The comma is not my lover, nor is it even my friend; when dealing with quotations it may be my greatest foe.

After years of wondering how punctuation and dialog work together, today I grasped ( and punched and prodded ) the rules of comma engagement. In the vicious struggle,
I claim a partial victory. The manuscript is better, though my eyes ache courtesy project fix fractured dialog.

Since punctuation glitches are make or break at this stage of my career – though probably less so later, as I’ve heard that established authors often hand in completed works riddled with basic errors – dialog seems a good focus for revisions. For a stickler, grammar is easy crime to hang on a novice. The idea is that the fewer points of grammar violated, the less reasons an agent has to say no. Right now the pitch is ready, the story ( more on this later ) is tight, the writing flows. That reminds me, I need a fresh supply of heavy weight paper. Anyway, I must be reasonably certain about the presentation. Catching everything won’t happen, and can not, perfection is impossible, but I can aim high.

Initially, the target was clarity of character, packaging each spoken line clearly so what character said a given snippet made immediate sense. Whether the dialog corresponded with something the character might say is a problem for later. I’ve got a touch of character meld in spots, and that can persist until the final stretch.

The big hangup: where in dialog, if anywhere, does the comma belong?

Rules make for boring reading, so I’ll spare everyone my studies save the following lesson. A comma separates a quote from a tag.

What does that mean in English?
“Brian, you ignorant slut.” Kathy said. << Needs a little work. “Damn Kathy, stop licking that,” Brian said. << BING BING! This works when there is a quote and a tag. And what if there is no tag? Out comes Mr. Period. “Oh, I will lick it off,” She seethed at Brian. << Naughty, naughty girl. “Right then. I will stop right now.” She seethed at Brian. << Someone gets a cookie! Seethed is not considered a tag, it's part of a separate sentence. Hence no comma. The upshot of this journey is the first 145 pages now have better comma placement in dialog. Additionally, I found many instances of quotes where the identity of the speaker was murky and adjusted them. This added quite a few words to the manuscript. In fact, it contributed more to the word count than any other session this week. That's a lot of he said, she said. EDIT - Saturday 11:35 EST - all 251 pages have clear quote attribution and comma placement in dialog. Check out that word count meter now, huh? 72, 871. Geez, if I revert to passive voice and modify roughly 1 verb per sentence out of 4957 sentences thus far, diluting the voice would mean nearly 5,000 additional words. Don't worry, though, I avoid passive voice unless conveying the same meaning with active terms makes the sentence cumbersome. For instance, “John is screwed” To me, that's an acceptable use of passive voice. Why? Because, who screwed John is a lot less important than his predicament. Sorry about that, John. On the other hand, “John was screwing old ladies out of money” makes my ears ache. It's not horrid, but no doubt with a little imagination I could make it so: “John was recklessly screwing aged ladies out of precious ducats earned through years of service in the court of the Crimson King.” Wow. There's a verb in the above sentence somewhere, I just know it.

A remarkable day, mostly for its lack of Monday-ness. At a recent meeting I spent most of the meeting drinking in details for characters. Once I finish this book, I’ll churn out a piece about the experience. Definite short story material echoes from those halls. Resemblances to actual persons, places or events will be unintentional. That’s what the lawyers always tell me I must say.

The 5AM rise, write schedule continues. Good session at the keyboard. Good session, indeed.

This was the least productive writing week of the past six months. Unfortunately, the sentence rings very hollow; I logged a similar claim last week. Still, the latest doldrum marks a new personal record. Five hundred words. Oh, how did this happen?

Edits bare some blame. I beat three chapters quite severely. Launching a new website ate a day, book buying and listing, another. Perfectionism aggravated the shortfall. I revised one chapter nine times in a single session, though certainly the streak explains no more than one off day across seven.

So, I examined differences between the past two weeks and more productive ones. The motive is self-serving.. In the name of finishing the book this year, I’d like piles of the latter, and very little of the former.

A common thread found among better weeks: a successful week begins on Monday, immediately after breakfast. Prolific, tight, readable writing occurs first thing in the morning, or not at all. At least for me, that is truth. When responsibilities are sloughed, the chores, the errands pushed back into the afternoon, and the writing assumes precedence, it happens. A clear mind drives a ship great distances, so to does writing early and often.

Therefore, I’m altering my sleeping patterns. After feeding the cats at 5AM instead of returning to bed, I’ll rise, write until 9AM, then handle life.

The new schedule starts Sunday.

Stephen King makes a very good point about writing. To paraphrase: if you don’t find time for reading, you will find writing difficult. He recommends a diet of two to four hours of reading per day.

I concur resolutely with this advice. As simple and obvious as it appears, his guideline makes sense. Reading someone else’s words is a reminder that the business of turning sentences into stories is not rocket science. If one person writes a book, certainly a second can, and maybe the process is not so tricky. Books also confirm another fact. Rough drafts do find a home after completion.

My preferences are varied. Here’s a few books I enjoyed this summer:
1) On Writing – Stephen King
2) Master of the Senate – Robert Caro
3) Seven Steps on the Writer’s Path – Nancy Pickard and Lynn Lott
4) From Nobodies to Somebodies – Peter Han
5) Reading People – Jo-Ellan Dimitrius
6) October Dreams – edited by Richard Chizmar and Robert Morrish
7) The Devil Wears Prada – Lauren Weisberger
8) Logan’s Storm – Ken Wells
9) The Interview with a Vampire – Anne Rice
10) Power Broker – Robert Caro

The list is far from exhaustive. Of the rest, I either can’t recommend them, or consider them forgettable. Although in the case of Anne Rice’s Vampire Lestat, I wish I had a fireplace.

BTW, I shaved the mustache off yesterday. The furry caterpillar haunts my upper lip no more!