I’ll never forget that day.
I received an email from a reader saying she had just finished reading my book. Great, fan mail. I love it. Only this fan had some constructive criticism.
Ashley Case was her name. Pointing out typos and grammar mistakes was her game. When she first told me my book had multiple typos and errors, I honestly didn’t believe her. It can’t be, I thought. This was crazy talk. I had just hired a proofreader to go through my book. And before that, there was me, which doesn’t really count, my editor and a couple of beta readers.
I asked Ashley if she would be kind enough to point out these errors. I had excepted that perhaps one or two might have slipped by. The next day I received an email from her with an Excel doc attached. She had only looked over 60 pages, yet she had found 50 errors. Holy moly! I was shocked and then pissed. Not at her, but at myself for allowing my book to be out there that way. There was a massive failure somewhere in my quality control and I needed to fix it.
I eventually emailed Ashley back, thanking her for the document. I told her she had a real eagle eye and should consider becoming a proofreader. I received an email back from her stating she had always been interested in becoming a proofreader but didn’t know how to get started. I hired her on the spot.
Ashley has since proofed two books for me and I’m happy with the results. There are a lot of proofreader’s out there for hire and finding the right one for your project can be tricky. If you find yourself in this situation, consider hiring Ashley Case.
