My friend, an aspiring author, told me about a young lady who published – and sold – an un-formatted book that was full of grammar and punctuation errors. She said in disgust, “Girl, it was just bad!”
As an anal, gifted writer with good editing skills, I think bad writing on any level is evil. Poor grammar and punctuation are cardinal sins of writing, and poor formatting is a sin for book publishing.
However, as a published author of four eBooks, who understand what it takes to plan, write, complete and publish a book of any kind, I applaud the young lady for completing – and selling – her book. Even if it is crappy.
My friend adamantly stated, “Oh, no, I could never put out anything that’s bad!” I’m sure many other people who claimed they wanted to write a book have said the same thing, yet their books have not yet been written, let alone published or sold.
Personally, I am proud of anyone who starts AND completes anything they set out to do, no matter how large or small. So many people start stuff, myself included, and never finish. There are so many stories untold because
- people don’t feel they can write their stories;
- people don’t know how to write their stories (and they never ask for help);
- people are just plain lazy.
Either way, their books are not done. More than likely, they haven’t even been started writing what could be the next literary masterpiece.
Scott Allen said,
Done is better than perfection.
To published authors who had the audacity to complete and publish a crappy book (hopefully it was just one):
Congratulations on finishing what you started and kudos for selling it (if this applies). Now go and get that baby edited and publish a second edition.
To aspiring authors who criticize these crappy books (and rightfully so), but have not completed your book:
If you channel the time and energy you are using to criticize toward completing your own book (also known as minding your own business), your damn-near perfect book (and it better be after talking ish about these people) may be done sooner than expected.
That is all.
Image: neenjames.com