Sherri Cornelius

Yesterday I went through the printed scenes of my WIP, assessed each one's viability, and inserted placeholder pages for scenes which were missing. I got about halfway through. By the time I'm finished I hope to have every major plot point mapped in, with plenty of room for fun extras like backstory and worldbuilding. The underworld where my story is set has mushy time, and to convey that uncertain, disjointed time I'm inserting random flashbacks. A lot of those have already been written, but there's lots of room to be creative there, still. I'm excited.

I mentioned earlier that my editing projects this time are both erotica stories. Now, I'm not a prude by any means, but I am demure. Sex and sexy things are mostly private for me, and while I don't care if others feel comfortable talking about them, I was interested to see how I would react. It's funny how un-erotic erotica can be when you're looking for punctuation errors. I knew I would be fine when I made this note without blushing: "You said where Guy #1's ____ is, but what about Guy #2's _____?"

What language to use in my notes is something I've wondered about. Do I mirror the language of the story in notes like the one above? It sounds too dirty for a professional. So do I use the correct terminology? Well, that sounds too stiff and uptight (puns intended). So I think it's cute to use nicknames, like you-know-what and hoo-ha, but that's not precise enough. I guess I'll go with correct terminology, since I am a professional, after all, and you can't go wrong with penis and vulva.