Tropical Writers of Far North Queensland: Tropical Writers is a writing group in Cairns that has published four anthologies. Each year we employ Barbara to be our editor and in 2010 she not only edited all 42 stories and poems, but also did the layout for us. Because there are different skill levels in our group, some of the writing required only a copy edit (for punctuation and grammar), while others required a full structural edit. Barbara worked well with all of the authors and managed to turn even the most difficult manuscripts into a publishable state. We firmly believe that it is the Tropical Dragon’s editing knowledge and expertise that make our books so successful. - Contact Diane Finlay on findpublishing@hotmail.com to obtain copies of the anthologies.
Sally McDonald, Editor: I am an editor myself, so I trust my ability to produce a grammatically correct manuscript. However there is more to editing than just getting the punctuation right and for that I hired Barbara. She picked up on the times I repeated phrases or used superfluous words. For example, in one sentence I wrote: “I saw that there was a backpack on the table” and by trimming that to, “I saw a backpack on the table,” Barbara was able to keep me within the word count restriction. More importantly, Barbara understands the dynamics of structure and dialogue in writing. She pointed out that my 80 year old character would probably not utter the modern expression I had given him, and this insight made my story much more believable. I can't recommend Barbara highly enough - she is a master at picking up on things you completely missed! - Sally has produced a quick guide to Punctuation and Grammar, and also recently published a collection of her stories as a pet sitter 'Pet Sitter's Diary'. Both of these are available from Sally at smcd46@bigpond.com
Diane Andrews: I sent a short story to Barbara for editing, Dog One Man Zero. She did a fantastic job, so good in fact that it was accepted for publication immediately I submitted it. Now it is in a print anthology - "Heroes and Villains" from Canadian publisher All Rights Reserved - Diane can be found at Write Down Under
Cloris de Matteis: I have found Barbara Holten by chance on the internet, and I say that it was a lucky day for me. She has proof read my two books for publication and she has done a marvellous job. I can recommend her highly as she is very thorough and nothing escapes her very professional eyes - “An Italian Down Under” is available from Cloris de Matteis
Lauren Budden: I am very happy with all the changes and I so appreciate the time and effort you put into it as well as the extra advice…. I don’t think I could have found someone better for the editing. I really feel that you got it and you felt it… "Oh my God! I'm a Lesbian" - not yet published but sparkling on the slush pile