On the Tenacity of Typos

I like to think I do a good job proof-reading for others, but when it comes to my own work, I need other pairs of eyes for that important final step. My final manuscript is never as polished as I think it is.

As all published authors know, the last typos will hide, the little blighters, until the moment we press submit, and then they will shimmy and throw off their manifold disguises, tittering at our impotence to stop them appearing for all the world to see.

This is why I’m glad my first readers tend to be fellow writers with younger eyes than mine. They alert me of what I've missed, and I spend a week or so collecting the little blighters before sending my final_FINAL_3 .doc to Daiva for formatting. Only then do I get the paperback version up. After all, typos in an ebook may be annoying, but there’s nothing quite as exasperating as typos strutting their stuff in broad daylight on the pages of a printed book.

Even after all due diligence, I’m fairly certain there would still be one or two lurking around. Those last ones deserve to be there. They have earned the right to be where they don't belong. They are tenacious little buggers that blend in like chameleons, who wave their magic wands so that ten pairs of eyes slid away from them. They believe in themselves. They are committed. We have much to learn from them.

My new motto is this: Be like the typos that make it to the final version of your books. Be that tenacious and committed. Have that unshakeable faith in yourself. If we had half the tenacity and self-confidence of those typos, we shall go far in life, let alone our writing career.