Editorial Notes = clarifying information, additional insight, annotations Hiya Reader, We use passwords to protect everything from our bank accounts to our email, so why not our families and friends? Given the prevalence of AI and its increasing technological advances, experts are increasingly recommending that households come up with a shared code word — a simple, memorable phrase that loved ones can use to verify they're really talking to who they think they are. Think this is excessive?...
24 days ago • 3 min read
Editorial Notes = clarifying information, additional insight, annotations Hiya Reader, Wherever you are in the world, spring has sprung or is springing or will spring. The always awesome team at Merriam-Webster shares this list of spring-related words for your enjoyment (and Scrabble wins!) I personally love "repullulate" which, while it means "to spring or bud anew," to my ears sounds like a Shakespearean insult. Forwarded this email? Subscribe here for more! Join List Example of the Week...
about 1 month ago • 3 min read
Editorial Notes = clarifying information, additional insight, annotations Hiya Reader, When I'm doing the creative work of editing, I often need to take breaks. For me, this isn't usually time dependent but more along the lines of segments. For example, I'll take a break after a section or a chapter or even a tricky paragraph description. Sometimes I'll do something physical, like suffering through a few pushups or peeling vegetables for steaming. But sometimes, I just web surf. Cute animals...
about 2 months ago • 4 min read
Editorial Notes = clarifying information, additional insight, annotations Hiya Reader, New goal level unlocked: Books, time, writing space, Paris, and all social media/publicity prohibited! Close your eyes and picture it: waking up in Paris, spending your days writing and reading, following in the footsteps of Ginsberg, Baldwin, and Hemingway. Will one of you be one of the lucky 20 this year? Think a friend would appreciate Editorial Notes? Send them this link to sign up: Refer a Friend! (And...
2 months ago • 3 min read
Editorial Notes = clarifying information, additional insight, annotations Hiya Reader, I'm late to the party here (so many books! so little time!) but Virginia Evans' lovely novel The Correspondent is one of the best books I've read this year. It reminded me a bit of an older book in which an entire relationship plays out in the back and forth letters between the two characters who start out as strangers and become much more than that. It had something to do with a marble. Anyone remember...
3 months ago • 4 min read
Editorial Notes = clarifying information, additional insight, annotations Hiya Reader, I can be an annoying person to watch movies and series TV with because I am rarely surprised by the supposed twist and not exactly quiet about it. A perfect example was last century's (ha! I picked an old one so as not to spoil a current one for you) M. Night Shyamalan movie The Sixth Sense. I kept waiting and waiting and waiting and waiting for the promised SHOCKER at the end which, when it came, was a...
3 months ago • 4 min read
Editorial Notes = clarifying information, additional insight, annotations Hiya Reader, As a nerdy middle schooler, I asked my parents for the Oxford English Dictionary as a holiday present one year. Not the single volume, simple dictionary my father gifted, but this one, the multi-volume definitive history of the language: OED I wanted the improbable set largely due to my fascination with etymology, i.e., the entries detailing word origins and their shifts in meaning over time. I told you I...
4 months ago • 5 min read
Editorial Notes = clarifying information, additional insight, annotations Hiya Reader, A subscriber and fellow bibliophile shared this piece from LitHub: Nothing Better Than a Whole Lot of Books: In Praise of Bibliomania. On a recent trip to Seoul, I got to experience the absolutely gorgeous Starfield library, the shelves of which are more than 40 feet tall. A whole lotta books and a happy place indeed. Starfield Library, Seoul Think a friend would appreciate Editorial Notes? Send them this...
4 months ago • 4 min read
Editorial Notes = clarifying information, additional insight, annotations Hiya Reader, I have no idea how this started, but in my family, my then-teenagers started to falsely-on-purpose "correct" any spoken usage of less to fewer and vice versa. "Use a little less flour." Response: "Fewer flour." "Fewer leaves to rake than last week." Response: "Less leaves." This ridiculousness went on for so many years that I now, genuinely, have to stop and think which word is actually correct. (Fewer is...
5 months ago • 4 min read