Pet Peeve – Advance Uncorrected Proof ???

Have you ever felt like you simply could NOT get ahead of the game? As I said before, I started to get behind the eight ball before the holidays hit. Then, I ran full force into a slump of January Blues with my dad dying in February. Weeks after that, I finally began to feel like I could see a slight glimmer of light at the end of the task-filled tunnel and they close schools, my kids come home, and we have a stay-at-home order issued.

In case you aren’t familiar with my family, that means fixing three meals a day for 8 people, while keeping the house from being destroyed. I barely get done with one task and I’ve got three more waiting for me, and that is IF I get that one task done with the dozen of interruptions from everyone asking MOM what – how – when to do something. Because, let’s face it, teens and pre-teens are not the cleanest people. Although they have the capabilities of picking up after themselves, they don’t. Then you have the 2 who aren’t capable of doing things themselves still making messes that no one wants to pick up. Plus, I now have a 4 year old who thinks he can do all the things the older kids can without the common sense to guard his actions, which as I am sure you can imagine, produces more mess. I’m telling you, it’s chaos around here. 🙂

I know many of you have been dying to read the next book in the Seasons of the Heart Series, and now that many of us are stuck at home, this would be a great time. I truly apologize that it is taking so long. However, I might have some good news, I was recently made aware of the possibility to offer an Advance Uncorrected Proof copy. What this means is that you would be able to read the story knowing there are errors in it and it has been unpolished.

Is that something you’d be interested in?

The reason I ask brings the title of this post into play. I have a HUGE pet peeve about reading books that have been published where the editing is HORRID! Recently, I was reading a series and it appeared that the publishing company simply did not care if the story was even in tact. There were huge errors from book one to book 4. I’m talking about the name of the character not even being the same! Or words completely being left out to the point that a skim reader like myself couldn’t follow the train of the sentence without stopping and pondering the context. WHY, I ask you, is that book in print???

Now, I know my books have had errors. I know that many books have errors and I have become more sensitive to the fact that it is rather difficult even with an editor to catch EVERY mistake. However, I’m not talking about a random misspelled word or a strangely phrased sentence. I simply cannot understand how these authors get their books published by major publishers with so many issues. It makes me sick to read them knowing how much time and effort I put into my work. Where is the pride in publishing a quality work?

This is why I have not jumped on the Advance Uncorrected Proof idea. I do not want to be known as one of those authors that do not take pride in their creations. However, I acknowledge that it is taking me a lot longer than I anticipated to get the story out there and I don’t want my followers to lose interest. So, I’ll ask again. Would you be interested in reading a book where the story is intact, but it was released with known errors and unproofed?

Please know that if I DO go down this path, I will finish the book and release it corrected and polished. I look forward to hearing your thoughts on the matter.

Until later…