Warning: rant ahead.
There’s a discussion going on in one of my Facebook groups and I’m having a very hard time staying out of it. So lucky you, you get to hear the side that’s going on in my head.
The complaint was a misused word. The sentence they are “Ugh!”ing over included the phrase, “something worst.” The original complainer called it a grammatical error. I pointed out it could have been a typo, and asked if it was one of many. She said it was the only one she’d found, so I said it was understandable: even a spellchecker wouldn’t have picked it up, to which she replied, “True probably self published.” Note the total lack of grammatical issues with her reply. (Sorry, I get sarcastic when I’m pissed off.) What I wanted to say was that even had it been edited and proofread professionally by a traditional publisher’s editing department, they hire humans. And humans are fallible.
Oh, but this isn’t the worst of it all. Someone in the group actually had the gall to say that with cheap, self-published books, you get what you pay for. First let me say that we self-published authors, no matter how much effort we put into a book, have to stay competitive. That means charging less than the big publishers do, because we don’t have the fan base who will buy anything as long as it has our name on it. That means, yes, undervaluing our work much of the time. But even so.
Name one profession other than writing where you can pay the person producing the work under five dollars for five thousand hours of work. Think about it. How long does it take you to read a three hundred page book? Do you think the writer wrote and edited it faster than you read it? Did you pay minimum wage for the number of hours it took you to read it? I don’t care who you’re reading, you’re getting much more than you paid for, and chances are if it’s a self-published author, you’re getting a lot more of their blood, sweat, and tears than you are of an author with a team of editors and marketers behind them.
End rant.
June 19, 2017 at 2:07 pm
I absolutely love your little rant. It’s true. I’m just starting out in all of this, and it is a lot of work. I haven’t even gotten to the self-publishing thing yet. I’m working on my first novel, or at least the first one I intend to publish. Reading your post definitely helped though, because it helps me understand there will always be haters. But it’s important to keep working at it. So good for you! 🙂
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June 19, 2017 at 2:20 pm
Happy I could help, Kristen. We indie authors have to stick together! 😀
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June 19, 2017 at 2:51 pm
Haha, that we do. Especially in a tough industry like this.
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June 4, 2017 at 4:03 pm
I want to self publish and I know the difficulties of doing so, but it isn’t exactly easy when I keep hearing that I need money to pay for cover design, and editing. I understand that but I am really good at catching my own mistakes on paper when I read through my writing. People think I have to hire someone to promote it for me and drive around to bookstores asking for them to stock a few copies of the book. We have options for ebook publishing now. For free where all an author has to do is make a cover and format it properly for smashwords or amazon. I am highly not interested in sharing the rewards for my book with someone else when it was me who slaved and cried over it.
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June 9, 2017 at 5:44 pm
Honestly though? A great cover and an editor–as long as you don’t pay thousands of dollars for one–may just pay for themselves. But it’s true that if you only plan to sell to a few people, like friends and family, you don’t need to spend any money at all. 🙂
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May 1, 2017 at 9:59 am
Thanks for having speaking for all of us who are self-published. It is a hard business and I have to say just like you said that when I read a published book with the resources that they have-I always find atleast one issue in grammar. This article has prompted me to follow you! Happy writing! Leigh
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June 9, 2017 at 5:48 pm
Thanks very much, Leigh. 🙂 It’s true, there will always be errors in books as long as humans are writing them and proofreading them.
Happy writing to you too!
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April 12, 2017 at 1:30 am
I don’t know a word that properly describes how exuberant this made me feel. Maybe that’s the word. Amazing rant.
“Name one profession other than writing where you can pay the person producing the work under five dollars for five thousand hours of work.”
I don’t think anybody has ever hit a nail as squarely on the head as that sentence. That’s perfection. Thank you for this! I’m going to be sharing the crap out of this…
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April 12, 2017 at 1:48 am
Almost forgot to add, Stephen King is notorious for grammatical errors. Under The Dome had a billion. He’s got all the money in the world (besides Rowling) so you’d think his stuff would be ultra edited to the max. I don’t think they bother editing him at all.
