To be irritated by the number of mistakes in Jeffrey Archer's new book Cometh the Hour

[Bearbehind]

I posted this in 'Books' but I suspect even admitting to reading Jeffery Archer is frowned on there so I deserve all I get.

Do these top authors not have proof readers?

Haven't finished it yet but so far mistakes include (tried not to include spoilers):-

Both Harry and Sebastian going to deliver their readings at a funeral at the end of the same hymn; 'Abide With Me'

The hospital chairman being called Nick Caldercroft at one point then Nick Croft later on.

Giles proposing a new chairman then the company secretary asking if anyone else would second 'Mr Clifton's' proposal.

Sebastian booking and taking a taxi to the Mayflower hotel but checking into the Willard.

Virginia's monthly payment being $10,000 then $7,500.

It's hugely frustrating. That and the fact the plot is very thin, some of the sub stories are completely unrealistic and Sebastian's daughters language/ actions are totally unbelievable for a 10 year old.

Rant over.

YABU for reading Jeffrey Archer

I thought that might the the case *salmotrutta^

To be fair the Virginia one isn't a mistake, I've realised why the amounts differ but the rest just seem to be careless.

That would really annoy me! I've not read Jeffrey Archer for years and not sure I would want to now. Is there an email address you could write to, to let them know?

Along the same vein I bought "The curious adventures of Matisse the Cat" by Amanda Walsh for my dd which is riddled with typos. Not plot ones, but punctuation marks. Missing or extra apostrophes littered all the way through. Awful in a children's book.

There, rant over. I feel better now! Oh and YANBU!

I've not read it either, £7.50 for a book with careless mistakes is not on.
I'd email them as they can update the kindle versions at least.

That is pretty poor.

As someone who works in the publishing industry, I can tell you that editing and proofreading seems to be a dying art. Alas!

Ok- so I've finished it and not only is it littered with mistakes but it was a completely pointless book in the series.

Very disjointed and basically just padding out a few years.

The reason editing and proofreading are dying arts is that no one is prepared to sodding pay us enough for it.

Also, bear in mind that you have no idea what the text was like before it was edited. Sometimes bringing things to 'barely literate' form is all you can do.

Sod's law says that this post will have two major typos and a grammatical error. I don't care any more. Humph.

Archer is just churning out shite to make money - he couldn't care less about plots, proof reading or accuracy. I used to read him when he first started because - well - it was an easy read albeit somewhat formulaic. Since his 'troubles' his books have been literary diarrhoea really - and that's not being kind to diarrhoea!
I think if you ever found yourself picking up another one of his books then you'd really have trouble defending yourself against accusations of unreasonableness!

I'm still bitter after reading a review of a book that in its original typescript was repetitive, badly translated in some places and plagiarising big chunks of Wikipedia word for word in others. I turned it into something readable after weeks of work for the measly pre-agreed sum, only to have Mr SmartyPants Reviewer point out that it still contained 'some clunky phrasing that clearly needed more thorough editing.' No, it needed a better author.

Jeffrey Archer is an evil little weasel of a man though. If he was the best writer in the world I wouldn't buy a book to line his pockets.

His early books had good plots, but the writing was so bad, not typos or inconsistancies, but just clumsy, full of cliches and stilted, I found them painful to read. In fact I would rather stick pins in my eyeballs than read a book by him now!

YABU. You've paid for a book 'written' by a slimy piece of pooh, and you don't like it. Well Fan My Brow.
You won't do that again?

To be honest, whether he is slimy or not- I still don't see the need for continuity errors.

His books have always been awful though. I remember reading Kane and Abel or whatever it was called and thinking "this is shite".

Still, if you've paid money for a book you would expect it to have been proof read and void of such stupid errors.

The last couple of Ruth Rendell books published before her death were littered with mistakes.