The Comma Cop

That’s what they call me around here, in this wide world of Novel Adventurers.

Yesterday, I pulled a prank on one of them, telling her she’d put a comma out of order in an email to me. I was kidding, but her response surprised me. She gushed apologies, assuming I’d been serious since, well, I guess I can get pretty serious about punctuation.

The other day, I edited the post of another co-blogger who hit back with, “No matter how much I go over my own posts, you always manage to find something. Not just something but a lot of somethings.”

Yep, that’s me, the comma cop. It’s a designation that’s served me and those I edit well through a long publishing career and active participation in fiction critique groups. I’m a stickler for good grammar, spelling, and punctuation, because to me, they are the glue that holds any message together. Even the most interesting message can get lost if its expression is sloppy.

Plus, I love to edit. Making order out of chaos on a written page helps me relax, reminding me that anything can be fixed, made clean and even beautiful. Some people paint as a relaxing outlet. Others go running or meditate. Me, I edit. And I can make a living from it, so it’s definitely win-win.

I’ve edited just about every type of publication out there, yet I find most people, including the most well-educated folks and even other professional writers, repeat the same mistakes time after time. 

Not proofreading one's own work has to be the most common problem. 

Misusing commas and apostrophes (or forgetting to insert them) comes a close second. 

Beginning sentences with vague starts (“this is” or “that was”) makes the reader have to backtrack to figure out what these pronouns refer to. 

Another problem is misplaced modifiers. Take this example—“Though she’s a healthy child, John believes his only daughter is too fragile to spend time outdoors.” As it turns out, “healthy child” modifies John, not the daughter. 

Lack of parallelism occurs a lot too, as in, “We are going out, eating plums, and have a nice time.” 

Misuse of language can be annoying but sometimes it’s fun too. Take the following example found on Wiki:

"King Charles walked and talked half an hour after his head was cut off." 

versus

"King Charles walked and talked; half an hour after, his head was cut off."

Am I alone in this? Any other sticklers out there, or do you hate this stuff? Does poor editing hamper your reading enjoyment as it does for me, or do you tend to gloss right over (groan) mistakes?