Feo Takahari
Auror
I don't like em dashes, so I use double hyphens--like so. My beta reader is pushing me to find-and-replace with em dashes. Should I?
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Is the double hyphen appropriate for published stories?
- Thread starter Feo Takahari
- Start date
I would. I think the em dash looks professional. With the double hyphen, it just looks like the author doesn't know you're supposed to use an em dash (in my view). It's something that I think a professional editor would change automatically.
If you feel strongly about it, then go with what you prefer. It's your work, after all. But if I came across the double hyphens in a published book, it would certainly make me stop a moment and wonder why it was done that way. There's no way to tell the reader you made a conscious decision as opposed to simply not knowing better.
If you feel strongly about it, then go with what you prefer. It's your work, after all. But if I came across the double hyphens in a published book, it would certainly make me stop a moment and wonder why it was done that way. There's no way to tell the reader you made a conscious decision as opposed to simply not knowing better.
wordwalker
Auror
Plus, there's always some risk that line breaks will shuffle around until they split your hyphens (maybe in some ebooks). 
psychotick
Auror
Hi,
If you're indie publishing do what looks best to you, just be consistent. If you're submitting to agents etc, do what your agent / publisher wants. Personally I prefer the em dash (and the en dash for hyphenated words). It just looks neater to me. And I hadn't thought about what wordwalker says - I would have assumed that word would treat double hyphens as single words since there's no blank space between them - but if he's right that's a worry.
Cheers, Greg.
If you're indie publishing do what looks best to you, just be consistent. If you're submitting to agents etc, do what your agent / publisher wants. Personally I prefer the em dash (and the en dash for hyphenated words). It just looks neater to me. And I hadn't thought about what wordwalker says - I would have assumed that word would treat double hyphens as single words since there's no blank space between them - but if he's right that's a worry.
Cheers, Greg.
