Canadian here! Most of us genuinely want the best for the American people (who don't deserve economic hardship either), but family and friends *have* been making lists of US products to avoid. ...My brother was particularly devastated to read "Product of USA" on his Earth Island Vegenaise.

Great list! I totally love all of these. I've found Story Grid's resources to be really helpful for developmental editing, as well.

Thanks for tagging me, @mmelemew.bsky.social! ❤️ I am, unfortunately, tied to my Kindle Scribe, so I won't be buying ebooks through Bookshop myself. 🥲 Super excited about the prospects of this, though!

Oh, awesome! Thank you. 😊

He *might* be my favourite design from you. I adore this lil' dude—and the FB haters only make the fires of my love burn brighter.

Iconic. He will be missed. Although, I am digging the new site design.

I re-arranged these tips in the middle of writing this thread and forgot to fix them at the end. Let's just pretend they're in order. 😂

I’ll stop there for now—but these tidbits have helped me greatly both as a writer and a copy editor! If anyone has any questions, feel free to drop them below. 😊 #booksky #writing

(9) Keep an eye on filter words (e.g., thought, knew, realized, heard). This essay from Chuck Palahniuk is an invaluable read: litreactor.com/essays/chuck....

(8) Watch for misplaced and dangling modifiers. Misplaced modifiers are situated too far from the words they describe. Dangling modifiers describe a word/phrase/clause that’s been mistakenly omitted from the sentence. For further explanation, check out this article: opentextbc.ca/advancedengl....

(7) Watch for nonparallel constructions. E.g., “He grabbed and tossed his hat to Joseph” doesn’t quite make sense. If we take out “…and tossed” this reads like “He grabbed his hat to Joseph.” Revision: “He grabbed his hat and tossed it to Joseph.”

(6) Does each paragraph flow into the next? (Unless a sudden break in flow serves your style/narrative.) If one paragraph describes the setting and the next describes the MC’s mother who lives in another city, this could throw readers off if no logical connection has been made between the two ideas.

(6) Are there any descriptions that don’t add to a scene? Action beats of a character turning about or looking in a certain direction can often be trimmed. E.g., “He looked at Amy. ‘What do you want from me?’ he asked” might be simplified to dialogue only: “’What do you want from me, Amy?’”

(5) Watch for pet phrases! These are recurring words or actions throughout the manuscript. Every author has them. The most common pet phrases I see are adverbs (e.g., almost, really, even, seemingly) or action beats (e.g., releasing a sigh, running a hand through one’s hair, smiling warmly).