General Mistakes in Novels

Lolly · Aug 19, 2006

There's a thread here about changing POV's in a novel, and whether it's a mistake. Have y'all ever caught any other mistakes in a book?

For instance, I was reading a novel set in Russia at the turn of the century. The main character attended a party where he met the famous composer Tchaikovsky. The only problem was, Tchaikovsky had in real life died a few years before the party was set. Doh! :Headbang:

I know everybody makes mistakes, but I must confess that that kind of thing irritates me. I mean, would it have been too hard to look in an encyclopedia to see when Tchaikovsky lived?

maestrowork · Aug 19, 2006

A major tense change (and awful) in one of James Patterson's best-selling novels.

Carlene · Aug 19, 2006

A woman putting bullet into the barrel of her .38! I couldn't stand it and wrote the author and told her, nicely that's not where they go! She wrote back to thank me and said she'd never been around guns and didn't know a thing about them! This from a mystery writer - and so easy to remedy.

Carlene

icerose · Aug 19, 2006

Backstory on each and every character the moment they are introduced, you get to read about their life story. Tom Clancy is horrible at this and it stops me almost every time because it bogs the story down.

Scrawler · Aug 19, 2006

One of my favorite authors gave a female Middle Eastern character a common Middle Eastern men's name. Sure, there's a slim chance you might find a woman named "Joseph" or "William" (or its foreign equivalent) but I think if she had checked, she would have chosen a more suitable name.

Gary · Aug 19, 2006

The book I'm reading now has a murder committed with a 20 ga. shotgun shell placed in a 12 ga. shotgun. She also calls it a rifle....many times!

novelator · Aug 20, 2006

After reading this, I have to wonder how some "writers" managed to get published at all.

Makes a great case for doing your research though.

Mari

gp101 · Aug 20, 2006

icerose said:
Backstory on each and every character the moment they are introduced, you get to read about their life story.

Oooh... I hate this one. Really does get annoying fast. Especailly when even the throw-away characters (a vendor at a sausage stand where the MC grabs a bite to eat before continuing her quest) gets a full description or partial life history. Who cares.

Ken Schneider · Aug 20, 2006

This topic should make us all realize that we can, and do make mistakes as writers that editors miss, and the books are still published.

It gives me more confidence in my work to see those mistakes.

Also, some of the items mentioned above are silly things that one shouldn't take for granted if you know in your own mind that you don't really know the answer.

"I've never owned a gun, so I wouldn't know about that." ????

So I'll assume that no one else knows either?

Proving to us all the the reader,(Carlene) is much more aware of what we are writing about than we give h/them credit for.

There is a lesson to be learned with that statement, and shows the laziness of the writer.

I don't like it when any writer used a certain tag line numerous times in a chapter, and never uses it again, but switches to another favorite tag line in each proceeding chapter.

Boo for tag lines other than H/S/ anyway, if any at all.

blacbird · Aug 20, 2006

In Tony Hillerman's The Sinister Pig, the name of Vietnamese communist rebel leader Ho Chi Minh (for whom Saigon was renamed Ho Chi Minh City, which appears on any modern map of the country) was consistently misspelled as Ho Che Min. At least Hillerman and his editor were consistent.

This book also suffers from other lapses, including one egregious error in dialogue attribution in the middle of the book that had me re-reading a page repeatedly to try to figure out what was going on.

But God help you if you have a typo on the first page or two of your submitted manuscript.

caw.

Jamesaritchie · Aug 20, 2006

blacbird said:
In Tony Hillerman's The Sinister Pig, the name of Vietnamese communist rebel leader Ho Chi Minh (for whom Saigon was renamed Ho Chi Minh City, which appears on any modern map of the country) was consistently misspelled as Ho Che Min. At least Hillerman and his editor were consistent.

This book also suffers from other lapses, including one egregious error in dialogue attribution in the middle of the book that had me re-reading a page repeatedly to try to figure out what was going on.

But God help you if you have a typo on the first page or two of your submitted manuscript.

caw.

Well, in Hillerman's defense, that really isn't a typo, but a spelling choice based on how the name was often spelled in this country for a good long while, particularly in regional newspapers. Hillerman tends to spell everything based on how it was spelled when he was a reproter, and from the part of the country he was raised in.

He usually spells "cigarette" as "cigaret," for example. This isn't wrong, and isn't a typo, it's a legitimate, alternative spelling based on where he was raised.

It's fine to question such spellings, but they aren't typos, and he does have a reason for his alternative spellings.

I'm not sure I'd make the same choices, but I do think his "incorrect" spelling of some words does add a regionalism, a time and place element, he wouldn't achieve if he always used the "correct" spelling for every word.

