Proofread Your Manuscript - Over and Over Again

I consider myself a pretty good proofreader. I’ve proofed thousands of articles and documents through the years for various publications and companies, and was often known as the guy who would find an error if one existed.

Proofreading one’s own copy is more difficult, however, because you know how the sentence is going to read before you even get to it. So, there is a natural tendency to gloss over it. You probably won’t give it the same amount of attention you would to someone else’s copy.

But thoroughly proofreading your novel – over and over again – is essential. During my seemingly endless proofreading sessions with Bamboo Harvester, I would find an error or an inconsistency and invariably say to myself, “How did I miss that before?”

It was simply incredible to me that I had not seen that problem during the first 10 times I read it. Yet suddenly there it was, plain as day. Each time I would find a mistake that I should have caught in a previous read, I would think, “Man, what else have I missed?” And the longer the manuscript is, the more chance that type of thing will happen.

So, here are my six thoughts regarding proofreading your novel before you publish it:

·                     Read slowly. When you know what’s coming, as you will when you’re reading your own stuff, you’ll speed up your reading without thinking about it. Don’t let that happen. Slow down. That’s the best way to catch errors you previously missed.

·                     Look it up. There have been many things that I was absolutely positive were right, but after forcing myself to fact-check them, I learned they were wrong. Even a novel needs to be factually correct when you’re referring to real things and real people, so make sure they are.

·                     Be consistent. There is nothing that frustrates a reader more than seeing an author contradicting herself. If you said a character’s hair was wavy in chapter one, it better not be straight in chapter 25 unless you’ve explained that the character changed her hairstyle.

·                     Check punctuation. At least once before you publish your book, you should go through it looking only at punctuation. Make sure every sentence ends with a period, question mark, or exclamation mark; make sure all the commas are in the right places; and make sure every opening quote mark is eventually followed by an end quote mark.

·                     Keep reading it. While I was proofreading Bamboo Harvester, I can’t tell you how many times I said to myself, “OK, this is the last time I’m reading this novel.” But every time I did, I found enough things I wanted to change to warrant another reading. Of course, I eventually did proofread it for the last time before publishing it, but not before I read it at least 25 times.

·                     Get more input. The more people you can get to read your manuscript – before it’s published – the better. This is what family and friends are for. Ask them to do you this favor and tell them you want their criticism and that you won’t be offended by it. You don’t have to make every change they suggest, but you will definitely benefit from their input.

The worst feeling in the world is not finding an error in your manuscript before it’s published. It’s finding an error after it’s published. No matter how sick of reading your manuscript you become, read it again. You’ll be glad you did.