A Book Review, A Suggestion

Today, I'm reviewing a book for you and making the suggestion that you buy it. This book, Rainbows in the Storms, is by a friend of mine and it's the poignant story of a young wife and mother of four who faces the terminal illness and subsequent death of her beloved husband and father of her children. The author, Ann Asprey Erdmann, tells how each and every step of his illness affected her and their family as they journeyed through the storms that rolled over them again and again.

I was privileged to be one of her first editors and, let me tell you, this young woman is the real deal. Any time I told her that the message of God's power in seeing them through was not coming out in her writing, she was willing to change it up until it told the story right. The story is heart-wrenching, yet filled with hope. This hope is only found through God and His saving grace through Jesus Christ. That is the author's clear message and clearly the message of her husband, even as he lay dying.

I recommend this book. You will see how one young family not only survived the storms that swelled up around them, but how they thrived even while staring down the ultimate enemy - death.

Ann's willingness to take what some might consider harsh criticism has allowed her story to shine and be a beacon to others looking for hope. What if she had not listened? What if she had not been willing to take criticism and dug in her heels instead? She was not afraid to take criticism, not afraid to hire an editor and do it right and not afraid to face anything that came her way as she sought to tell her story in the best way possible.

Kudos to Ann for getting her book published!
Kudos for her humble spirit!
Kudos for her ultimate desire to honor God through all her writings!

Writers, learn from her. Take criticism. Hire editors. Work hard.

~Tricia

Comments

My Top Five Editing Tips

In my e-book, Writing for Publication , I list my top five editing tips. If you have not read the book and you want to earn money writing, read the book today. It's available on Amazon, here , and on Fiverr, here . Editing is vital to writing success, but I do understand that not everyone can afford to hire an editor; some have to edit their own work. I never recommend this, but I know finances require it at times. Here are my top five editing tips: Get rid of "that" whenever you can Use both "very" and "really" in a very limited way. Really. Be careful of repetition. Don't repeat yourself repeatedly. Keep your tense consistent. Don't start a sentence or paragraph in past tense, then time travel to the present tense by the end. Do not write the same way you talk. These tips will help you a great deal. Memorize them and learn to mentally use them as you write or as you review your writing. I tend to e...

Editing Hurts

Editing hurts. Yes. It hurts when someone cuts your words, rearranges your sentences, deletes your creative use of language, etc. It hurts. The first thing a writer has to do is leave their ego at the door. Most writers write with passion and passion doesn't always reflect good grammar or proper use of punctuation. I recently edited for the CEO of a large corporation. She was taken aback by my edits and questioned if she wanted someone cutting her writing up like I did. But, while she might be a great CEO, her grammar, word choices and sentence structure were lacking. Most people, when writing with passion, give little thought to how their words are put together. The words spill out with feeling while grammar is laid aside. And that's ok. That's actually how it should be. We should write with passion.....then hire a good editor to make our points flow well and be cohesive. We editors make your passion shine by clothing your writing in easy-to-read prose with good ...

Grammar, Readability and SEO

Grammar and readability are not mutually exclusive to good SEO. I've recently read a few articles whose authors claim grammar is not a factor in Search Engine Optimization (SEO). However, I've read just as many articles which cite readability as a major factor for increasing SEO levels. You can't have one without the other. You can't have good readability and bad grammar. Good grammar is what makes readability exist....it's what causes your content to be easy to read. According to the Bedford Group , readability is defined as, "the practice of making your writing understandable and easy to digest for your target audience." (First of all, I would correct this to say, "the practice of making your writing understandable and easy for your target audience to digest," but I digress.) How do you make your writing understandable? How do you make your writing easy for your target audience to digest? Step one in answering these questions is goo...

Search This Blog