Sunday, January 11, 2009
Fog, Mist and Smoke
I realized this morning that the three main things on my mind at the moment can be summed up with the words in the title of this post: fog, mist and smoke. Starting with fog, yesterday I was pottering about with my novel Island of Fog. The printed manuscript that I sent to the literary editor a while ago is full of little red marks, and I'm now running through them and making corrections as necessary. In doing so, I've converted the document to proper manuscript format.
Now, I've always had a good idea about the correct format in which to send a manuscript to agents, but until now I've not bothered with that aspect too much. Printing the manuscript for a literary editor back in October involved using double line spacing (as usual) and her preferred font, Times New Roman. But perhaps a more proper format is to make the manuscript look like it's been typed on an old typewriter, and that means using good old Courier New. This font is monospaced as opposed to proportional (in other words each character uses the exact same amount of space, whereas with a proportional font the letter "m" uses more space than the letter "i") and the result is fewer words per line and thus many more pages to print. So I've gone from 295 printable pages to 480, almost an entire ream of paper. And that's just for 95,000 words, a pretty modest total compared to, say, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, which is, according to Scholastic, a total of 257,045 words. I imagine J. K. Rowling hired a removal van to ship THAT manuscript off to her agent! (This is the longest book in the Potter series, and while some readers say they couldn't put it down, I personally had trouble picking it up.)
Some of the corrections I've been making to Island of Fog are because I'm an Englishman in America, a bit of a half-blood when it comes to writing. A Brit would probably write "Hal looked about" while an American would write "Hal looked around." Not a big deal, but these little "Brit" nuances might make an agent or publisher frown a little, so I want to get them right. Unfortunately I can't even ask my wife because she's just as bad, having spent five years living in England and being influenced by my Britishness. So it's often a bit of a surprise when someone — either a fellow writer nitpicking my work, or a website client correcting some text that I might have added to their site — says something like, "Whoa, what's a 'car park'? Do you mean 'parking lot'? And as for 'enquiry'... we use 'inquiry' in this country, pal." Throw in some colloquialisms from my local hillbilly town and I'm in real danger of having characters say stuff like "Where's it at?" and "I might oughta get home now" and "I'm fixin' to mash this button."
The "mist" part of this post is the strange misty substance that appears to be smudged on my left eyeball. That's what it's like — a smear of goo that's distorting and blurring my vision (see last post). I'd like to say, "Yes, I've seen a doctor," but honestly I haven't yet. Our medical insurance is still in a pending status, and I want it to be in effect before I go to a doctor and say, "Please remove my eye and replace it with a bionic one," because if it's going to cost six million dollars then I want the insurance company to pay for it. If I go too early, then it'll be classed as a "pre-existing condition" and I won't be covered. It hasn't got any worse though, and if anything I've seen some improvement. At least I think it's some improvement. The smudgy bit has shifted and I can see little floaters now, but overall it's a little clearer, I think, than a few weeks ago. Still, the appearance of floaters is not to be ignored, and I'll be going to see a specialist very soon, insurance or not.
And finally, the "smoke" part of this post. My wife's parents own a barn that stands by the side of a lake. For years now, my father-in-law (a builder) has been converting the barn into a home, with the lower floor being left as a workshop and the living quarters in the roof. It was coming along nicely, with a nice glass wall and screened deck overlooking the lake, and all the pumbing and electrics in place, the walls filled and sanded ready for painting... But it all came to an end when the place burned to the ground a few mornings ago, sometime around 5am. The fire was (probably) caused by a heater which was left on to 1) keep the place above freezing, and 2) to dry some lumber. Something went wrong and a fire started, and the place probably burned quietly for a while before a container of saline blew up and woke the neighbors. They called my father-in-law immediately, but it was already too late; the place was nothing but a pile of soggy, black ashes and charred wood. And smoke.
A sad end to what would have been a very nice retirement home.
This post has 9 comments
Doesn't the publishing industry use e-files yet ? Never heard of Acrobat ? No wonder they are in trouble.
Funny, I left an engineering position which was 95% paperless & went to a Hospital where patient files were all 3" thick -- paper, paper everywhere. When I made an appointment, some gnome from the records dept. had to send my files up to the Surgeon on a trolley -- Lucky the rest of the hospital was up to date.
Psst ! -- What's wrong with surplus FEMA trailers ? Bolt 2 together.
"....and while some readers say they couldn't put it down, I personally had trouble picking it up."
LOL!
The "smoke" part of your post was very sad. What a sad end to such a wonderful-sounding retirement home.
Good luck on publishing Island of Fog!
Ever-Reader of Keith's Excellent Blogs,
Julian Parry.
Your eye problem sounds like makula degeneration which my dad developed in his early forties. I'll keep my fingers crossed it's something different and that you will get rid of it completely soon!
I had episcleritis in my left eye over the past few weeks that I spent in England (November and December), but finally got rid of it. I had to go twice to Moorfields Eye Hospital in London.
Now I'm back in the US again and will soon start job hunting, however the unemployment situation looks very bad right now. Even my friendly Workforce counselor does not sound optimistic at all.
It was good to read your new post in the blog!
Chrissie
Chrissie, I thought of macula degeneration also, but although it can affect younger people in their 40s, I'm still only 39 so it can't possibly be that! ;-) No, seriously, macular degeneration seems to come on slowly over time, hence the "degeneration" part, whereas mine happened overnight and has not get any worse (or much better) since. So far, central serous retinopathy seems like a better fit. Sorry to hear about your own eye though! Glad you sorted it -- and on the NHS too!
Thanks also, Ming and Julian, for your comments. :-)
Best wishes
Julie
I wish you'd see a doctor about your eye, though -- I understand where you're coming from with insurance and everything, given you're in the States, but you don't want to risk losing your sight.
And I know exactly where you're coming from with the lingo in your novel. When I'm writing, I find little British expressions falling into Australian stories and Australian expressions falling into British stories. It's one of those things you're unaware of. Perhaps keep a copy of your Pommie version, though, so that you or your agent can seek a British publisher as well as an American one down the track
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