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April 12, 2017 at 11:37 pm
Thanks very much, Matt. 🙂 Glad you enjoyed it.
And funny you mention Stephen King – I just found a misplaced semi-colon in one of his short stories, the other day. 🙂
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April 13, 2017 at 8:38 am
Only one? 😛
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April 13, 2017 at 9:35 am
Trying to read for pleasure and not edit as I go–that’s my day job. 😛 😉
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April 13, 2017 at 7:33 pm
Oh yeah, good luck with that. I can never do that, and it’s my ruination.
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April 13, 2017 at 9:41 am
By the way, are you aware that clicking on your name doesn’t take you to your site? Did you recently revert back to a free account? You might want to fix the link. 🙂
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April 13, 2017 at 7:36 pm
Yeah, I tried to fix it, but I’m not sure how to. The site that was hooked to my account was a “news” site that I wrote for. It went under before I could disassociate my account with the site and now it’s an issue…
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April 13, 2017 at 7:37 pm
Ah, now it’s sending me there. That I can fix. Thanks for telling me!
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April 11, 2017 at 11:45 pm
Here, here, I’m praising and sharing your rant! 🙂
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April 12, 2017 at 11:35 pm
Thanks very much, Debby! 😀
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April 13, 2017 at 9:32 am
🙂 🙂
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April 11, 2017 at 1:02 pm
https://fortheinvisible.wordpress.com/2017/01/25/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-priest/
This link shows a little bit of the hard work one young author has done for her book.
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April 11, 2017 at 1:00 pm
There is a very young nurse who likes to write about special topics in religion. She posted one blog article recently that tells a story of how she has created a book about A Day in the Life of a Priest. At present she has had some trouble deciding whether to self publish or go with an established publisher. What do you think? https://fortheinvisible.wordpress.com/2017/01/25/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-priest/
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April 11, 2017 at 10:33 pm
I’ll have to go give it a read when I have a chance. It does sound like an interesting project.
The decision whether to pursue traditional publishing or go with self-publishing is a tough one for many of us these days. Most of the time we find there’s no choice. Thanks for the links, Beth. 🙂
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April 11, 2017 at 12:50 pm
Trying to catch up on posts here. Proofreaders are human. Humans make mistakes. One of my groups recently noted a book was a whole page missing! The author was aware and tried her best to rectify the situation. Human error. Facebook can turn into a nasty place at times when people start to rant about things that, actually, are low down in the order of things. Yes a typo is annoying. But when people start coming out with lines like “there’s nothing worse than….” they should stop and think. There are so many worse things happening in the world today. I’m glad you skipped genocide too. (If I’ve made any typos or grammatical errors please feel free NOT to point them out to me lol.)
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April 11, 2017 at 10:36 pm
Yes, there are far worse things than the occasional typo. If machines existed that could accurately proofread, there would likely be machines that could write books. Where would be the fun in that?
And don’t worry about typos with me, Wendy. I never mentioned them unless asked before I became an editor – I’m even less likely to bring my day job to my pleasure reading now. 😉 Haha. 😀
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April 11, 2017 at 3:39 am
Yeah, fcku her and her sthtiy attitude to typos.
(If a snarky comment is worth posting once on the wrong post, it’s worth posting again on the right one)
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April 11, 2017 at 10:39 pm
Haha! Indeed it is.:D
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April 11, 2017 at 2:13 am
Shared to FB. The advent of the digital, on demand, publishing era has flipped the conventional catch 22. It used to be that getting published was Sisyphus’ Hill to most writers but the marketing was pretty much a given. Now anyone can be published and succeeding at marketing is the crap shoot. I guess that when it comes to catches, “22” backwards is still “22.”
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April 11, 2017 at 10:41 pm
Haha! It is. Excellent observation, Rick. And yeah, even traditional publishers expect authors to help with marketing these days. Ain’t no such thing as a free ride. 😛 😉
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April 13, 2017 at 2:20 am
Yep, the lottery is a better investment but if I won I’d probably just spend it all on marketing the books.
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April 10, 2017 at 8:20 pm
Reblogged this on Books, Books, and more Books and commented:
This is very true!
