When writing back cover descriptions …
Here is the back cover description for Chaos, by Iris Johansen, a book that’s included with this month’s SFBC mailing:
When CIA agent Alisa Flynn flaunts the rules by breaking into a mansion in the middle of the night, she skillfully circumvents alarms and outwits guards only to find herself standing in billionaire Gabe Korgan’s study . . . busted by Korgan himself. This could cost her her job unless, in a split second, she can turn the tables and try to convince him to join her on the most important mission of her life.
In a ripped-from-the-headlines plot, schoolgirls in Africa have been kidnapped, and Alisa knows that Korgan has the courage, financial means, and high-tech weaponry to help rescue them. With so many innocent lives hanging in the balance, what she doesn’t reveal is that one of those schoolgirls is like a little sister to her. But when the truth gets out, the stakes grow even higher.
Calling in additional assistance from renowned horse whisperer Margaret Douglas, Alisa and Gabe lay their plans, only to see them descend into chaos as the line between right and wrong wavers before them like a mirage. Every path is strewn with pitfalls, each likely to get them — or the hostages — killed. But with the help of a brave team and a horse with the heart of a warrior, they might just get out of this alive.
Quick! Who spotted the problem with the above description?
This is actually the first time I’ve personally seen someone using “flaunt” when they mean “flout.” I’ve heard other people say this is one of the typos in their personal top ten most hated, but I’ve never noticed it and don’t think the words seem that same and kind of wondered whether this error is actually all that common.
Well, I guess maybe it is, if it got into the book’s description on Amazon and in the SFBC mailing and no one caught it.
I think this particular error has to occur for people who don’t subvocalize. The words do not sound very much alike to me, so I suspect those who do subvocalize don’t tend to make this mistake. What do you all think? Is this a typo that gives you trouble, and if so, do you or don’t you silently pronounce words as you read them?
I like the general sound of the story, but typo aside, the description does have a few problems. You can’t convince anybody of anything in “a split second.” Convincing somebody necessarily takes time. It’s not clear why the protagonist reserves the information that one of the children is special to her — what’s the reasoning there? I get why the person who wrote the description wanted to mention the horse — lots of readers like horses — but this “And there’s a horse!” type of mention seems weird to me. One sentence indicating why a horse is a useful in a rescue mission in Africa would have helped a lot.
I think what I actually like is my impression of what this story could be, depending on how the author wrote it. I like the idea of the story I would write if I were matching that description. Having never read anything by this author, it’s difficult to guess whether I’d like the story Johansen wrote. I know this isn’t SFF, but has anybody read anything by her? What did you think?
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