Cheerio, duckies! Orange is everywhere, and pumpkin spice has our flavor options in a death grip. It is decidedly fall. It is also decidedly easy to fall prey to sneaky little style slipups. Luckily, we have our faithful CMOS to finesse any faltering. Today’s case in point: the hyphen. That teeny little line can bewilder the best of writers, but the Manual is quite forgiving with regards to hyphen usage. In section 7.77 of the Sixteenth Edition, the CMOS acknowledges the mental gymnastics required to decipher compound mechanics. It also offers an easy out: by consulting the dictionary. Webster’s provides a substantial, though not exhaustive, list of hyphenated compounds. Section 5.91 of the CMOS goes further, providing an especially helpful rule of thumb. Look for substantial alterations in meaning when deciding to apply hyphens. Is it a small shoe shop , or a small-shoe shop ? Hopefully, the size of your feet does not range into square footage, and you’ll easily see the di...

Graphic courtesy of stock.xchng Hello again, dearies! Having just enjoyed a birthday, your Style Maven is inspired to discuss age. Not my own mind you; Heavens, no. What we’re going to discuss today is the fact that while age is only a number (usually unlisted), it’s terribly important to write that number correctly. When age is included in a description, how does one hyphenate? More to the point, should a hyphen be used at all? As usual, it boils down to usage. Since we’re all of an age (and quite clever enough) to learn by example, I’m going to show you when and how age terms should be hyphenated. Raise your hand once you catch on; you’re sure to pick it up straight away. When I was twenty years of age, I purchased a five-year-old coat in a vintage shop. A collection of thirty- to forty-year-old hats was found in the costume closet. These shoes are three years old, but still very chic. A six-year-old often has a unique sense of fashion. Are you ...

To hyphenate or not to hyphenate; that is the question. Is the glass half full or half-full? The answer is not simple. There are so many exceptions it can drive you a little batty. The grammar books advise us to use the hyphen to form some compound words expressing a combination of ideas, such as cross-reference . It is also used in SOME compound adjectives (note the use of the word “some”). This means when you use two words as a single modifier before a noun, those two words are hyphenated. For example, Meryl Streep is a well-known actor. The words “well and “known” combine to form one modifier for “actor.” BUT: Meryl Streep is well known. The two words are no longer describing another word and come after the noun. Sometimes words can mean different things depending on the hyphenation. When you hyphenate the words, you are applying them as a single unit to the noun. For example: A hot-water bottle is a bottle for holding hot water. BUT: A hot water bottle is a water bottle th...

HYPHENS, ELLIPSES, DASHES Ellipses vs. Dashes; Hyphen, Em Dash and En Dash  A.   Ellipsis (…) or Dash (—)? In fiction, An ellipsis (…) is used to show hesitation : “What I meant is…I don’t know how to begin…”  (Also indicates the omission of words in a quoted text.) A dash (—) , also called em dash, is used to show an interruption in speech: “But I—” “But nothing! I don’t want to hear your excuses!” or a sudden break in thought or sentence structure: “Will he—can he—find out the truth?” The dash is used for amplifying or explaining , for setting off information within a sentence, kind of like parentheses or commas can do: “My friends—I mean, my former friends—ganged up on me.” B.   Hyphen vs. En Dash vs. Em Dash: The en dash is longer than the hyphen but shorter than the em dash (the regular dash) A hyphen (-) is used within a word . It separates the parts of a compound word: bare-handed, close-up, die-hard, half-baked, jet-lagged, low-key, never-ending...

I realize you all know this. I love hyphens. So needless to say, I use them often. It's a rare occurrence for me to take pause, stymied by the proper use of this lovely and under-utilized punctuation mark. But it happened to me just a few days ago. It wasn't a bad thing. I got to use my new, blue Chicago Manual of Style . Have I told you how much I love my new CMS? No? Oh, yes, I do love it. It's so wonderfully new and improved, including the cover color. How improved is it? Check out the changes in Edition 16 by clicking here . Included is a new and improved hyphenation guide! Now tell me if you've heard of anything cooler than that in the past week. So back to my hyphenation dilemma. I was editing a blog post which referred to a children's book written for 5 to 8 year olds. I knew that was wrong. 5 to 8-year-olds. Nope. Hmmm. 5-8-year-olds. Wow, that really didn't look correct. What does the CMS say? It states in the section about compounds and hyphenati...

What are the most common errors you see when line-editing manuscripts? I've been a copy editor for the last 10 of my 23 years in newspapering, and recently I've been keeping loose track of the kinds of errors I spot in the news copy I read five nights a week. Tell us how often these kind of mistakes pop up in your own red-pen adventures. In no particular order (and leaving out typos because spellcheck usually identifies those, and often they're mistakes of speed-typing rather than deliberate ignorance): Sentence-Smoosh Syndrome. Example: "The sergeant, who found the car to be stolen, attempted to pull it over, but the man refused to stop, and a pursuit began, going down Auto Center Way, onto Kitsap Way, and eventually to Chico Way." I realize that in fiction, long sentences can convey a certain intense dramatic flow or sense of unrelenting action. But it takes a high degree of skill to keep from losing a reader by cramming too many thoughts into one cerebr...

Ideally an author and an editor cooperate to create an even better manuscript. The author offers the product of her imagination and experience. The editor reminds her of her audience and the standard rules that will help readers understand her book. My finest and most memorable editing usually occurs when I dialogue with an author. Several years ago I was honored to copyedit Lee Lynch’s novel Sweet Creek and among my suggestions told her that, according to Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary , 11th edition (the standard for our book company), the word “far-out” needs a hyphen. Lee had accepted all my suggested revisions but balked on this one. She insisted that the word was “far out.” I put on my English-professor hat and loftily explained that it has been around since 1954 and that compound words evolve from two separate words (far out), to a hyphenated word (far-out), and eventually to one word (farout). I concluded my mini-lecture but stating, “We’re now in the word’s second stage ...