The Editing Tip You Probably Haven't Tried

Are you editing your book and searching for mistakes that you might have previously overlooked? Here's a tip that you probably haven't tried yet.

After finishing a draft of a book, writers often put them aside for a limited period of time. When writers are too familiar with a piece of writing, they are more likely to read what they expect to see. Distancing themselves from the work for a period of time allows them to view it with fresh eyes and helps a writer to be more objective when there's no one else available as a sounding board. It's kind of like picking up a diary written in junior high and thinking, "I can't believe I actually wrote that," although, hopefully you haven't let your manuscript sit for that long.

While letting your work rest a bit between drafts, getting a trusted friend to read your work, or hiring an editor are all excellent ways to polish a manuscript and spot mistakes (and I recommend them all), perhaps you should also include listening to your book as a step in your editing process. Sometimes you can hear a mistake that your eyes might have overlooked.

Microsoft Word has a "Speak" command that can be added to the Quick Access Toolbar. While the voice is quite robotic, it does help in listening to how a section of text flows and in spotting spelling errors or mistakes created with improper editing with improper editing [sic].

I admit that I prefer listening to a book on Kindle. This will involve uploading the book to Kindle and would probably be more practical in the later stages of a book. While the Kindle voice is very smooth and uses inflections much like a human would, it is not perfect and occasionally mispronounces words, such as "read" when used in the past tense. Even so, it's amazingly good software and has helped me to spot many errors.

Note: Although it is accessed in the same location on the interface, this feature is not the same as the "Audible" feature and is only available on Kindle devices. Older devices may not have this feature. Therefore, you won't see it in the Kindle app on your iPhone.

So, the next time you are looking for a fresh set of eyes to check for spelling and grammar errors in your book, perhaps it's time to use your ears instead.