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Muckraker Mystery Trilogy

Stanley Nelson and I wrote these three books about Tommy Jacks and his family during a time I was healing from a serious case of writers block. These books and my experience writing them are some of my most enjoyable time writing. The three books take Jacks through his most formative years as a beginning reporter and political columnist in the 1960s during an ugly, vicious newspaper war in Oklahoma City. You may wonder why we set this fictional story in Oklahoma City--it is because we were there at the time and much of this story is based on what actually happened. Sure, we made up a lot of stuff, but the core story is true. Stanley and I knew many of the people we write about (with different names) and had heard the stories these people told about their adventures in competitive journalism. (Don't tell anyone but most of the murders were made up--it made for a much more interesting story--it is fiction, after all.)

Some of you may have overlooked these books; because they are different than my other books. But you should check these out--lots of history, political intrigue and great characters. They're a little darker; but, I think, they're very engaging stories about a different time. There is still humor, tragedy and romance, just like life.

The final book in the trilogy should be published later this year or early next.

This month we are continuing our interview with Stanley Nelson. Stan co-wrote the Muckraker series with me and is a good friend. His background is journalism and editing. My opinion is that he is one of the best on both counts. I asked Stan a number of questions and he will answer one today.

Ted. Language is always evolving, but it seems that the rate of change has accelerated. Slang has always existed but now words come and go very rapidly. How does this impact editing?

Stan. Briefly put, various editing protocols can change because of cultural shifts like trends in language. Such changes generally happen after accepted authorities of style and usage react to them somehow. The Chicago Manual of Style, the Associated Press Stylebook and the most relied-upon dictionaries and thesauruses are examples of such authorities.

Changes in language and word usage can be interesting to follow, especially if one remains objective. The dictionary usually is first to adopt any change as a matter of mere record. (An experienced editor knows it's a mistake to regard a dictionary, even the hallowed Oxford English, as an arbiter of usage. A dictionary only records and verifies usages, while the speakers of a language determine them.)

Let's take an example from the immemorial trend of converting unmodified nouns into verbs. The word "impact" began life as a mere noun. Guardians of grammar and good writing looked down on its use as a verb. Most regarded it an invasion by ungainly business-style jargon. Stylebooks tend to hold the line and warn against such misuse at first, even if widespread. In time, against what seemed a tide of popular usage on a variety of levels, the change was officially adopted, and "impact" began to be accepted as a verb, if begrudgingly.

And so it was on to the next, and so on.

It's hard to say whether any language, let alone English, changes more rapidly now than it ever did. Scholars of every language, even ones that have fallen out of use, are likely to wax academically enthusiastic if anyone would approach them on the subject of historical changes in syntax and usage. And don't get them started on neologisms.

For a writer or editor, language--however it changes, has changed or will change, under whatever influence--is the primary tool of construction, and the closest thing to a magic wand either could have. It's hardly perfect; no human invention is. We all bear witness that the flexibility of language exposes it to promiscuous abuse. Our common discourses stumble and careen under the weight of enough misapplications and overuses to fill a devil's dictionary of literary and rhetorical sin. Perfectly good words are routinely (and brutally) rendered ambiguous to the point of practical meaninglessness. And then there's slang, the pervasiveness of which brings the realm of bacteria to mind--partly harmful, partly beneficial.

All that taken together means language is our best and certainly most universal medium of expression for every artistic or epistemological purpose. What writer or editor could not be intrigued by the idea that bad language, however one might define the term, can be used for the benefit of the reader? And so it has, many times. In other words, misuse surely has its uses, especially for purposes of irony, my all-time favorite literary device.

Muckraker Mystery Trilogy

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