Mayor of Moronia · Aug 20, 2006

I wish I had a nickle for every spelling change of Peking, China since I was a kid.

Anonymisty · Aug 20, 2006

Lolly said:
Have y'all ever caught any other mistakes in a book?

I don't know if this is a mistake or merely an out-of-fashion turn of phrase, but it annoys the bedoodles out of me when an author writes,
"Little did she know what would happen next."

Unless you're writing about someone with precognitive powers, of course she doesn't know what's happening next! Yet it happens all too often. More often in YA novels, but I see it sometimes in adult novels. And I'd really prefer not to see it at all.

L.Jones · Aug 20, 2006

novelator said:
After reading this, I have to wonder how some "writers" managed to get published at all.

That certainly seems to overstate the issue. Research is good - a case can be made you shouldn't be writing about something like guns without finding out about the way they work, etc - but does any of this call for questioning how someone ever got published?
For the most part what's been mentioned here are slip ups and style choices. Stuff happens. Often small mistakes pop up in editing, spelling changes, or an editor puts a hand in and the writer either doesn't have the chance to change it or doesn't find it or agrees with the change on page 200 not realizing they've created a continuity issue back on page 98. A lot of mistakes happen in production and have nothing to do with "writers" research or ability. I am often surprised on a final read the things I never wrote that show up or did write and got by the editors that needed to be fixed.

Many steps go into making a book better, hopefully the Best it can be, there is nothing that can make it perfect. And if it were perfect for one person someone else would find something to bellyache about.

annie jones

Jamesaritchie · Aug 20, 2006

Anonymisty said:
I don't know if this is a mistake or merely an out-of-fashion turn of phrase, but it annoys the bedoodles out of me when an author writes,
"Little did she know what would happen next."

Unless you're writing about someone with precognitive powers, of course she doesn't know what's happening next! Yet it happens all too often. More often in YA novels, but I see it sometimes in adult novels. And I'd really prefer not to see it at all.

Depending on how it's written into the story, this can either be author intrusion, or omniscient POV, both of which were once a great deal more common than they are now.

Jamesaritchie · Aug 20, 2006

L.Jones said:
That certainly seems to overstate the issue. Research is good - a case can be made you shouldn't be writing about something like guns without finding out about the way they work, etc - but does any of this call for questioning how someone ever got published?

annie jones

I'd say it definitely calls into question how such a writer gets published. This is not a small mistake, and it's one any writer should have caught. It is, at best, pure laziness, and takes away any and all credibility the writer has.

It's also a case for firing a copy editor, but that's another story.

We all make mistakes now and then, but if you say Washington D.C. is in California, you have no right to be published. And when you won't take ten minutes to get the most basic facts about weapons correct, then either don't write about them, or pray you find a publisher, and some readers, who are just as ignorant on the subject as you are.

It's none of my business whether such a writer gets published, but it sure means I wouldn't read her, and I'd warn everyone possible away from her books.

Zolah · Aug 20, 2006

Small mistakes can slip past even the most careful author, editor and copy-editor. I did bags and bags of research on my first ms, making sure that I knew everything I needed to know about, for instance, medieval animal husbandry, how woodframe houses were put together, how traditional herbalists used plants for medicines, etc. Those were areas where I knew my knowledge was lacking, so I knew I had to be careful and watch what I wrote.

But somehow I managed to misspell the word 'callus' (as in an area of thickened or roughened skin) every single time I used it. I thought it was spelled 'callous'. My editor and copy editor both throught it was spelled that way too. It only got picked up at the very last stage just before it went to be typset, by a random (very observant) person glancing at the first page and going 'Hey, I don't think that's spelled like that'. And I just KNOW that if it had gone to press without being noticed, someone (perhaps many someones) would have thrown the book across the room in utter rage that such a ridiculous error riddled the story.

Scrawler · Aug 20, 2006

I agree with Jamesaritchie.
I'm not writing something that requires extremely detailed research, but I won't write "I drove down the Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica " because it's a pedestrians-only section and if my novel is set in Santa Monica, I should know that.
I have since changed the part where my MC watches the car leave the parking lot of a restaurant that doesn't have a parking lot. Is that too small a detail to worry about?

Jamesaritchie · Aug 20, 2006

Zolah said:
Small mistakes can slip past even the most careful author, editor and copy-editor. I did bags and bags of research on my first ms, making sure that I knew everything I needed to know about, for instance, medieval animal husbandry, how woodframe houses were put together, how traditional herbalists used plants for medicines, etc. Those were areas where I knew my knowledge was lacking, so I knew I had to be careful and watch what I wrote.

