Don't sabotage your submission
Subtitle: save your manuscript from turning up D.O.A.
By: Chris Roerden
Publisher: Bella Rosa Books
Published: 2008
Place of publication: Rock Hill, SC
Language: eng
Number of pages: 301
ISBN-13: 9781933523316
Subjects: Fiction; Handbooks, manuals; Technique; Authorship; Marketing; Art d'écrire; Guides, manuels
Notes: "Insider information from a career manuscript editor"--Cover

Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: Precautions: for long-lasting relief; title: Not about rules; title: Judge and jury: screener-outers; title: what they look for; title: The plaintiffs: writers; title: what you hope for; title: The defendants: agents and publishers; title: why they want what they want; title: Corrections facilities: self-editors; title: how to do what only you can do; title: Terms of the will: a legacy of techniques-speak; title: With purpose aforethought: with density and richness for all; title: Hobbled hook: replace with high-tensile lines that stretch your holding power; title: Perilous prologue: Beware: may lead to low-tension, post-prologue, backstory ache; title: Bloody backstory: hide the evidence by slicing, dicing, splicing; title: Fatal flashback: caution: braking and shifting in reverse risks collision; title: Toxic transcript: watch those verbatim stories-within-the story; title: Deceptive dream: make the character wake up before the reader does; title: Time bomb: prevent whiplash from wacky sequencing; title: Dastardly description: Revoke the driver's license and come out of the clothes closet; title: Poisonous predictability: get therapy for cases of arrested development; title: Disappearing bodies: why introduce what isn't worth mentioning again?; title: Shifty eyes: danger ahead: slipping and sliding point of view; title: Unsettling setting: oh, no, not just another pretty place; title: Insufficient grounds: satisfy the hankering for anchoring; title: Slow death: end adverbosity, adjectivitis, and other contagious habits; title: Buried agenda: beware a tension deficit disorder; title: Dying dialogue: quit pretending its dialogue just because you put it in quotes; title: Treacherous tags: Snip; title: like embarrassing price tags worn in public; title: Mistaken identity: fight confusion profusion; title: Strangled speech: do you hear what I hear?; title: Killed by cliché: avoid like the plague; title: Gestured to death: stamp out illiteracy in body language; title: Snitch vs. spy: Telling vs. showing: long time no see; title: Noisy voice: Strengthen weak style; title: Words & misdemeanors: arrest abuse and insidious mis-uses.