Some books are so poorly edited these days.

raccoon

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Mon Nov-30-09 10:10 AM
Original message

Some books are so poorly edited these days.

For instance, I was in the middle of CAT STRIKING BACK by Shirley Rousseau Murphy, and I probably won’t finish it because there are so many run-on sentences it drives me crazy.

And the Jake Tiptree mystery series by Sarah Graves--it drives me nuts the way she makes up all these "ly" words. For example, "crimsonly."

Once I read an intro to a SF anthology, where the writer actually used the word, "lovelily." I kid you not.

Aargh!!!!! Everybody and their mother thinks they can write, and published books aren't edited any better than this???

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OneGrassRoot

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Mon Nov-30-09 10:18 AM
Response to Original message

1. LOL....no, most often they're not.

IMHO, the publishing industry started to implode in the mid-90s and has largely disintegrated since then. The quality of books published with traditional publishers versus well-written, self-published books is hard to distinguish as far as the writing; the only difference is the money behind the marketing of the book. There used to be several layers of editors working on a book, which greatly improved the quality of output. Nowadays, it seems paying a good proofreader, let alone an editor, is often not part of the budget, even with traditional publishing houses.

It's really a shame.

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SPedigrees

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Mon Nov-30-09 10:22 AM
Response to Original message

2. We are rapidly becoming a nation of illiterates. nt

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Jackpine Radical

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Mon Nov-30-09 10:27 AM
Response to Reply #2

3. I disputitate that averrance.

You must got no couthitude to even cogitize like this; it's all some kinda pubic mastication.

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NV Whino

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Mon Nov-30-09 11:43 AM
Response to Original message

4. I find myself marking up books

and correcting grammar. I'm not the only one either. Many of the books I read have already been marked up by someone who was offended by lack of proper grammar.

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raccoon

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Mon Nov-30-09 12:10 PM
Response to Reply #4

5. That's a good idea.

Maybe I'll do that, and hopefully the library won't catch me. :silly:

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NV Whino

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Mon Nov-30-09 09:03 PM
Response to Reply #5

7. My reasoning is

the editing is so terrible (or nonexistent) that I figure I'm actually improving the book.

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tigereye

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Mon Nov-30-09 03:19 PM
Response to Reply #4

6. I do that too, but only with books that I own.

The spelling is horrible.

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RebelOne

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Tue Dec-01-09 08:22 AM
Response to Original message

8. I am a copy editor for 28 outdoors magazines.

I work with six editors. You would be surprised at some of the errors that they do not catch.

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hedgehog

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Tue Dec-01-09 12:39 PM
Response to Original message

9. I've come across books with everything from clear mispellings that got past spell check

(their they're there) to actual errors in continuity. For example, I might find a paragraph repeated word for word because the author moved it and forgot to delete it from the original position.

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raccoon

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Wed Dec-02-09 09:02 AM
Response to Original message

10. Let's at least let the publishers/authors know about this.

Yesterday I sent an email to an author of a series of poorly edited books.

May not help, but at least I can try.

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