But somehow I managed to misspell the word 'callus' (as in an area of thickened or roughened skin) every single time I used it. I thought it was spelled 'callous'. My editor and copy editor both throught it was spelled that way too. It only got picked up at the very last stage just before it went to be typset, by a random (very observant) person glancing at the first page and going 'Hey, I don't think that's spelled like that'. And I just KNOW that if it had gone to press without being noticed, someone (perhaps many someones) would have thrown the book across the room in utter rage that such a ridiculous error riddled the story.

This seems like something spellcheck would catch, or that you would certainly check a dictionary about.

Bleak House Books · Aug 20, 2006

Jamesaritchie said:
This seems like something spellcheck would catch, or that you would certainly check a dictionary about.

Spellcheck wouldn't catch it because both are words.

From Dictionary.com--

Usage Note: Do not confuse the adjective callous, as in Years of dealing with criminals had left her callous, with the noun callus, as in I have a callus on my thumb. Also, do not confuse the verb callous, which means “to make or become callous,” with the verb callus “to form or develop hardened tissue.”

alleycat · Aug 20, 2006

Gary said:
The book I'm reading now has a murder committed with a 20 ga. shotgun shell placed in a 12 ga. shotgun. She also calls it a rifle....many times!

What book is that? I'd like to see it.

Ken Schneider · Aug 20, 2006

Scrawler said:
I have since changed the part where my MC watches the car leave the parking lot of a restaurant that doesn't have a parking lot. Is that too small a detail to worry about?

Yes. It is not widely known that this certain eatry doesn't have a parking lot, and who really cares about that.

Maybe I've been there sometime in the past and they've added a parking lot.

It's not as glaring like a bullet being dropped down the barrel of an m-16 or something.

Gary · Aug 20, 2006

alleycat said:
What book is that? I'd like to see it.

A Faint Cold Fear, by Karin Slaughter.

Jamesaritchie · Aug 20, 2006

Bleak House Books said:
Spellcheck wouldn't catch it because both are words.

From Dictionary.com--

Usage Note: Do not confuse the adjective callous, as in Years of dealing with criminals had left her callous, with the noun callus, as in I have a callus on my thumb. Also, do not confuse the verb callous, which means “to make or become callous,” with the verb callus “to form or develop hardened tissue.”

Good point. Another reason not to trust spellcheck.

This is a more complicated issue than most words. A "callus" produces "calloused" skin. And, as a noun, many seem to think either "callus" or "callous" can be used. Even the OED merely lists one as a variant spelling of the other.

I think "callus" is only wrong if you use it as an adjective or a verb, and it seems to be perfectly fine with most to write "I have a callous on my thumb."

ibid. · Aug 20, 2006

Bleak House Books said:
Usage Note: Do not confuse the adjective callous, as in Years of dealing with criminals had left her callous, with the noun callus, as in I have a callus on my thumb. Also, do not confuse the verb callous, which means “to make or become callous,” with the verb callus “to form or develop hardened tissue.”

I always thought they were one and the same. Like say to be blistered by somebody's attitude, and to be blistered by a hot iron. Wonder what the real difference between callous and callus is -- same root? or not?

Anyhow, seems this topic is focusing on the microscopic level of novels -- probably because it is much much easier to pin point where an author has 'been wrong' rather than 'gone wrong' -- which is probably the difference between a doctor pin pointing a particular, say, aching back, and applying their knowhow to fixing that -- or, on the otherhand, that same doctor trying to recreate the posture, movement, and psychology that has lead to the ache.

What makes a book bad? Spelling? Facts? Things of that nature we can agree are 'wrong' because we have a common standard to evalute with. But a novel, by deffinition, is a work of art that approaches some sort of independent 'thing-in-itself' -- and how we judge that 'thing' 'in itself' speaks much about where we're coming from, what we want, and all that other subjective crap.

What generally peeves me in a novel is when it is good enough to keep me reading, but sort of hovers on this side of 'going there', really following through on all that dramatis and idea that has got me involved.

And I'm not speaking simply of plot. But of that world, that 'itself' that the book promises to be, become, or take me.

General Mistakes in Novels

Lolly

maestrowork

Fear the Death Ray

Carlene

New kid, be gentle!

icerose

Lost in School Work

Scrawler

Bored fanatic

Gary

novelator

gp101

Ken Schneider

Absolute sagebrush

blacbird

Jamesaritchie

Mayor of Moronia

Anonymisty

L.Jones

Jamesaritchie

Jamesaritchie

Zolah

Over the hills and far away

Scrawler

Bored fanatic

Jamesaritchie

Bleak House Books

alleycat

Still around

Ken Schneider

Absolute sagebrush

Gary

Jamesaritchie

ibid.