Part 1. Approaching the Story -- Chapter 1. Focus on fundamentals: The editor within -- Editing is Reading with an Attitude -- The Editor Emerges -- The Editor Shifts From Me to We -- What Editors do and Why It Matters -- The Editor's Changing Role: From Print to Multimedia -- The Changing News and News Judgment -- Preparing to be an Editor -- Chapter 2. Focus on news judgment: The editor's attitude -- The Editor Steps Forward -- The Editor's Attitude -- News Values and News Judgment -- Applying the News Values -- News Judgment in Action -- Doing the Right Thing: Fairness and Ethics -- The Starting Point: Your Stylebook -- A Look Around the Newsroom -- Chapter 3. Focus on skills and tools: The editor in the newsroom -- The News is in the Details -- Skills for Today's Copy Editor -- Organization: the Shape of the Story -- Accuracy: the Substance of the Story -- Numbers in the News -- Tools for Today's Editor -- Chapter 4. Focus on grammar: The mechanics of language -- Why Grammar Matters -- What are Grammar, Style and Usage? -- Building Grammar Skills Step By Step -- Sentences: Putting the Parts Together -- Punctuation -- Chapter 5. Focus on good writing: Strong and graceful prose -- Correct Writing and Good Writing -- Style and Usage: Let the Writer's Voice Be Heard -- The Editor's Role: Seeing the Details and Hearing the Song -- Clarity Through Word Usage: Be Simple, Be Brief -- Misused Words -- More on Quotations and Attributions -- Building Graceful Sentences -- Part 2. Inside the Story -- Chapter 6. News close to home: Editing local stories and community news -- The Importance of Local News -- What's Different About Local News? -- The Characteristics of Strong Local News -- Raising the Standards in Community News -- The Debate Over Civic Journalism -- Chapter 7. News from afar: Editing wire stories -- News From Afar -- Looking Inside the Wire -- The Wire Editor's Tasks -- Reading and Selecting Wire Stories -- Editing and Trimming Wire Stories -- Chapter 8. Making a long story short: Editing for brevity and clarity -- Cutting Stories Without Cutting Corners -- Old Tools for New Needs -- Thinking Through the Story -- Editing Briefs: The Shortest of the Short -- Chapter 9. After the fact: Editing features and more complex story forms -- Feature Editing is Creative Editing -- Features, News and News Features: Some Distinctions -- The Feature Editor and the Feature Writer -- Changing Priorities: News Values and More -- Leads and Language in Features -- Focus and Organization in Features -- Chapter 10. No safety in numbers: Poll and survey stories -- Polls Can REflect or Distort Public Opinion -- A Primer on Polling -- Key Concepts in Poll Results -- Bias in the Questioning Process -- Scientific and Nonscientific Polls -- The Impact of Polls on the Public -- Chapter 11. Doing justice: Legal issues, ethics and bias -- The Lessons of 1998 -- Developing A Sense of What is Right -- The Concept of Libel -- The Right to Privacy -- Ethical Guidelines -- Part 3. Beyond the Story -- Chapter 12. Headlines: Precision, power and poetry -- The Voice of Authority -- What Headlines Do -- Getting Started: Headline Basics -- The Language of Headlines -- Four Stages of Headline Writing -- Intention: What Good Headlines Must Do -- Approach: What Good Headlines Should Do -- Mechanics: Compressing Meaning, Maintaining Clarity -- Structure: Headlines on the Page and Screen -- Chapter 13. An eye for news: Editing photos -- The Power of Pictures -- Image and Reality -- Selecting Photos -- Ethical and Legal Issues -- Cropping and Sizing Photos -- Writing Cutlines -- Chapter 14. Showing the story: Editing information graphics -- The Value of Showing the Story -- Types of Information Graphics -- Data and Distortion -- Editing Text in Infographics -- Chapter 15. The balancing act: Designing pages -- Communicating Through Design -- Why Design Matters -- Design Concepts -- Story Design with and Without Art -- From the Module to the Page -- Typography: the Visual Dimension of Words -- Advanced Issues in Design -- Laying Out Inside Pages -- Color Considerations -- Chapter 16. From gatekeeper to guide: Online news and 21st-century editing -- The Leap from the Page to the Screen -- Audience, Advertising and Ethics: New Realities Online -- The News and the Newsroom Go Online -- Adapting Your Skills to Online Editing -- The Web, Free Speech and Democracy -- Appendix A. Frequently Misused Words -- Appendix B. Glossary -- Appendix C. Sample Dummy Sheets.