Are these errors or style differences?

[Karen Hotchkiss]

Hello everyone,

I am a newbie and just finished my first book. I’ve read the tips on writing the review and am making good progress there, but I do have some questions on the error reporting. As I was reading in Kindle, I noted any potential errors, exported the file when I finished the book, and now I am trying to work out which of these are actually errors that should be reported and which are just style differences. I’ve tried checking them in Grammarly and Scribens free tools but am getting mostly inconsistent results, which makes me think that the majority should be uncounted errors. I’m going to list them here, along with the reason I flagged them, and would appreciate any feedback.

I apologize up front for the lengthy post – I thought that one long post with all my questions would be less annoying that many individual questions, but please let me know if individual would be better. Thanks so much, in advance!!

1. Book: I had always been amazed wondering how they had built a skyscraper straddling the interstate highway…
Uncounted Error: Comma needed between amazed and wondering.

2. Book: Stepping from the building, we were met — actually more like challenged — by an older handsome sort of man in his late forties with grey hair.
Uncounted Error: Comma needed between older and handsome

3. Book: It’s strange where one’s mind will take you.
Uncounted Error: Seems like it should be ‘where one’s mind will take one’’ or ‘where your mind will take you’

4. Book: I was starved!
Uncounted Error: Should be ‘I was starving!’ Is this considered passive voice misuse?

5. Book: That’s when I became, embarrassingly, aware of Phil and Peter standing behind me.
Uncounted Error: Unnecessary commas.

6. Book: If I were asked a question, I’d give the best answer I could.
Uncounted Error: Should be ‘If I was asked…’ Is this passive voice misuse?

7. Book: Our station had been unusually quiet and uneventful, and although there had been several bad accidents, none was on my shifts.
Counted Error verb tense: Should be 'none were on my shifts.'

8. Book: ...Mike and the Russians managed to understand one other with a little Polish and Russian translation.
Counted Error: Should be ‘understand one another’

9. Book: He spoke slow and deliberately.
Counted Error adverb: Should be 'slowly and deliberately.'

10. Book: One needed to be a patient listener when dealing with Red, and this, surely, would be part of the difficulties between him and his mother, because Ida was not a patient woman.
Uncounted Error: Should be 'he and his mother'

Last Question: If there are errors and we miss them, is that counted against us?

Again, thanks so much!

[The Holy Grail]

Hello, I am a new reviewer and may not give an expert advice on this. However, I've noticed that you've marked most of the errors you've noted as uncounted. From what I understand in the guidelines, if you mark uncounted errors, they don't count towards the tally of the errors you should mark. What "uncounted" means is that you're not sure if they are errors (which you are), so you are safe. If you didn't have any other strictly objective error, I would mark 0 errors and list the uncounted errors. In the review, though, it will not be a must stating that the book was exceptionally well-edited.

I don't think you are penalised for missing errors in a book. We have reviewers who are not that fluent in English, so it would be unfair penalizing them for what they don't know (my thoughts).

I hope this helps, but I'll be glad if someone points out if I'm wrong.

[Karen Hotchkiss]

Thanks, I appreciate your taking the time to read and reply! I submitted as you suggested and it was fine. I realize now that I probably should have posted this in the International Grammar forum.

[gali]

I moved the thread to the correct forum.