A Boy Scout salute derails my editing start on 'The Fracking War'

WATKINS GLEN, New York, USA - I had my printed out copy of the draft of The Fracking War sitting on my desk, ready for the red-pencil treatment just a few days ago.

The next phase in this process is for me to read it a closely as a I can, making changes, perhaps adding chapters if needed. Because it's the last time I will edit before it goes out to my beta readers, it's a little nerve-wracking. I want to be sure to iron out any inconsistencies, fix factual missteps and smooth out the roughest edges factually and stylistically.

It's been at least six weeks since I peeked at it. So in some ways, it will be brand new and I should spot things that I would normally have read right past had I done this when I first completed the draft in Sacramento.

My confidence was very high until I dove into a novel I picked up at the Watkins Glen public library, a book that seems to have  been through the traditional publishing mill: editors, fact checkers, fact checkers who check other fact checkers and the editors.

Did I mention the fact checkers?

Then I read these three sentences on page 7 of this novel:

"No long stories. Scout's honor." 

The detective lifted two fingers in a Boy Scout salute.

Santa Crappo! The author wrote that he lifted two fingers.

Boy Scout salute

My time with the scouting organization was limited. A couple of years as a Cub Scout. Maybe three as a Boy Scout.

I still say the longest summer I ever spent was a week at Camp Merz, a Boy Scout camp in Chautauqua County, New York.

But I did learn all that paramilitary protocol forwards and backwards.

Cub Scout salute

For the record, the Boy Scout salute uses three fingers. Cub Scouts use two. Believe me. I saluted my butt off. We had some retired military guys as leaders who loved the saluting.


So you might say, big deal, a minor error.

Yes, a minor error, but just the kind of minor error that should never appear in a well-edited novel. If the writer (and fact checkers and editors and the fact checkers who check the other fact checkers) can't get a detail like a salute correct, how will a reader believe the plot?

They won't. Which I why I will be reading The Fracking War even closer than I had planned.

Oh, by the way, there is some saluting in The Fracking War. But if I remember, it's mostly of the single-digit variety.

Sac Bee's Marcos Breton on tap for Column Writing class

SACRAMENTO, Calif., USA - This week the column-writing class at CSU, Sacramento is hoping to hear from Sacramento Bee columnist Marcos Breton as a guest speaker in class. Breton, who in the past has written about and sports and other feature-type stories for the newspaper, now is a major city-side columnist.

In recent months, he has written a lot about the Kevin Johnson-Heather Fargo race for mayor of Sacramento.

And most recently (Sunday), he wrote about the controversial Proposition 8 which state voters just approved.

Tolerance or intolerance?

Marcos Breton

Breton was scheduled to speak in class a few weeks ago, but like so many other staff members at the Bee, has been busy doing his job - and a lot more - to help the newspaper with its struggles in the down economy and had to cancel.

Dan Weintraub to visit column-writing class Oct. 21

SACRAMENTO, Calif., USA - Dan Weintraub, a columnist for The Sacramento Bee will be coming to the CSU, Sacramento column writing class next Tuesday to talk writing, politics and perhaps a little about the future of the newspaper industry.

He was scheduled earlier in the semester - the night of the second presidential debate - and had to cancel.

Like many Sacramento Bee staffers, Weintraub has been adjusting to the new fiscal realities of the publishing industry. Among other things, he has started a new feature in the newspaper called The Conversation which goes into depth on different issues.

The approach is interesting and Weintraub will likely talk about what it was like to launch The Conversation, as well as how it is going.

Weintraub is a veteran member of the Sacramento press corps and believes in doing a lot of reporting before he writes a word for his column.


Dan Weintraub