If I wrote a horror film for editors, the opening scene would go something like this:
A young woman sits at the local coffee shop, earbuds in, staring intently at the sentence displayed on her laptop screen.
Young Woman: I don’t know, but it feels like there should be a comma here. I guess I’ll put one in.
Sirens wail, a nearby building explodes, and a horde of the undead rush past making vague guttural noises.
Punctuating and formatting because something “sounds right” or “looks right” not only will make your publisher mildly apoplectic but also is a dangerous game to play in the world of shifting style guides. Associated Press (AP), American Psychological Association (APA), Modern Language Association (MLA), the University of Chicago Press (CMS), and other style guides often approach punctuation and formatting differently. Should you use a cardinal or word-form number? Depends on your style guide. Should I throw in an Oxford comma? Depends on the style guide.
Our tenth grade English teachers were right: we actually do need to look things up instead of trusting our gut. After all, if the heart is deceitful, as the Bible tells us, do we really want to think about the reliability of our intestines?
Since you’re fated to looking up proper grammar and style, a few resources will make your research go faster. Invest in good dictionaries. Know which styles guides your publications need. And make sure you have a good reference for our ever-evolving English usage.
Use Specific Dictionaries
Both Webster’s New World College Dictionary and Merriam-Webster's Collegiate are solid resources to have on hand, especially for double-checking hyphenation. (Did you know that double check as a noun has no hyphen, while the verb does?)
Own a Style Guide
Style guides come in book form; they come in online subscriptions; they even come in apps. Own one for the style you use. Some publishing niches even have guides that address terms and issues specific to their content. In addition to one of the standard content guides, get a copy of the Christian Writer's Manual of Style if you write or edit in that category, or the Society of Biblical Literature's SBL Handbook of Style if you work with a broader scope of biblical studies and related disciplines.
Physical or digital copies of official style guides are invaluable for their handy indexes and carry more authority than an unvetted blog that pops up in your Google search. Many resources on the internet, however, are helpful. For style-specific questions, check out the following:
For general grammar and punctuation questions, try these sites:
And of course, our Writing Tips & Resources
When it comes to formatting for publication, you must back every choice with a rule, so start checking now. If you can’t state the rule for why “the comma comes after the word cat” or “the word Dispensation needs to be capitalized,” look it up. Good writers and editors check.
Keep Up with Changing English Usage
Unfortunately, you don’t know what you don’t know. Obtain a copy of Garner’s English Usage along with the manual for your preferred style guide and skim sections regularly to stay aware of rules that may trip you up. A habit of perusing usage manuals and style guides will lessen your linguistic blind spots and help keep that editing apocalypse at bay.
Callie Johnson works as Editorial Assistant at Kelli Sallman Writing and Editing with a bachelor’s degree in Theatre Arts and Creative Writing from Calvary University. She previously interned with Kelli for two years, working as proofreader and copyeditor on several manuscripts. Her strange obsessions include kerning, East Coker, and the sound of cows chewing.