The other day I did something I don’t usually do. I reread one of my books. In a fit of writer’s block, I picked up ABOUT LAST NIGHT, a Harlequin American Romance released in February 2004. This book is one of those special ones. It outsold the rest of the line that month. It got 4.5 stars from RT. The funny thing, my editor didn’t like my hero. She kept saying, “I would never stay with a man like that.” But women do, and the book jumped off the shelves because she had the vision to let me keep Shane Jacobsen as he was.
Normally I don’t reread what I write, at least not right away, because I’ve already read the story about five or six times before I even sent it in to my publisher. Then I’ve read it again and again as the book went through revisions, copy edits and line edits. Yet, with all these things, mistakes can be made. I was reminded of this fact this week when a reader found an error in a Silhouette author’s book. A friend posted on a list serve that the reader wanted to know if she should let the editor know. The question then became, should she?
As an author, we want to hear from the reader first if you are so bothered by something. First, it’s our name on the cover. Second, editors are busy. Once the book is published, the fact that the hero got out of his truck on one page and into his car on the other isn’t something an editor has time to deal with. The book won’t be reprinted. An editor isn’t going to go search and try to figure out who made the mistake either. Yet as the author, I will. Why? Because my name is on the cover and I’m a perfectionist. I’ve put my heart and soul into the story. While I can’t necessarily change it, I want to know.
In my Harlequin NASCAR, HART’S VICTORY, on page 243, the spotter says “Pit car on pit road next pass.” Eke! It’s a pace car, and of course as a NASCAR fan (go #14) I know that.
But you know what? It’s my mistake. I wrote it that way in the original draft, and because I type really fast and a P is a P, pit and pace got jumbled in my mind. But I didn’t catch the mistake on edits. Neither did the NASCAR editor or the copy editor. Or my editor. Or anyone else for that matter. Still, I’m the one frustrated. It bothers me.
In EMERGENCY ENGAGEMENT, another Harlequin American, my corrections never got inputted. Production’s fault this time as they sent the book through without them—one of those glitches that happen. They thought they had the green light to start production on a Friday; my editor and I thought we had that same Friday to make final changes. My editor and I both winced—we discovered what happened after the book came out. And there it is—on one page the heroine had a glass of milk, and on the next it was Gatorade. Yet it didn’t detract from the story, which won Cataromance.com’s best Harlequin American Romance award for that year.
Unfortunately, mistakes things happen. I just read a Dorchester release and noticed a period was missing in one of the sentences. It didn’t ruin the book for me. I’ve found small typos where bat is pat and so forth in others, or thing is think and vice versa. Usually these happen because your brain fills in the blank or auto corrects. Lik U can rede dis. Yes, there are those books out there that are so riddled with mistakes that you wonder if anyone ever read the thing or at least used spell check before printing. I am not excusing those.
I promise you I comb through with a fine-tooth comb, as does my editor. We work very hard to bring you the best book possible. My latest release, BACHELOR CEO, is on the shelves now and I’m praying it is error free. But I won’t read it for at least another few years to find out. But you can, and if you do find something, feel free to let me know.
Michele Dunaway
Bachelor CEO out now!
BACHELOR CEO, Harlequin American Romance, 7/09
BABY IN THE BOARDROOM, Harlequin American Romance, 2/10
July 6, 2009 at 9:44 am
The errors that I notice and that bother me are usually the large ones like you mentioned with the pit/pace thing or a doctor putting a cast on a leg when it’s the arm that’s broken. Spelling errors usually don’t even attract my attention~~bu that’s because I read too may student papers when I was teaching and after 35 years of misspelled wrds I no loner notce thm unles it’s a drastc mistke. But I’ve read reviews where the reviewer gets all bent out of shape over spelling. But since once a book is on sale what good does it do to bring it to anyone’s attention??? They aren’t going to reprint the book and correct anything are they???????
July 6, 2009 at 11:41 am
A typo here or there don’t bother me….and I rarely notice if there is a small change such as blue jeans in one scene and cords in another. I know people who DO notice these things, but for me I’m more focused on the story itself.
What has bothered me is when there are MANY typos or grammer errors…a constant barrage of them. And yeah, I have read books that this happens in. It will throw me out of the story if it is excessive, and then I’m done.
July 6, 2009 at 1:05 pm
I’m not as picky as I used to be now that I see how many places along the road things can go wrong. I caught one error (glaring) in the ARC of When Danger Calls. I introduced the head of the company as Blackstone instead of Blackthorne (since the name of the company is Blackthorne, Inc., it was a stupid error.) It went through all the reads, re-reads and edits and nobody noticed until I saw the ARC.
