Davis Proofreading

Since I have started down this road of proofreading, I’m constantly looking for mistakes in books. Most of the time it’s not on purpose. I like that my brain is subconsciously looking for errors, even if it does ruin the reading experience for me now.

This got me thinking about the journey of a book from writer-to-reader. Everyone likes to say things a certain way, even if it doesn’t make sense to others. There were many times when I would explain something and people wouldn’t understand. I would backtrack and try explaining a different way and it would usually clear things up. But with writing, that’s not as easy. The writer needs to trust that the reader will get the meaning or at least be able to figure out a little bit of the context. Here are a few things I think would be helpful.

Be careful on cultural terms if you are an author writing about a culture you aren’t native to.

Example. I was recently reading a book that was based in the South and was written very Southern. There were plenty of terms in there that I wasn’t sure about but muddled my way through, no problem. Then I came to a sentence that I had to reread ten times and still didn’t understand. I decided it was just a mistake the author or an editor missed and thought, “Man if only they had a proofreader like me.” I wanted to use the sentence as an example for why someone should use a proofreader so I went back through, found the sentence, and started trying to prove my point. My gut kicked in and said, “Hey you should Google this real quick” and what I thought was a mistake, turned into another Southern term I had no idea about.

Even though it was a term that exists, I still think the author used it wrong. The sentence was supposed to be read as “I was surprised he wasn’t out-and-out tapping his foot.” Out-and-out is the southern term meaning, “Absolute” or “Complete” in a negative way. So it should be read, “I was surprised he wasn’t completely tapping his foot.” And even after that switch I still don’t feel like it fits well. It would have been fine to say “tapping his foot” without the out-and-out.

I don’t think it’s a problem if there are terms that readers don’t know but I do think it’s the author’s job (or at least the editor’s job) to make sure that the definitions of those terms fit what they are trying to convey. If the author is from England and has a character that is English they will know exactly what their terms mean but if they are going to put an Australian character in they may want to make sure they have a nice understanding of the language. Also, don’t go overboard on slang words. Not every slang word has to be used.

Another thing I feel needs to be said is to stay consistent with the language you use. I read a second book in a series and the author decided to update her vocabulary and was using a word that she hadn’t in the first book. It was an older word and didn’t add to her world. But she used it so much that every time I saw it I had to stop and remind myself what the word meant. She did add new POVs but the word wasn’t to just them it was throughout the whole book. If she had kept the word to one of the new POVs I felt like it would have added to who the character was. Be kind to your readers. Wait until your new series (or new characters only) to throw in new words.

These are all just opinions of mine that I have collected now that I’m in the mindset of finding those mistakes. I will never claim to be an expert but I would like to be a helpful advisor.

I hope this helps as you work on your writing!