Note: Any typos in this blog were put there by the gremlins.
The second time I discovered there were gremlins in my manuscript I was on a train to Cardiff about to deliver my novel for my masters degree in creative writing from the University of Glamorgan. I had read and reread the manuscript. Three other people had read it.
I thought I had caught every typo, every fault.
The novel was called The Card. It was later published in the US and Germany.
There it was -- a typo. My debate was whether to correct it in pen it or hope the readers wouldn't notice. I liked the system the university used for final evaluation. The novel would be evaluated by my reader, the head of the program, and a professor of writing at another university to stop political games.
The gremlin had to have been responsible.
It did not make feel any better that when I worked for the Polaroid Credit Union, some 300 posters were printed with Polaroid misspelled. The artist, the printer, the printer's proofer, my assistant and my secretary and I had all missed it. There it was in 48 point type. POLAORID
Was it a gremlin that had put it in there after all the proofings?
Never did I dream that the typo gremlin would follow me to Switzerland? To Wales? To France.
Some 17 published books later, the gremlin is still with me.
Neatness counts. When I submit a book to my publisher it needs to be as close to perfect as possible including consistency, spacings, fonts, spellings, etc. However, the gremlin is not happy to let my neatness stay neat. He moves things around.
I was lucky to have a housemate with an eagle eye for errors and a husband who is a professional journalist, also with a bird like talent to swoop in on typos.
All this week, I've been trying to whip my new novel DayCare into shape. Rick has gone over it, but every time I've looked at it, I see something that needs changing. Some are creative, some are spacing or font size and some are typos.
Hopefully by next week I'll have caught the gremlin or at least seriously wounded him so I can get the book to my publisher.
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1 comment:
That pesky gremlin rifles through all our endeavors. I suspect it is the universe reminding us that we are imperfect and that this is one of the most precious things of all. We are not machines. It is hard, I know, to see those tricks the gremlin plays on us, for we can imagine the story we weave and in our vision we see it as we see the sun - a perfect shining star. It helps to realize that there are spots, even on the sun. Brava, mon amie, you have expressed it so well.
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