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April 12, 2017 at 11:25 pm
Thanks for the reblog, Jane. 🙂
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April 10, 2017 at 3:31 pm
Well said Linda!
Some people are so up themselves!!! I don’t get why they want to put self-published authors down anyway!
We are all human, not bloody robots!
It made me laugh that the person who complained about the grammar error, needed to look a little more closely at her own!
😡😡😡
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April 10, 2017 at 11:25 am
“The preacher’s kid or the town cop’s kid has is always held to a higher standard….” – Sigh – so much of this growing ‘topic’ actually makes me hopeful – From my perspective, as more negative reviews come through, as more people choose to moan and groan over the ‘self-published’ world, here and there….just means more folks are choosing to read self-published works – 🙂
The book club I de-camped from 3 years ago, for their refusal to even ‘think’ about reading a self-published work, is now scrambling to find enough library copies of self-published works, so they can order in for their next monthly meet –
Sooooo… self publised authors, after you be nice to the nasty commentator, go forth & always remember to donate one or more copies to your local library.
Many libraries are starting to offer Self-e digital publishing services, here’s link to Library Self-e program: http://self-e.libraryjournal.com/ –
You could also, make friends with your local librarian/book club programmer – I recently watched a local, self-published author, scramble to find extra books to sell, when he was a guest author at a book club meet – so if you go, take plenty of copies to sell, with you…… 🙂
Librarians and book club folks are some of your best, very best, fan bases to launch from – 🙂 Because they’ll hotly defend you and your work, (which means you don’t have to….) when a typo slips through – Why? Cuz you were just so durn funny, witty, interesting, personable when you sat at their book club meeting and joined in the discussion… 🙂
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April 12, 2017 at 11:29 pm
I do indeed have every intention to try to get my book in as many libraries as possible. I believe it’s taken more seriously all the time, in some circles. 🙂 Thanks for sharing your experience, my dear. 🙂
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April 10, 2017 at 9:27 am
I just finished going through a book for a friend, she does the same for me when it’s my turn. Good intentions aside, things slip through. I kind of roll with it, she gets apoplectic. With herself not me, with me she’s very nice but she gets so hard on herself for missing it. Self publishing is tough, time consuming and terrifying at times, we could all be a little kinder to ourselves.
Tell whoever that was you were mad at I said to “Shhhhhhh”.
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April 12, 2017 at 11:31 pm
Haha! Will do. I agree – self-publishing really isn’t as easy as it looks.
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April 10, 2017 at 9:20 am
My replies to silly complaints are always best kept in my head. However, I would have been so tempted to reply to the complaint…”It could have been worst.” Of course, my autocorrect would have changed it to “It could have been wool.” And I wouldn’t have noticed until I went back later to read a slew of rants about wool. 🙂
http://judithabarrett.com/
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April 12, 2017 at 11:33 pm
Hahaha! Yeah, you’ve gotta love autocorrect. Thanks for the laugh, Jaye. 😀
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April 10, 2017 at 8:27 am
I wonder what these people think when cars and appliances get recalled. Typos occur in almost every written thing. My wife finds them in newspapers, magazines, books and, fortunately, my blog. Well, it’s fortunate when I ask her to read them before I hit publish.
When someone shares their thoughts, their experiences and their emotions, we should be grateful. The people who would snark over a couple of typos aren’t worth following.
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April 11, 2017 at 11:21 pm
Yep, I agree. And it’s true – everything is occasionally flawed.
You’re lucky to have such an eagle-eyed wife though, you realize that, right?
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April 12, 2017 at 7:31 am
Oh, I do realize that Linda. Also lucky that she was one of the girls paying attention during grammar lessons.
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April 10, 2017 at 6:55 am
Thanks for taking a stand on this! I would add that self-publishing is more about equality of freedom of expression for those of us who are unable to pay big bucks for editors and publishers. Many unsung awesome writers have missed out being published because of this and many of those published by professional editor/publishers wouldn’t be that awesome without all that ‘expert’ help they received. Amen to self-publishing!
http://www.meinthemiddlewrites.com
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April 11, 2017 at 11:19 pm
It’s opened a lot of doors, that’s for sure. Thanks for your comment, Mary Lou. 🙂
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April 10, 2017 at 3:10 am
Hear hear Linda! You get on that soapbox hun!
