SECTION 2:  COMMON ERRORS

2.1 - SENTENCE FRAGMENTS

It's fine to use the occasional sentence fragment for effect. (Damn skippy!) However, it's pretty easy to tell who's doing it on purpose and who's making a big mistake. A simple sentence generally has two parts: the subject and the predicate. That is, as my father once said, who's doing what. For example, in this sentence, "My nose fell off for some reason.", my unfortunate nose is the subject, and the predicate, or action, is the falling off part.

Most sentences MUST have both parts. You need a verb in there, people! I'm seeing a lot of this sort of thing: "Bright light, screams. He looked up. Above him, purple lights and writhing fog."

Yes, "writhing" is a verb, but it's not acting on the subject. That's not a complete sentence, and because of all the incomplete sentences, that paragraph sounds VERY choppy. It would sound a lot better if it read: "He saw a bright light, immediately followed by screams from above. He looked up and saw several purple lights, and a writhing fog to boot!"

2.2 - BRITISH vs. AMERICAN SPELLING

I don't care one whit if you use "color" or "colour". However, I do ask that you keep it consistent. Set your spellcheck to either British or American English, and then make sure you use it.

2.3 - COMMON SPELLING and GRAMMAR ERRORS

Its and it's: 'Its' means 'belonging to it'. 'It's' is a contraction of 'it is'.

Anymore, alot, and awhile: Although some publications are beginning to accept "anymore" and "awhile" contractions, "any more" and "a while" are still preferred. It is never permissible to use "alot": this should ALWAYS be "a lot". Two separate words.

Apostrophes: Belonging to my dog: my dog's. Lots and lots of little dogs running about - dogs.

There, their, and they're: 'There' refers to a place. 'Their' means 'belonging to them'. 'They're' is a contraction of 'they are'.

Too, to, and two: 'Too' means 'as well, also'. 'To' is the word you might see on a set of directions: 'This way to Florida!'. 'Two' is a number. One, two, three....

Where, were, and wear: 'Where' refers to place. 'Were' is the plural past tense of 'to be' ('They were at the flea market last night'.) 'Wear' is...what you do with the clothes you bought at the flea market last night, when you WERE there with your friends. Where? At the flea market. That's right. (Sorry. Sometimes I think I'm funny.)

Beginning sentences with 'and', 'but', or 'so': For stylistic purposes, I'll let a few of these slide. I'm not a grammar Nazi. However, if every other sentence begins this way, that's...annoying.

Weird and wonderful fonts and formatting: Please don't get too wild. It's confusing wading through a million and one HTML tags.

Verb tenses: It would be very confusing if I'm always going to write every sentence so it sounded like this one. Ie--keep it consistent, please. A good rule of thumb is NOT to change tenses unless there's a specific reason for doing so. For instance, you'd change tense if a character started talking about something that was going to happen in the future.

Commonly misspelled words:

I am DEPENDENT on the Internet. (Not dependant. A dependant is someone you write off at income tax time.)

I KNOW this is annoying, but it needs to be done. (Not 'now'. 'Now' means...this minute. The present.)

I WONDERED when you'd arrive. (Not "wandered". Wandering is another word for meandering. Wondering is what I do when you're two hours late.)

The AVERAGE person doesn't make this many mistakes! (Careful with all those vowels--don't write "avarege".)

It's ESPECIALLY dark in here. (Not "espically", "especialy", or any other variant.)

I can't wait UNTIL Friday. (Just one "l". The abbreviated form of "until", on the other hand, has two. "Till" is the accepted abbreviation, not "til", "'til", or any other variant. However, since this is a fantasy site, I will allow the more archaic-looking version--"'til". Why not?)

I am DESPERATELY in love with Epilogue. (The most common misspelling here is "desparately". That's not a word. Don't use it.)

My APPEARANCE is absolutely immaculate. ("Appearance", not "appearence", please.)

This is ABSOLUTELY ridiculous. (Not "absultly", "absulutely", or any other variant.)

You are a HAIRY, SMELLY, SLIMY barrel of ooze! (Don't put extra e's in there! That is, you're hairy, not hairey.)

After that, I CONTINUED ON... (This isn't a misspelling, but a common redundancy. If you continue, it means you're moving onwards. You don't need the "on" in there. Yes, I know Stephen King says "continued on" all the time. That doesn't mean YOU have to do it.)

I DISTINCTLY heard the curlew call. (No need for an extra e here, either. That's "distinctly".)

I always keep the red M&Ms SEPARATE. (Not "seperate".)

My teacher kicked me out of his class for plagiarism because I didn't include a REFERENCE. (Not "referance".)

They threatened me with the death SENTENCE (not "sentance".)

Redundant language: One thing I've been noticing in many of the rejected submissions is repeated use of the same words and phrases--over and over again. Try and shake things up a little. For example, if you're describing someone and you've already used the word 'red' to describe her lips, try using 'scarlet' or 'crimson' instead for her nails. Read your work aloud to yourself after you've written it--this can help you sort out problems with rhythm and flow. (This goes double for poetry!)

Paragraphs: Begin a new paragraph when you begin a new idea, or when a new character speaks. Huge blocks of text are VERY annoying to sort through, especially when there's speech in there.