Oops!

One of my faithful readers pointed out today that the Sea Story about Ensign Benson had an uncharacteristic number of typos and punctuation errors in it. Further, it was pretty rough sounding.

I found I had posted an early, unedited version.

My writing technique consists of putting down my story or thoughts on paper--well, OK, on the computer screen--without too much concern for typos and style. I'm mainly concerned at that point with telling a consistent story.

Then I go back and correct the obvious typos and punctuation glitches, cut and paste to rearrange sentences and paragraphs, and tighten things up. Still later I'll make another pass through, frequently reading out loud. Now I'm trying to get a flow, and to hone my choice of verbs and adjectives.

Even after all of that I usually read through the chapter or section a couple more times, trying out different words or sequences of words.

What I had posted was a version very early in that process. In my haste to get it on the web for all of you to see, I converted the wrong Word file to html, and used my FTP software to move to a web address.

The tone is intended to be conversational, as if the narrator was relating a story to you orally. Thus the style is casual, and the vocabulary is a bit coarse, as in, "It was just sheer luck and the inherent stability of the T-2B that saved his ass." I was envisioning sitting at the officers' club bar at happy hour, telling this story to several people including pilots and non-pilots. That was the tone I wanted to establish throughout the book.

I should have reviewed it more carefully before posting it. My apologies, faithful readers. You expect better from me, and should get better in the future.

The version that's there now is a bit cleaner, but still would need some work before I'd present it to an agent or publisher.

P.S. Still no word on the hearing results.