Is the pursuit of perfection worthwhile? I’m enjoying reading Louis XIII: The Making of a King, but every few pages there are letters or words circled, and notes in the margin. The one I found today was correcting advisor to adviser. There, my spell checker didn’t pick that up. However I have checked the Oxford English Dictionary, and although there is advisory, the noun is adviser. The book was printed by the Yale University Press, and must have been proof read, several times I imagine.
When I write my Sir Anthony Standen Adventures, I often refer to a dictionary, grammar books and websites to get things right. When I finish writing, I give myself some time, then read it. I will always find errors. Once corrected I run it through ProWritingAid, which is a very sophisticated spelling, grammar, and style checking application. That always offers hundreds of corrections and improvements. Then I print the manuscript for my wife Claire to read.
Claire always finds errors that both I and the application have missed. She also comments on plot errors and things that the reader wants to know, that I haven’t told them. After that it goes to my professional editor who finds further errors and makes more suggestions.
When I listen to the audiobook files, I read the book as I listen. I’m looking for any errors my narrator has made. I find a few, and I also find errors that I’ve made, where the narrator has said what he expected me to write.
I remember the leaving speech of a teacher who was leaving my school to teach at another. He was quite emotional, and the gist of his message was always to aim for A grades. If you aim for a B, then you’ll probably get a C. I think he was right. The pursuit of perfection is worthwhile. Aim for perfection, but know that 100% is rarely achievable.