Good Morning. I thought the title of this post would get your attention. It's about misspelled words, or homonyms if you will. You see, while I was on vacation, I read like a maniac. New York authors who make the big bucks and have tons of editors. And I found several misspelled words. (Which was kind of fun in a weird OMG kind of way.)
...Jimmy slid the car around the corner, I think we were doing seventy by then, and when he saw the train, slammed on the breaks... (brakes)
...The huge cat beared its teeth, and we all froze... (bared)
I know I should not point out the mistakes in others, but I'm a writer. Hey, it's what I do.
Imagine my horror, when I sent my latest novella to my critique partner and she pointed out these little beauties...
If Edward thought about Arianna in any possible light, Bella was sure to distinguish the flame. (extinguish)
There was no reason for him to be hurt in such a manor. (manner)
Ewww, I said. Just ewww. I should have known better, but I was in writing mode, fast and furious trying to finish the book so I could enjoy my vacation. Yes, I did read it over before I sent it off, but I think because I wrote it, and had read it 20,000 times already, I just didn't see it.
Can we say the same about New York authors? I don't know. Don't they have gatekeepers, people who check and double check? Or does New York not care anymore if the author makes the company a bazillion dollars a year?
Which begs the question -- why should self-published authors care about that kind of thing if New York doesn't?
My answer is -- because we should. Because we have the "stigma" of being self-published and even today with the rise of ebooks in popularity, we should put out the best product we can.
Tell me -- Have you ever cringed when reading one of those? What are some of your best misspelled words?
Happy Labor Day!
Anne Gallagher (c) 2014
PS -- If you'd like to see what I've been working on over vacation you can find it here.
5 comments:
Ha! We all misspell--and those homonyms are so tricky. My recurring offenders are discreet/discrete and boarders/borders. Now I do an automatic word search for those specifically. And yeah, as independent publishers, we need to be even more careful in our editing because I think our work is looked at with a more critical eye.
typos are as ubiquitous as breathing. They are just gonna happen. Sigh.
You can't have enough editors and early readers. The more eyes the better.
My first lesson learned in a critique group...with 20 critiquers...they'll all find different issues.
My worst error is "withe" instead of "with the". Yeah, by the time I've read my work 20,000 times I only read what it should say. And I do believe those Big Guys in New York probably have the same problems. They probably use spell checker, and some things just don't get caught.
I'm not a great speller but even I catch so many simple spelling mistakes. More and more. Glad you got a lot of reading done on your holiday.
Cheers and boogie boogie.
I had "accident" instead of "accent" for about 6 drafts of my first novel. Nobody who read it noticed! Until my mum (an ex-English teacher) read it.
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