Version Control, or, What Do I Do Now?
So despite reading and re-reading my book, a professional edit, and a re-read after formatting, I’m still finding spelling errors or grammatical mistakes. These are not “onesy-twosey” things either. There are four errors in the first quarter of the book alone.
I am dismayed. It’s not like I didn’t check for these things until my eyes bled. There was blood. And there are still the mistakes. I wonder how I managed to ever string together a coherent sentence. At what point did I stop seeing these mistakes? I’d like to know so I don’t waste time and energy on the next book, since there seems to be a point where I don’t see what’s before me.
This brings me to the question of what to do. In the world of paper publishing, you are stuck. However,I have a chance to fix things. It’s simple enough to make the fixes, reformat, and upload again. But what if there are more errors to catch later on? When does this end, or does this end?
Since I’ve had some sales (whooooo hooooo!) those people will have a different version than what is currently uploaded. So there will be potentially multiple versions. Is that fair, even if if the difference is just corrections?
Part of me says I should just focus on moving ahead. I’m working on the next book, and I’d like to put my energy there rather than on what has gone before. But I’m just not sure. I hadn’t anticipated finding so many more mistakes, given how careful I thought I was being.
Does anyone have any thoughts on this?
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Thanks Tasha! I needed someone to talk me down. I suppose it's not all that bad. But the perfectionist in me goes bonkers when I find stuff like this. I think it's like you say: you know what the words are supposed to be and your mind just compensates.
Sounds like you need a beer...Rock Bottom is just around the corner. Let me know and I will meet you there.
This may be a necessary part of the writing process. Good advice, Rob!
You said you had a professional edit and you read and re-read, did you have a third person read it carefully? You know what the words are supposed to say so it is what your mind is going to try to see. For this same reason a lot of readers aren't going to see the mistakes either. If there are a whole bunch together I notice and spend the rest of the book trying to find more; I hate that. But like I said that didn't happen with yours. I don't usually read each individual word though, I read in word clumps, and probably only notice an error if it's at the beginning or end of the clump.
If it is really bothering you than fix it otherwise let it go.