any vehicle or it’s contents. ” No, these are two pairs of words that,...

Office Happenings

Another November has rolled in, and with it a host of exciting and diverse projects for copy editing and proofreading from business reports to grant proposals to academic manuscripts and self-publishing projects. There are perfect moments in being an editing team, and one of those is when new or returning clients send us their projects knowing we’ll handle their writing with care and professionalism. In this edition of...

Editing / Style

I wanted to write about punctuation marks and symbols because I’m fascinated by their use. When used correctly — that is, according to style guides like Chicago or APA — they can turn an otherwise awkward or convoluted sentence into a concise, clean line that brings out meaning and strengthens tone (among other things). The Comma One of my favourite examples of how a tiny punctuation mark can bring...

Language & Editing

Mid-October is that wonderful time of year when the air takes on a fresh new chill, the leaves turn their rich autumn colours … and rubber bats hang in doorways, cotton cobwebs appear in corners, and cardboard cut-outs of black cats, jack-o-lanterns, and monsters peer out from the doors and windows of homes and stores.   It’s fairly well known that the word Halloween (now more commonly — and officially...

Publishing

I had the absolute pleasure of attending the eighth annual New York Art Book Fair a couple of weekends ago, an event I’ve been wanting to go to for some years now but never had the chance. The fair was organized by Printed Matter, the New York–based arts organization founded in the 1970s with the mandate of promoting artist publications. This year’s fair featured 283 exhibitors, over 60...

Event

This Sunday, September 22, the streets around Queen’s Park will turn into a paradise for book lovers. Writers, book publishers, literacy organizations, bookstores, magazine publishers, and readers of all ages will gather for Word On The Street, Toronto’s annual celebration of words and the people who love them.   Of course, with hundreds of exhibitors and dozens of readings and signings, it’s easy to get overwhelmed, plunk yourself onto a...

Office Happenings

Copy editing and proofreading of business reports, academic manuscripts, publisher’s manuscripts, website copy, grant proposals — the late summer has brought an array of projects to our office. As well, we have new talent joining us and their pencils are sharpened! All of us here at TEC are ready to get to work on your incoming projects. Here’s a look at what’s up at TEC as we launch into...