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April 11, 2017 at 11:18 pm
Thanks, Ritu! 😀
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April 12, 2017 at 4:16 am
😀
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April 10, 2017 at 2:55 am
powerful, a strong wake up call!!
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April 11, 2017 at 11:17 pm
Thanks, Mihran. 🙂
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April 10, 2017 at 2:53 am
So, so, so true! I know it’s worse in some genres than others, but it shows up across the board. And heavens forbid you use the wrong phrase for the time era or world type you’re writing in.
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April 11, 2017 at 11:17 pm
Ha! Yes, do your research or else. People pick apart stuff like that with such glee!
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April 12, 2017 at 11:20 pm
Ug, yes. And if you’re on a role, hitting a “common” modern phrase and then trying to figure out how to make it era appropriate can really derail the momentum.
As a reader, I can ignore quite a bit of poor grammar/bad punctuation (my worst areas), but what gets me is when the plot has holes big enough to drive a mack truck through. (Sorry romance authors – picking on you) – so many times the “boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy and girl marry for happily ever after just… doesn’t …. fit. If she hates him (or he hates her), why would they ever get back to gether after they split up in the first place? (And, the similar implausible themes that show up in sci-fi and fantasy are just as bad.)
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April 14, 2017 at 1:21 pm
I agree – I feel cheated when I read a forced happy ending. Sometimes the reunited lovers thing works, but other times they’re like trying to stick the same poles of two magnets together. 😛
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April 14, 2017 at 7:21 pm
Odd question time. Do you find the forced endings more, or less, irritating since you started publishing? (I’d ask about grammar, but that’s a whole different bucket of worms.)
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April 14, 2017 at 8:33 pm
Equally irritating or more, it’s hard to say. As far as grammar goes, since you mention it, I find it hard to ignore. Especially since I started editing professionally. I’m currently editing… I mean reading “A Game of Thrones.” 😉
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April 15, 2017 at 2:52 am
::Chuckles:: I think I’m thankful I don’t have an editor’s eyes, though I take my hat of in deepest thanks to those who do (and are willing to tackle… erm… read the stories that others tell.)
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April 10, 2017 at 12:43 am
Hey thank you…your post is an inspiration for me…😊
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April 11, 2017 at 11:12 pm
I’m glad. Thank you for commenting. 🙂
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April 11, 2017 at 11:13 pm
My pleasure 😊
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April 10, 2017 at 12:24 am
Hear hear. I could not agree more. Put a celebrity name on it and anything will sell, and normally it’s an afterthought. Self-publishing takes a lot of courage as you are putting more of yourself out there than mass market work does. But people love to hate
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April 11, 2017 at 11:12 pm
They certainly do, in fact I know people who aren’t happy unless there is something to complain about.
Thanks for commenting, Geraint. 🙂
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April 9, 2017 at 11:32 pm
WordPress, give me a LOVE button stat! Hugs from me, Linds.
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April 11, 2017 at 11:10 pm
Thank so much, Mai. 😀
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April 9, 2017 at 9:53 pm
Right on. There’s a lot of crap out there, and some of it sells well. I’ve seen some horrible stuff Everyone who reads a lot has, right? Every writer makes a cringe-worthy typo here and there.
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April 9, 2017 at 10:04 pm
We do, and we can’t help it. My 67,409-word novel has 297,185 characters in it. (That’s accurate, according to Word.) Chances are at least two of them are in the wrong order. 😛
Thanks for your support, Joey. 🙂
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April 9, 2017 at 9:24 pm
Well said!! The entitlement from some readers is beyond belief. I’ve seen typos even in books published by major houses. It happens. You’d think that paying a smaller price would humble these people but no. They don’t ever consider the time the author has spent on their story. Even with free stories, you get the same entitlement. We are our own worst enemies sometimes!
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April 9, 2017 at 10:00 pm
I do think we are. But what can we do but just keep trying to prove ourselves. Some people will never be happy though. *sigh*
Thanks for your support, my dear. 🙂
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