Funny mistakes authors make

miles · Dec 8, 2008

Today I was reading THE FACE by Dean Koontz.

This is on page 160:

Turning to the door again, Ethan encountered his reflection and closed his eyes, perhaps to guard against the sight of an impossible phantom figure sharing the glass with him. He opened the door, then opened his eyes.

In a growl of wind and a jingle of overhead bells, he stepped out of the shop into the cold teeth of the December night, and drew the door shut behind him.

He waited in the entry alcove, between the display windows, as a young couple in raincoats and hoods passed on the sidewalk, led by a golden retriever on a leash.

And this is on page 173:

His vision irised to a dim spot of light, and then the mortal knot drew tighter still, blinding him completely. Accepting the inevitability of death and endless darkness, at last he closed his eyelids.

He opened the door, then opened his eyes.

In a growl of wind and a jingle of overhead bells, he stepped out of Forever Roses into the cold teeth of the December night, and drew the door shut behind him.

In shock to find himself alive, in disbelief that he stood on legs unbroken, he waited in the entry alcove, between the display windows, as a young couple in raincoats and hoods strolled by on the sidewalk, led by a golden retriever on a leash.

What are some big mistakes you've found in novels?

RobJ · Dec 8, 2008

Are you sure it wasn't deliberate?

maestrowork · Dec 8, 2008

It's more likely an editing problem -- remnant of a erroneous cut-and-paste, perhaps?

miles · Dec 8, 2008

RobJ said:
Are you sure it wasn't deliberate?

Very. They are completely different chapters and he's not having a flashback.

maestrowork · Dec 8, 2008

Here's one I always talked about: Patterson's Sam's Letters to Jennifer.

The story started out with 3rd/present tense. Now read page 4 and see what happens... Lo and behold, it's now past tense.

RobJ · Dec 8, 2008

Fair enough.

Cheers
Rob

dclary · Dec 8, 2008

I have a version of Tolkien's essays-and-short-stories collection ("Of tree and leaf" I think it's called) wherein a huge chunk of pages are flat-out repeated.

Having already owned a version wherein the pages were accurate, I blame the publisher.

dclary · Dec 8, 2008

I also have a copy of Fellowship of the ring, early 70s Ballantine american paperback edition, wherein Bilbo has a line of dialogue -- during the winter gale the fellowship passes through attempting to cross the misty mountains. I'll have to see if I can drag it up, and then compare to my post-movie editions and see if it's been corrected.

underthecity · Dec 8, 2008

I don't know, Miles. I've read The Face and I distinctly remember reading that repeating phrase. I thought it was deliberate and seemed to work in the context of the story. I read it last year so the details are sketchy, but to me it seemed like it was a peculiar doubling experience the MC was having. He was in the middle of a very peculiar experience, after all.

miles · Dec 8, 2008

underthecity said:
I don't know, Miles. I've read The Face and I distinctly remember reading that repeating phrase. I thought it was deliberate and seemed to work in the context of the story. I read it last year so the details are sketchy, but to me it seemed like it was a peculiar doubling experience the MC was having. He was in the middle of a very peculiar experience, after all.

If you're right, I suck. :Shrug:

underthecity · Dec 8, 2008

But I might be wrong. Therefore, you wouldn't suck.

Someone needs to give Dean Koontz a call and ask.

Clio · Dec 8, 2008

miles said:
Very. They are completely different chapters and he's not having a flashback.

Great gods, Miles - I am indebted to both you and this Forum. A few years ago I used to read and quite enjoy the odd Dean Koontz book. Now that I have learned to read like a writer, with my editor's hat on, I am absolutely appalled - not only at the mistakes but the writing itself! I take it this novel is one of his later ones, when his editors forgive him anything?

Gary Clarke · Dec 8, 2008

Not to be fighting Mr Koontz's corner or anything ( like he needs anyone to do that for him!) But do be aware that what you blame on writers may actually be a mistake on behalf of editor, copy/editor, or printers.

Phenomenal amounts of weirdnesses seem to show up out of no-where and from left field at any and all stages of the publishing process.

dclary · Dec 8, 2008

underthecity said:
But I might be wrong. Therefore, you wouldn't suck.

Someone needs to give Dean Koontz a call and ask.

The two aren't mutually exclusive...

