My Silly Worry

[blairmacg]

In my heart of hearts, I believe the plot and characters in Sand of Bone are the best my current skill set can make them.

So what has me fretting prior to release?

Typos. Stupid typos.

It's a professionalism thing, I suppose. Once a certain baseline of writing ability is met, "good story" becomes subjective. But an incorrect gerund, missing comma, or extra hard return? That's just plain wrong. But no matter how many people read the novel, no matter who I pay to proofread, no matter how meticulous I am about every little change and correction, a mistake is bound to be missed or -- worst of all! -- created in that final round of editing.

And that's the fear I'm sitting with right now.

Comments

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

Sigh. Welcome to the cantina!

[blairmacg.livejournal.com]

Lol! Yep, it's the fun part!

[green-knight.livejournal.com]

Copy editor/proofreader wisdom is that you catch 90% of mistakes on the first read of a text; and fewer on a separate pass. You also catch fewer errors in your own writing.

The knowledge that everything I edit - that I get paid to edit - goes back to the PE/author *with errors in it* isn't welcome, but I'm starting to accept it.

[blairmacg.livejournal.com]

Heh. I'm at the point of getting more and more nervous the fewer and fewer typos I find. After all, if I find a mistake, I must be focused on the task. If I find nothing, I worry I've missed something.

I try to take comfort in knowing I once found a typo in a piece of writing that had gone through numerous betas, one copyeditor, one proofreader, and a ton of my own obsessive readings. But it isn't comforting at all, really, is it?