In Hidden Fire, I sent all my copy edits in, yet somehow they never made it to production, so I was majorly upset to see the book had gone to press in the pre-corrected version. They did say they’d “try” to fix it in the next print run. Some were trivial, others were more significant. Not holding my breath.
Recently I read a book where the h/h left the heroine’s daughter safe in a cave while they went to find the bad guys. A few pages later, when they found the bad guys in the woods, the daughter was there. As far as I could tell after re-reading it several times, the bad guys had never found the cave.
July 6, 2009 at 2:17 pm
Spelling errors don’t bother me. The changing of eye or hair color of the h/h does bother me.
July 6, 2009 at 2:57 pm
Nice post… the mistakes don’t bother me. On the contrary I’m quite happy when I find one, it means my english is improving (I’m french;-) !!
July 6, 2009 at 5:15 pm
I have come to expect an error or two. With all the things that authors have to do and people to deal with I think it is just bound to happen.
July 6, 2009 at 9:19 pm
I’m picky, too, Michele, and will check back in my draft to see if the mistake was there before the pages were printed or if it happened somewhere else. I’m a perfectionist from way back – if anyone knows a way to help me, I’d appreciate it
. I typed my husband’s master’s thesis (on a rented Selectric typewriter!) and his professor said it was the cleanest copy they’d ever received. Of course, then I open up the bound book after all the orals, etc. were over and there, in the middle of the page, was ‘taht.’ Possibly the only error in the entire thing but I never read it through to see. Still bugs me when I see the book on his shelf, especially since I know it can never be changed. Ah, well.
July 6, 2009 at 11:05 pm
I’m only bothered if the characters’ physical descriptions
on the cover do not match the text. Picky, I know, but
I seem to imbed that description in my mind as I begin reading the story. It seems to help me get a better grip
on the text.
Pat Cochran
July 7, 2009 at 9:26 am
Thanks for all the great comments. It’s awesome knowing I’m not alone in stressing about all this–but then afterwards you can’t necessarily let it ruin your experience.
The funny thing is, it’s amazing how things blur in your mind when writing. Not that that is an excuse, but my editor once called the hero Blake in ever revision letter, when the guy’s name was Blade. It was fine in the book.
It’s hard to keep track of time and the weather, something that I have to really make sure I don’t screw up.
July 7, 2009 at 9:28 am
Tessa, I remember all those white out strips and typing my English papers that way. Kids don’t know how good they have it!
Terry–the kid poofed there.
It was probably there, and then one of those throw-away lines that got cut in editing. I’ve done that.
Ellen–no, they won’t reprint. They may fix if the book sells through and goes into second printing.
July 7, 2009 at 1:39 pm
I tell my sons and students that often
– we rented the Selectric typewriter because it was ’self-correcting’ and I didn’t have to use strips or any other additions.
I’ve tried to grow out of some of that persnicketyness – decided life’s too short. When I had a job as a secretary (to help put same husband through that grad school), I would bring home messed up letterhead sheets in my purse so the boss wouldn’t know how many mistakes I made! Their letterhead was an off-buff color and didn’t match any of the White Out shades available.
Now I use spiral notebooks to record pertinent facts for my stories to help keep track as I go along. And love to write on the computer!
July 8, 2009 at 4:47 pm
So many books that I have read have had at least one error.
I just don’t know how errors can totally be kept from occurring.
Is there a computer program that can scan a manuscript and
then compare the printed book against it? Perhaps that is
a project for some computer savvy person!
Pat Cochran
July 8, 2009 at 4:52 pm
Just about every book I’ve read has had at least one error.
I just don’t know how to keep that from happening since
humans are involved. Perhaps this is a project for some
computer savvy person: devising a program that will keep
typos out of print!
Pat Cochran
July 8, 2009 at 5:07 pm
I’m much more forgiving of typos. It’s the ‘real’ mistakes that bug me. Like a flight from Hawaii landing at the International gate at LAX? Isn’t Hawaii still part of the US?
Not to mention the ‘wrong’ description of the waiting area. People aren’t allowed to greet passengers at the gate anymore. If you write about something real, do your homework. Editors need to know the subject matter as well.
Or the affect/effect mistake. Copy editors are supposed to find things like that.
July 9, 2009 at 12:03 am
As a reader It doesn’t bother me when there are small errors like that, If a story has a great plot and is well written, them that’s all that matters to me.
~ Afshan