You might be wrong AND he might suck...

...

just saying....

Kalyke · Dec 8, 2008

It is still a good reminder to really read your stuff before submitting it.

miles · Dec 8, 2008

dclary said:
The two aren't mutually exclusive...

You might be wrong AND he might suck...

dclary: such an encouraging guy

thethinker42 · Dec 8, 2008

Without reading what other people posted, my two favorites:

Killconey, The Amazing Sex-Changing Ferret in "Redwall", by Brian Jacques. Female in one chapter, male in another, then female again.

Deaf-mute Nick Andros hears in "The Stand" by Stephen King (in an early chapter after he's been beaten by a gang, he hears gravel crunching when a car pulls up).

ChaosTitan · Dec 8, 2008

Gary Clarke said:
Phenomenal amounts of weirdnesses seem to show up out of no-where and from left field at any and all stages of the publishing process.

Which is why, when I get my galleys, they'll be read and examined word for word, line by line.

Incidentally, I was editing a manuscript last night came across this one: graffiti adored the wall. :tongue

dclary · Dec 8, 2008

miles said:
dclary: such an encouraging guy

Always willing to help!

CheshireCat · Dec 8, 2008

Phenomenal amounts of weirdnesses seem to show up out of no-where and from left field at any and all stages of the publishing process.

QFT.

Grrarrgh · Dec 8, 2008

thethinker42 said:
Deaf-mute Nick Andros hears in "The Stand" by Stephen King (in an early chapter after he's been beaten by a gang, he hears gravel crunching when a car pulls up).

Do you know where that is? I just went back and re-read that entire scene and I don't see anything about that. I see where he said that something about the sound of screeching brakes filling the air, but not about Nick specifically hearing it. Then in the next paragraph, Nick is struck in the face by some pebbles and is looking at a car that stopped less than a foot from his face and notices the rocks between the treads of the tire, but there's nothing about him hearing gravel crunching anywhere.

Sorry - it's just that inconsistencies like that always jump out and annoy me and I just re-read this a month or so ago, so I would have thought that
I'd have noticed it if something like that happened.

thethinker42 · Dec 8, 2008

Grrarrgh said:
Do you know where that is? I just went back and re-read that entire scene and I don't see anything about that. I see where he said that something about the sound of screeching brakes filling the air, but not about Nick specifically hearing it. Then in the next paragraph, Nick is struck in the face by some pebbles and is looking at a car that stopped less than a foot from his face and notices the rocks between the treads of the tire, but there's nothing about him hearing gravel crunching anywhere.

Sorry - it's just that inconsistencies like that always jump out and annoy me and I just re-read this a month or so ago, so I would have thought that
I'd have noticed it if something like that happened.

It may be in an older edition. I don't have my copy with me (it's in storage in the States), but I remember after someone pointed it out to me that I went back and found it.

swvaughn · Dec 8, 2008

Once there was a book. It was published only in the loosest sense (through a pay-to-play POD outfit), but I was reading it for reasons I won't go into, and one line will stay with me forever:

He glanced in the mirror with, a toss of his hair-filled head.*

Another character in the book managed to somehow "slip deeper into his comma."

Of course, these errors aren't really fair . . . but they're funny.

*Comma misplacement is deliberate, since it appeared that way in the book.

selkn.asrai · Dec 8, 2008

The dread Twilight says that vampires don't sleep, breathe, or eat (anything but blood) but Glittering Edward the Perfect Vampire has breath, and it smells like flowers. We'll ignore the fact that you can't have a voice (a whisper, mayhaps, but no voice) without air passing through your larynx, and that if he drinks blood only, his technically-impossible breath probably smells like iron...

One of the book's myriad inconsistencies. Where is her editor? For that matter, where is her talent?

^ I obviously dislike Twilight.

KikiteNeko · Dec 8, 2008

I think Dean Koontz is just such a moneymaker that they bypass any editing at this point.

Anyway, I'm not sure if this is the author's mistake or an editor's mistake, but I found a typo on page one of Margaret Atwood's Surfacing. At the bottom of the page, it says "my bother" but it should say "my brother."

Funny mistakes authors make

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Fear the Death Ray

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Unabashed Mercenary

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Finestkind

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Finestkind

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Rawr.

.