Copyediting sample 35:
With hungry eyes

In this sample from a fantasy novel, my slight revision of one sentence (without adding or dropping a single word) allowed that sentence to seamlessly flow from the sentence preceding it and into the sentence that followed it.

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This sample is presented here with the two authors’ permission.

Original
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Tryam absorbed the surrounding vistas with hungry eyes. He no longer fretted about Roderick’s presence as he watched the sun dance off the distant Corona mountains. The ill-mannered knight was insignificant in Aten’s grand scheme.

Markup
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Tryam absorbed the surrounding vistas with hungry eyes. He no longer eyes. As he watched the sun dance off the distant Corona Mountains, he no longer fretted about Roderick’s presence as he watched the sun dance off the distant Corona mountains. presence. The ill-mannered knight was insignificant in Aten’s grand scheme. [My suggested revision is to impose Aristotelian coherence: always preceding new information with given information. Sentence 1 (opening chapter 20) begins with given information (“Tryam absorbed” and “surrounding vistas”), which elaborates on the new information provided at the close of chapter 19: being “on the path that Aten had chosen.” Sentence 1 closes with new information (“with hungry eyes.”) The revised sentence 2 opens with given information (“As he watched the sun dance off the distant Corona Mountains”), which elaborates on the new information in sentence 1, describing what Tryam’s “hungry eyes” were doing. The new information for sentence 2 (“he no longer fretted about Roderick’s presence.”) leads into (is elaborated by) the given information in sentence 3 (“The ill-mannered knight,” the elaboration concerning the knight Roderick’s ill manners). That sentence’s new information tells us more about the knight: that he “was insignificant in Aten’s grand scheme.” The original sentence 2 muddied the coherence: That Tryam no longer fretted did not elaborate on his hungry eyes, and that he watched the sun dance had nothing to do with the ill-mannered knight.]

Result
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Tryam absorbed the surrounding vistas with hungry eyes. As he watched the sun dance off the distant Corona Mountains, he no longer fretted about Roderick’s presence. The ill-mannered knight was insignificant in Aten’s grand scheme.