Common mistakes in writing

They rear their ugly heads daily as I proofread and edit, worming their way into document after document as if sticking a tongue out at me goading, Catch me if you can. And I do catch them, day after day - mistakes I find so often they jump out at me from the page as if 3D.

Here's my top five:

1. Comma splices: It's amazing how many writers join two sentences together with a comma, and rather alarming how prevalent this has become in published books (take a look at this weekend's HP finale).
2. Missing/incorrect apostrophes: Did you notice the apostrophe in weekend's above? Many seem to feel the apostrophe is either optional, or something to plonk anywhere in the vicinity of the word in question.
3. Random capitals: I spend an impressive amount of my day decapitalising words.
4. Inconsistent styling: It's thirteen miles to London, but three lines later it's 15 days until Christmas.
5. Spellchecked nonsense: Just because that word is spelled correctly, doesn't mean it's the right word. This morning I found the following while proofreading a serious article on a church: The chap is a plaice for queer time (The chapel is a place for quiet time).

My top ten* children's authors (in no particular order)

One of my current writing projects for myself is a series of illustrated children’s books for young readers. I find it a great way to wind down after a day of proofreading, editing or copywriting – doing something deliciously fun and fairly ridiculous with words. It usually involves vibrant felt-tips, an enormous sheet of paper and some stick men drawings my two-year-old nephew would scoff at.

So reading (and rediscovering) children’s books is something I’m particularly into at the moment. Earlier today I was chatting with a client about which children’s books his grandson may like, and I enjoyed myself so much suggesting authors, I thought I’d share some of my favourites here.

Roald Dahl – the man was a genius
Terry Pratchet – especially the recent Wee Free Men books
J.K Rowling – obviously
C. S Lewis – for the Narnia series
Philip Pullman – I especially like the Sally Lockhart quartet
Dr Seuss – try reading Fox in Socks aloud quickly!
Hans Christian Andersen – beautiful
L. Frank Baum – his Oz books are much better than the film
Enid Blyton – her books have a certain charm
Judy Blume – because she was one of the first authors to stop talking down to kids

Thinking about it, I rather disagree with labeling children’s books as that at all. I think the world would be a far happier place if adults read this stuff more as well (and no, I don’t mean at your wee one’s bedtime when, in order to tuck them in quickly, you skip whole paragraphs, speak so fast your tongue cramps and turn over the pages ten at a time!).

* For today at least. There’s so many to choose from!