How to write an email

Everyone hates opening their email and finding a barrage of unwanted emails there.

Unfortunately many people inadvertently delete emails that are actually important, either from friends or something they ought to have paid attention to about their work.

So here are some hints to ensure the emails you send are read and that you don’t waste people’s time unnecessarily.

1. Personalize your subject line. Make sure it doesn’t look like spam or sound like a dozen similar emails. Ask a question if it’s short and clear.

2. Be polite. Don’t use a bunch of exclamation marks or write in all caps. Don’t be overfamiliar using kisses or calling people “Dear Fred” if you don’t know them well. Always thank people who’ve helped you.

And on the receiving end, don’t delete emails without checking the subject line and the sender. If it’s your boss, I suggest reading the email even if you’re sure it’s not relevant to you.

Helen Woodall
helen.woodall@gmail.com

Helen is available to line edit and/ or content edit fiction and non-fiction. Rates on application.

“Youse guys get off of the bed!”

“Youse guys get off of the bed!” aka Accents and Slang.

Between two villains or two teenagers this line is perfectly acceptable. Spoken by a CEO, millionaire, or university graduate not so much unless it’s a deliberate attempt to be funny. An author doesn’t need to have perfect grammar. However an author does need to have a basic feel for how her characters speak. And characters in well paid positions, or characters who went to a good school, would generally speak grammatically unless they were deliberately playing a part.

Therefore when the narrative has many grammatical errors, this raises flags in the reader’s mind. Either the book needs good editing or the author needs to listen to her editor and make some corrections. There is no excuse for constantly mistaking their/there, or other simple errors, anymore than there is for having characters speak poorly.

On a similar note, if you are using dialects, be very careful to have them checked by a person who speaks that dialect fluently. Nothing is worse than having a creole speaker break into latin in the middle of a sentence. Babelfish and other such programs are not infallible, so always check what you’ve written.

Helen Woodall
helen.woodall@gmail.com

Helen is available to line edit and/ or content edit fiction and non-fiction. Rates on application.

21 Harsh But Eye-Opening Writing Tips From Great Authors

For many authors, the hardest thing to face is a truly cruel rejection letter. Yet most of the great writers of our time have tried and failed and failed some more. For example, Vladimir Nabokov received a harsh rejection letter from Knopf upon submitting Lolita, which would later go on to sell fifty million copies.

In this article, twenty-one famous authors give budding authors their harsh, but useful advice. My personal favorite is #21. Don’t take anyone’s writing advice too seriously. – Lev Grossman

So, authors and aspiring authors, take a big deep breath, then read: http://thoughtcatalog.com/cody-delistraty/2013/09/21-harsh-but-eye-opening-writing-tips-from-great-authors/#f6JLMcdwKFYDHPCX.01


Helen Woodall
helen.woodall@gmail.com

Helen is available to line edit and/ or content edit fiction and non-fiction. Rates on application.

A Gimmick that became a Book.

Not every book begins with an author sitting at their desk, scribbling madly onto paper, or tapping furiously on their keyboard. Some successful books began in much more interesting ways.

There’s the classic one which was the result of a bet. There’s another one that took a well known impossibility and turned it into a possibility. And at least one which will have you questioning the author’s alcohol intake before beginning it.

All five of the books in this article have two important things in common. They are successful. And they’re different. Really different.

Go to: http://www.cracked.com/blog/5-dumb-writing-gimmicks-that-became-classic-books/
and find out for yourself.

Helen Woodall
helen.woodall@gmail.com

Helen is available to line edit and/ or content edit fiction and non-fiction. Rates on application.

That or which

For most people “that” and “which” can be used interchangeably, it doesn’t really matter, the sentence feels good to the author either way. In fiction this is probably correct, but in technical writing it can be really bad news. Million dollar lawsuits have been held over a misplaced comma, that, or which.

This is because they actually are different.
No, seriously, they are. Keep reading.

“That” is used (when used correctly) for a restrictive clause, and “which” for a non-restrictive clause. Put another way, “that” limits what we’re talking about, whereas “which” adds information.

Ah, so now you can see why contracts and technical papers need to get it right, and it doesn’t hurt authors to understand it as well.

Three of the cups that have blue flowers belong to me.
“That” limits the cups we’re talking about. Only the ones with blue flowers belong to me.

If I said:
Three of the cups, which have blue flowers, belong to me.
“which” tells you more about the cups. All these cups have blue flowers on them.
We also surround the clause telling us more information with commas.

And that is where your million dollar court case is born. When someone sticks commas in a sentence with “that” which should be restrictive, and now people want to think it is non-restrictive.
Three of the cups, that have blue flowers, belong to me. Adding the commas makes it both wrong and confusing.

If you haven’t understood a word I’ve said, that’s fine. Write fiction, not contracts or technical papers.
If you have understood this blog, congratulations!

Helen Woodall
helen.woodall@gmail.com

Helen is available to line edit and/ or content edit fiction and non-fiction. Rates on application.