Yorkshire Day: my favourite Yorkshire dialect words.

🗯️ You know I’m a fan of regional dialect. Today is #YorkshireDay and, while that’s not my heritage, the 12 years I spent living there were happy ones. To celebrate the linguistic variety of this beloved place, here are a few of my favourite Yorkshire-isms. (Now, it’s a BIG county so not all folk useContinue reading “Yorkshire Day: my favourite Yorkshire dialect words.”

How do you hyphenate or use a dash in the names of mathematical concepts? And are they capitalised?

🤓 I enjoyed the maths! There’s a sentence I never thought I’d say. 🔎 I’ve recently proofread ‘The Nick Warner Chronicles Vol II’, an adventure-filled Bildungsroman about the life of a maths genius. Nick navigates tricky life circumstances by applying maths. 🔎 As part of the edit, I checked every hypothesis, theory, concept and formula,Continue reading “How do you hyphenate or use a dash in the names of mathematical concepts? And are they capitalised?”

🎉Milestone! I’ve edited 1,000,000 words.

*In the voice of Dr. Evil 📢 ONE MILLION WORDS! ❓So, should I stop calling myself a newbie? 😆 One million words. That’s how many words I have proofread or edited since I started counting. And I started counting in Feb 2018 when I established Cronshaw Editing. Not bad, eh. Alongside teaching, too. 😅 🔢Continue reading “🎉Milestone! I’ve edited 1,000,000 words.”

Do authors get paid when their books are borrowed from libraries? Yes!

❓ Did you know that when you borrow library books, you’re still contributing to an author’s income — whether that’s a physical copy of a book or an ebook/audiobook through services such as Borrowbox. (Excellent, btw!) I’m talking specifically about the UK here, but there may be similar schemes in other countries. It’s worth checkingContinue reading “Do authors get paid when their books are borrowed from libraries? Yes!”

What does the name of my hometown (village! hamlet!) mean?

🐄 ‘Land where young bullocks are kept’. 🗺️ That’s the meaning of Little Strickland, the hamlet where I grew up in Cumbria. (Well, the ‘Strickland’ part anyway.) 🇬🇧 In Old English, stīrc was a young bullock or heifer. There are still lots of young bullocks kept in that area so things haven’t really changed much!Continue reading “What does the name of my hometown (village! hamlet!) mean?”

No smoke and mirrors. This is what happens if I edit your book.

There’s always that element of uncertainty when you hire a freelancer for the first time. ❔Will they do a good job? ❔Will they meet my deadline? ❔Will they offer value for money? ❔Will communication be smooth? The freelancer also has uncertainties when taking on a new client. ❔Will the work they’re offering fit in withContinue reading “No smoke and mirrors. This is what happens if I edit your book.”

Where should capital letters go in titles?

📝 So you’ve written a contents page. A leaflet. A blog post. An essay. And you’ve used a series of headings. ❓ The question is – should you capitalise the words in your headings? And, if so, how? 📢 The answer is that there is more than one way to approach this. There are individualContinue reading “Where should capital letters go in titles?”

What is a staycation? Musings on portmanteaus.

🤔 Is it just me, or has the meaning of ‘staycation’ broadened recently? Pretty sure it used to encapsulate the idea of taking time off work, staying at home and going for day trips. News items this week are using it to mean holidays taken in your home country. Is that how you’ve always usedContinue reading “What is a staycation? Musings on portmanteaus.”

Should food names be capitalised in menus? And other considerations when proofreading food writing.

😋 I proofread some menus today and they made me so hungry! They were Indian menus of dishes prepared for special occasions. If I hadn’t already sorted a shepherd’s pie for tea then I definitely would have ordered a takeaway tonight. Though it’s probably best I didn’t as it wouldn’t have lived up to theContinue reading “Should food names be capitalised in menus? And other considerations when proofreading food writing.”