Even before I became a writer, I appreciated customer feedback. For a large part of my career, I was responsible for customer and technical support for the high-tech companies that I worked for. One of my golden rules was that I made myself available to talk to the customers. If they called and had a complaint, I would take the call as my top priority. If they left a message, I always called them back. Customer feedback is not just important. I always considered it a gift. It is a gift that someone cared enough about a product or an experience to take their own valuable time and write a letter or make a phone call to tell us what they thought of us. Even if it was a complaint, it was still a gift.
Gracie, a person I do not personally know, bought my latest book. She read my book and for that I am very grateful. But even better, Gracie sent me a gift as well. She rated my book and she wrote feedback. What Gracie wrote was both embarrassing and inspiring. She liked the plot and the characters. What she didn't like was the number of mistakes in the book. I honestly thought she might be exaggerating, that while I had no doubt there were a few errors, I didn't actually think there could be so many as to be distracting. So I started going through the text with a fine tooth comb.
Believe me, editing is not any writer's favorite thing. And when you've written the book, you read it very fast, because you know what happens next. It's for that reason that many writers hire professional editors. But that is very expensive. So I took my red pen and I printed a copy of the text and I went to work.
Well, Gracie, you were not exaggerating and I am very embarrassed. But your comments also inspired me to start going through all my books. The beauty of print on demand and e-books, is that you can update and fix text fairly quickly. So, I have completed the review of How the Light Bends and resubmitted the new, updated text. It is live on Kindle today and will be live for paperback tomorrow. I have also completed the updating of The Mystery of Glengarron and The Mystery of the Siren Seeds and the new text for those two books is also available in Kindle and paperback. And I'm working hard to finish re-editing the other four Mick Malone Mysteries in the next four weeks.
So, Gracie, thank you. You were right. Far too many mistakes really does make for a rather disruptive read. I appreciate your honesty and feedback more than you will ever know. And I will certainly take far more care with my new books going forward!
Cheers!
