My story was rejected for Grammatical reasons

[_Lynn_]

Over the years of my writing, the one hard lesson I had to learn, apart for learning to spell (lol) was what is called the mechanics of writing. More great stories are rejected because of this than anything else. Having a draw full of rejection letter, I can attest about how stringent main stream publishers are about this, the format you might say. They demand certain point to be observed at all time, such a 1" margins, double spacing, indent on first words, all dialog on a separate line with opening and closing "..." quotes for speech and '...' for thoughts and so on. Depending on the publisher, they might even have additional things like 'New Times Roman' and nothing else or no tags on dialog. So the first thing I had to learn were these mechanic, or habits so that now I can hardly write without following them. Some appear outrageous and petty, but they are the publishers, and their word rules. For the beginning writer it's a daunting, time consuming task, especially when you are in the 'zone' and writing as fast as you can think. However, it has to be done, or spend endless hour re-editing the story until you are sick of looking at it. (Thank goodness for editors who have the 'eye' for all those nit picking little things that get in the way of writing).

Although I cannot speak for all publishers, the ones I work with also have specifications for the length of a paragraph. The number varies a little, but the average is eight lines (on a Word doc). They don't want walls of text.

As for the comment about editors . . . the more you learn from an editor (a good editor, that is), the easier it will be to write.

 

[sr71plt]

In nonfiction print, we try not to go over twenty lines per paragraph. Unfortunately some nonfiction authors can chomp that off in two-thirds of a sentence.

 

[Wildfire8470]

Hi,

I'm not listed as an editor yet, since I just signed up. What I know is that paragraphs should be "bite sized." If they're too long, It's difficult to read. Also, it's best to put quoted dialog on a separate line, as though it's a separate paragraph. I don't have tomorrow free but, if you would like me to help, I'm happy to take a look. I'm using Microsoft Word 2010, so the edits made will be you option to keep or discard, but this will require that we work together.

I'm just beginning my own editing business and had my first story sell today, so I tend to work evening or nights.

I edit my own work. If you would like some samples, my author's page is here:
http://www.literotica.com/stories/memberpage.php?uid=1350510&page=submissions

If you're interested, you can contact me there to let me know.

Wildfire8470

I am relatively new here and would like to introduce myself. I live in the Midwest. I am a lesbian and I occasionally write stories that are of a sexual nature. I decided that I would like to share some of them here.

This site is a bit daunting and I feel lazy. All I want to do is successfully submit a story that I just wrote. I submitted it a few days ago and it was rejected because of grammar. They also mentioned something about dialogue not being laid out right.

My story is about a young woman who sees a female psychologist and the psychologist starts making moves on her basically. I think it's well written. I have left it open to future chapters as this story can certainly grow.

I guess, long story short, I need an editor.

I am a female. I would want the editor to be female as well but that's my only request on it.

 

[master_chay]

"Ally had asked "alike like who?" and Miranda had said, "Like your father."

It just doesn't look right to me to split those.

Surely that should be:

Someone says, "Ally had asked, alike to who, and Miranda had said, like your father."

???

[upside down confused smilie]