Well, here I am …

My first blog entry in Toronto. I wish I was proofreading forever. That was my first job, proofreading a 300-page manuscript. It was a mystery novel by Maureen Jennings, and it was such a nice read, so much better than the bloody slush pile. The slush pile nearly killed me. Reading really bad writing is depressing and discouraging. I didn’t know it could be so draining. It insulted me as a writer—people thinking that good writing comes so easily and that they have talent when they really don’t. It reminded me of Canadian Idol, when people think they can sing after watching/hearing professionals that make it look so easy. These people read some good books, and think they can pull it off quickly and quietly, not realizing it takes years of practice and experience of gaining good writing skills and creativity.

I always thought proofreading would be so boring and awful, but I found it relaxing and challenging. I realized I enjoy grammar and making corrections. I was so happy when I found an error and fixed it. That makes me feel smart, that I outsmarted the copyeditor and typist. How smug. And it’s such a treat to read a book before it’s been printed, and to read good writing for free. If I wasn’t an intern, I’d be getting paid to read all day.

I assume as a proofreader there is a lot of boring writing that needs to be read. It’s not all fun fiction and memoirs. The technical and historical writing might be eye-drooping, as well as any writing styles that I wouldn’t enjoy, like science fiction or fantasy. The latter would still be somewhat stimulating though, if not comical.

I’m still tortured over comma usage. Should there have been a comma in the last line of the above paragraph, between stimulating and though? I hated it in the last manuscript when it was written, “Shall we leave, then?” I happily deleted those commas! How many pauses should there be in a sentence? A comma should be used whenever there is a pause, or breath in a sentence, but sometimes it gets a little ridiculous. I was tortured over the last manuscript because most of the characters had Scottish accents. Are there a lot of pauses in that dialect? The commas still annoyed me.