HD Hatcher- Errors In BooksI have found throughout my adventures throughout the literary world, that there are a lot of books out there with errors.
Many of us writers tend to be a little overconfident in our literary skills. As much as we would like to think that we are impervious to making errors, this is not the case.
I myself, do not mind reading books with errors in them. Honestly, I respect anyone that puts their work out there for the world to read and to have their baby judged by people they have never met.
Finding errors in books makes the story more intimate to me. It reinforces that just because something is not perfect, does not mean it isn’t good. Maybe I am too laidback, but I think that the beauty is in the story and not the mechanics. Just because a book is grammatically correct and technically correct, doesn’t mean that the story is worth telling.
I have read books by powerhouse authors whose books have errors in them. Guess what, it didn’t make a difference to their fans or their movie deals. Some of the best books I have ever read have spelling and grammatical errors.
It’s going to happen.
Let me offer writers this tidbit of advice. Don’t sweat the small stuff. Everyone is not going to love your style of writing, and not everyone is going to give your book a “stand on their head and clap” review. So bet it. But, in the same breath there is someone out there that will. This is who you write for.
There will be readers out there that will be able to look beyond the errors and find the beauty in your story. Accept the good with the bad, and if the errors have you bothered, calm down, and fix the errors in the second edition.
Thank you for allowing me to take up so much of your time. Hopefully we can do this again some time.
HD
About A Cold Dark Place:On a chance meeting, (at a mutual friend’s house) Luke finds the love of his life. Andy is what Luke has been longing for all of his adult years: the perfect man. But, this perfect man is not only straight—he is married to a woman who is more devilish than Satan himself.
In a bittersweet journey that will change his life forever, Luke must reach deep inside and find the strength he never knew existed. A Cold Dark Place is the story of a man who must pick up the pieces of his broken heart after a lifetime of heartbreak and betrayal.
About HD:
Author HD Hatcher is no newcomer on the literary scene.
He is author of In the Heart of the Closet, a
piece nominated for both the 2006 Stonewall Book
Award and the 2005 Lambda Literary Award. He is
an avid supporter of gay and lesbian causes, suicide
prevention programs, as well as Animal Rights.
Hatcher currently resides in the Grand Strand area
of South Carolina, near his hometown of Conway,
with his Life Partner of ten years, Jerry.
A Cold Dark Place
One Too Many (a short)
I so agree with this post!
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great post about errors in fiction. Unless indies have the powerhouse of a big name publisher, I think there are bound to be errors--even when professionally edited. If readers knew how many passes a writer makes over every line, they'd understand how familiarity with the text breeds glossing over of grammar nitties.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I do appreciate it when it is virtually error free read. Even the best indie book I've read in the last month had at least 2 errors, and I applauded the author for such quality.
I agree! And lest anyone should think that only indie books have errors, I've found errors in books published by some of the big houses, too.
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