Pobody's Nerfect!

Dear readers,

I’m writing to you today to ask you to forgive us editors. Despite most people’s assumptions, we are, in fact, only human, and despite being highly trained and experienced in noticing these types of things, we do sometimes miss them.

I’m speaking about typos. Everybody’s done it. You’re enjoying your new book, becoming immersed in the story, and then suddenly! A typo. A spelling mistake. A missing word where one should be.

We understand it’s a pet-hate of many. We also understand that it can turn people off a book. Us too! For many, it’s the reason we get into editing and publishing. We want to make a change, and publish books in the best way possible.

But, despite what many ‘90s rom-coms told us, (because EVERYONE worked in publishing in those!) editors don’t just sit around reading all day. In fact, we have many other tasks to do on a daily basis, and there is very little time for sitting and leisurely reading.

We work on multiple books at once – all at different stages of their manuscript journey, and we have to remember which manuscript is at which stage. We also liaise with authors – either sending the next round of corrections and edits back, or following up when the changes that need to be made are late back. We then have calls with authors to explain all the suggested changes – especially if they’re contentious to the author. And if the author is late in sending back these changes, there is then immense pressure to get the book to the next stage as quickly as possible. So we may work through the night to get the chapters read and checked. And it’s well understood that working non-stop without breaks is not great for your brain working at its maximum capacity.

Editors are generally expected to provide the copy for the blurbs of the books – and okay all the cover art, typesetting and other design. We’re also expected to be speaking to higher-ups in the company to understand and stay ahead of the trends – both in what people are buying and what authors are creating. We must understand and know our company’s list inside and out, and be on top of the ‘next big thing’

“Turning off things like ‘brain skip’, which is when your brain fills in the gaps because it knows what somthing ‘should’ say.”

in our field. Publishing is a business, first and foremost, and so we must prove that every single book we’re working on is a great business fit within the company’s list.

On top of that, editing a book takes a lot more time than simply reading it. There will be multiple rounds of reading and corrections, which are all looking at something different. If it is a developmental edit, you’re looking for big changes to the order of the plot, the chapters or even changes in tone or point of view. If it’s a line edit, then you’re reading every single word to work out if it should be there, and in what order. What a book is like when it is first written and what it is like when it’s published can be two totally different things. When these changes are implemented, it can cause problems – duplicated text, or even leftover words in paragraphs or at the ends of sentences.

Photograph by Pari Singh

Pari is a 17-year-old girl from India, who is very passionate about photography. Besides photography, she also enjoys reading and art. You can check out her photography page on Instagram here.

It’s a huge job to check the book at every stage. And for every edit, we must try to look at the book as if it is the first time we’ve seen it. Turning off things like ‘brain skip’, which is when your brain fills in the gaps because it knows what somthing ‘should’ say, or even spotting things that aren’t the norm – form instead of from, marginalizing instead of marginalising (dependent on the style guide). We’re looking for spelling mistakes and grammar mistakes at every turn, and cannot allow ourselves to be pulled into the narrative, but must read and consider the use of every single word. Doing this takes a lot of brain power – much more than just reading for pleasure. Try it – read every single word and piece of punctuation in this article, and consider what it means, why it’s there and is there a better way to say it still in the author’s voice, all within five minutes? It’s difficult.

We editors are only human. To err is to be human. Sometimes, things slip through our net. Sometimes we notice the mistake in the text, but too late – the book has been sent to press. Sometimes not quite perfect is good enough.

My request to you, dear readers, is when you next spot a mistake in a book you’re reading, don’t get angry, but smile, and know, this is a mark of humanity; of humility; of acceptance. It’s a mark of the human condition. Creating art through words will never be perfect, as language isn’t perfect, and we must accept it as such.

Yours Sincerely, An Editor

By Grace Balfour-Harle