Proofreading Gotchas

[Naughtylit81]

Went through my story that published today and realized I am missing a noun in a sentence. A minor character is wearing a skin tight black something. I missed the word pants.

More aggrevating I had three editors go over the story. We all missed it. Ultimately my fault and responsibility. Still, four of us missed the fact Melissa is wearing an unknown skin tight black something.

Yesh. I am half tempted, since the story is less than a day old to pull it down and fix it.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Went through my story that published today and realized I am missing a noun in a sentence. A minor character is wearing a skin tight black something. I missed the word pants.

More aggrevating I had three editors go over the story. We all missed it. Ultimately my fault and responsibility. Still, four of us missed the fact Melissa is wearing an unknown skin tight black something.

Yesh. I am half tempted, since the story is less than a day old to pull it down and fix it.

I doubt anyone will notice or say anything, I wouldn't bother.

It'll take two or three weeks. You need to find better editors

 

[AG31]

Went through my story that published today and realized I am missing a noun in a sentence. A minor character is wearing a skin tight black something. I missed the word pants.

More aggrevating I had three editors go over the story. We all missed it. Ultimately my fault and responsibility. Still, four of us missed the fact Melissa is wearing an unknown skin tight black something.

Yesh. I am half tempted, since the story is less than a day old to pull it down and fix it.

I bet a big proportion of your readers will also miss it.

 

[Katie_Mae]

Went through my story that published today and realized I am missing a noun in a sentence. A minor character is wearing a skin tight black something. I missed the word pants.

More aggrevating I had three editors go over the story. We all missed it. Ultimately my fault and responsibility. Still, four of us missed the fact Melissa is wearing an unknown skin tight black something.

Yesh. I am half tempted, since the story is less than a day old to pull it down and fix it.

I missed the whole first paragraph in one of my stories. Copy and paste error. I'm not sure which is more shameful, the fact that I made the mistake and didn't notice during the preview, or the fact that the story works fine without it and nobody has gone "hey, is there a paragraph missing here?"

I haven't bothered to fix it.

 

[shelleycat1]

I have just put up a mistake in the title. And I had the title written so I could cut and paste and obviously did not.
A Cloned Wife became a Coned Wife.

 

[Duleigh]

Last night I had a forehead-slap moment re-reading a story submitted earlier yesterday - a seemingly minor bit of dialog began with "I'll" when it should have been "It'll". Oops. Fortunately the story hadn't made it through the approval queue yet, so the quick repair was made and I took my lumps, reluctantly shuffling to the back of the line in the resubmitting.

"I'll" vs. "It'll" is something I've tripped over before. It's usually at the beginning of a line, both are spelled correctly, they're tall, skinny characters so the words themselves don't draw your eye, and in a new line of dialog they're slightly camouflaged by the leading quote plus the apostrophe. All this conspires to make them words your eyes skip over and your brain "fixes" them for you on the 15th or 16th proofread.

Anybody else have a vexing bit of typographical error like that that kicks you in the butt more often than you'd like?

Yes, tons of them. Words that LOOK right but are missing one crucial letter, but after a day of banging on the keyboard, I'll miss that word again and again. I'll and It'll is one which drove me to the brink too many time so I stopped using It'll unless I'm quoting the Critical Drinker. Regardless of how 'done' I think a story is, I give it one final audio read through and that's where I catch these look-alikes. The Read Aloud function in word (and MS Edge) has been saving my bacon time and time again recently, making me look much better than I really am.

 

[StillStunned]

The Read Aloud function in word (and MS Edge) has been saving my bacon time and time again recently, making me look much better than I really am.

No, using Real Aloud means you understand the tools of the trade. It's what professionals use. (For work, I put my original and edited texts side by side, and use Read Aloud with Synchronised Scrolling.)

 

[Duleigh]

Just found one - hit should have been hid... a bad mistake to make in a paragraph talking about a 4 year old child.

 

[Naughtylit81]

I have just put up a mistake in the title. And I had the title written so I could cut and paste and obviously did not.
A Cloned Wife became a Coned Wife.

So is she from Remulak and consuming mass quantities?

 

[designatedvictim]

My personal Frequent Flier Typo is breasts/beasts.

I've lost count of all the times I'd run into something like 'reached up to knead her beasts...' on the third or four re-read.

I suppose they might be beasts, or, perhaps, beastly, but if so, I doubt I'd be voluntarily reaching out for them. Not writing in SciFi or Non-Human, though.

Part of this one I lay at the feet of my old keyboard which I finally got replaced under warranty due to a block of keys zero- or double-striking.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

 

[alohadave]

My personal Frequent Flier Typo is breasts/beasts.

I've lost count of all the times I'd run into something like 'reached up to knead her beasts...' on the third or four re-read.

I suppose they might be beasts, or, perhaps, beastly, but if so, I doubt I'd be voluntarily reaching out for them. Not writing in SciFi or Non-Human, though.

Part of this one I lay at the feet of my old keyboard which I finally got replaced under warranty due to a block of keys zero- or double-striking.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

It gives sweater puppies a whole new meaning.

 

[StillStunned]

It gives sweater puppies a whole new meaning.

Or tits.