I get a lot of requests to look at peoples’ manuscripts and I have made a rule and say sorry to such requests. I try to write at least 2,000 words a day in whatever book I’m working on, I write at least one 500+ word blog every day, frequently more than one, and I actively market my books and our Gypsy Journal RV newspaper every day. I just don’t have the time to read everything people want to send me and it’s not fair to do it for one person and not everyone.
But once in a while I make the mistake of agreeing to take a peek at something. When I do, I remember why I never agree to read someone’s manuscript. No good deed ever goes unpunished. For example, a longtime blog reader asked me to “just look at” the first chapter of his mystery and give him my input. It begins with:
“Not since the bus left the Greyhound factory had it had such an unfortunate day. 80,000 miles of passenger service on the east coast and never an incident. Maybe Andy Miller, the longtime driver, had grown complacent. Or maybe bored. But this day he didn’t do his required vehicle inspection before setting out. That was why he never noticed the large pool of brake fluid from where the lines had been cut. But he noticed when he reached the crest of Peekskill Hill and started back down. Andy stepped on the brake pedal and it went to the floor. The 1974 Greyhound didn’t respond for the first time in five years. Headed home from his year in Viet Nam, young Larry Lott never made it.”
There were so many things wrong in the first paragraph, not counting writing style, that I had to stop right there and e-mail the author. I told him that Greyhound is a bus company, not a bus manufacturer. So there is no “Greyhound factory.” In that time period Greyhound used buses made by MCI, GM, and Eagle. Also, a five year old Greyhound would have way over 80,000 miles on it. And buses have air brake systems, so there would be no “pool of brake fluid” under it, and if an air line is broken or cut, the bus will lose air pressure. When that happens, the brakes will not release and it won’t move in the first place. And if the 1974 bus was five years old, that would be 1979. The last American troops left Vietnam (one word, not two) in 1975.
His response? “Well, obviously I’m no award winning NY Times author like you. Sorry to waste your precious time. You must be afraid of competition.”
Every author owes it to his readers to research everything about their story before they type the first sentence. I can’t tell you how many books I have read where somebody “slips off the safety on their revolver.” (Only a handful of rare revolvers have a safety). It turns me off the book instantly. If the author doesn’t care enough to do his research, why should I care enough to read his story?
A while back I was reading a book set in Tucson, Arizona where the main character was driving west on Speedway Boulevard as the sun was setting over the Catalina Mountains. There is a Speedway Boulevard in Tucson, and a mountain chain called the Catalinas. However, they are on the east side of the city, and the last time I checked, the sun sets in the west. That was another book I didn’t finish.
If you want to succeed as an author, do your homework before you ever set pen to paper. To do any less is an injustice to your story, to your readers, and to yourself.
