Words That Are Easily Confused -

and Words that Even the Best Spellcheckers

Don’t Always Pick Up.

 

I was talking to another writer the other day about easily confused words, and words that even the best spellcheckers don’t always identify as errors, and we swapped notes and here’s a brief list of some of the blighters that can occasionally slip through if you are not 100% on top of your game!

Many of them sound exactly the same when spoken, and when you are writing quickly they can find their way into your work when you least expect it!

 

Here Are Some Common Ones to Look Out For.

 

Peak and Peek:

 

Peak is the top of a mountain.

Peek is taking a look at something.

 

Peel and Peal:

 

Peel is the coat of an orange or any fruit.

Peal is the ringing sound that bells make.

 

Wave and Waive:

 

Wave is waving someone goodbye, or a radio wave.

Waive is cancelling something, or giving something for free, as in waiving the cost.

 

Sole and Soul:

 

Sole is the underside of your feet or shoes.

Soul can be emotional feelings, your spirit surviving death, a type of music, or even a person, as in he’s a happy soul.

 

Break and Brake:

 

Break means to smash something, or a break in play.

Brake is to slow down or stop a car or train or bike.

 

Steak and Stake:

 

Steak is a juicy piece of meat.

Stake is a pointy thing driven through the heart of a bad man, or simply a piece of sharpened wood driven into the ground, or maybe to affix a fence to.

 

Lose and Loose:

 

Lose is when you don’t win something, you lose it, or when something gets lost, as in don’t lose that.

Loose is something that isn’t tight; it’s loose, as in a loose cardigan.

 

It’s and Its:

 

It’s with an apostrophe is a shortened form of it is, it has, or it was.

Its (without an apostrophe) is used when something belongs to something, such as its tail, its mouth, its legs, its dinner, its money, its coat, its brother, its mother, its dictionary.

 

Dough and Doe:

 

Dough is a constituent of bread, or a slang word for money.

Doe is a female deer or rabbit or even a kangaroo.

 

Their, There, and They’re:

 

Their relates to specific people or things, as in their house, their car, their dog, their coat, their music etc.

There relates to a place, as in how do I get there? Or over there; or we’re getting there, or are we nearly there yet?

They’re is a shortened form of they are, as in they’re horrid people, they’re having a lot of success, or they’re mad!

 

Bite and Bight and Byte: - They all sound the same!

 

Bite is to grip with teeth.

Bight is a wide curving indent in a shoreline forming a bay.

Byte is a computer term representing eight bits.

 

Wonder and Wander:

 

Wonder is amazed admiration, or to speculate about something, as in, I wonder about that.

Wander is to move from place to place, or to walk away, as in wandering off, and don’t wander away!

 

Faint and Feint:

 

Faint is to pass out, maybe through the heat.

Feint is to pretend to go one way and switch back in the other direction, as used in sport or even on the battlefield.

 

Rain, Reign and Rein – and again they all sound the same.

 

Rain is water falling from the clouds.

Reign is the period of rule of a monarch or ruler.

Rein is a strap for controlling a horse.

 

Compliment and Complement.

 

Compliment is saying something nice about a person, usually when they are present, as in you have nice eyes.

Complement is something that completes or improves or perfects something.

 

Who's and Whose.

 

Who's is the shortened form of who is or who has.

Whose, meaning of whom, and is used when asking about belonging, as in whose shoes are these? Whose house shall we go back to? Or even Whose idea was it?    

 

There are dozens and dozens of these kind of trip-up words that sound identical, or are very similar, and automated spellcheckers will simply not find many of them.

 

All writers know that they can occasionally fall into the trap of using the wrong word, and this can especially happen if you are rushing things and your brain is already formulating the next sentence, while still typing the previous one.

 

I am not immune to it I can assure you of that!!!

 

I cannot see the words Doe and Dough without cringing about using Doe for Dough in one of my books that was spell-checked and proofread several times before being published, and one thing is for sure, if you rely on spellcheckers alone to weed out these nasty little beasties you could end up disappointed.

 

Do you have any favourite, or more to the point, least favourite words that can be easily confused?

 

Feel free to share them here, and I’ll add them to the list above for all to see!!! Shame them, that’s what I say.

 

Thanks for reeding, er, sorry, reading!!!

 

Have a great day.

 

David C.

 

 

 

 

Tags: easily confused words, confusing words, spellcheck busters, spellchecker errors, spell-check beaters, incorrect spellings, similar words, incorrect words, wrong words,              

 

 

"The Twelfth Apostle" is Now Finally Available After One or Two Delays!

The new Inspector Walter Darriteau murder/mystery, "The Twelfth Apostle" is now out both in paperback and as an ebook.

500 Pages of entertainment.

Here are the BUY NOW links;

        

If you'd like to read a large extract you can follow any of the above links and click on "SEARCH INSIDE".

The Twelfth Apostle

Hope you like it - "The Twelfth Apostle" is available now and as a UK ebook it is only £2.99!!

 

Thanks for reading,

David.

 

 

 

Missing Beagle Eva 

 

Here are the details of the pretty Beagle dog named Eva who went missing in the New Forest near to Wootton Stream.

Please get in touch if you know anything.

Thank you.

 

 

 

I BUY MASONIC ITEMS

 

 

Yes, I also buy Masonic items for cash including medals, jewels, badges, cufflinks, sashes, regalia, books, certificates, papers, cases, glassware, - indeed anything with a Masonic connection, from collections to single items.

 

Let me know what you have and the price you would like and I will get back to you.

 

I ALSO BUY RAOB ITEMS AS WELL – (BUFFALOES)

 

So if you have anything similar you are looking to sell do please get in touch.

 

Real Books Hit the Comeback Trail.

 

I read in the press the other day that “real books” are making something of a comeback. Phew! I’m pleased about that, seeing as my profession is one of being a bookseller. I have now more than 12,000 titles in stock, yes in the house, and please don’t ask me where they all are, because they are everywhere! Well, maybe not in the loo, for obvious reasons. Users might run out of tissue and grab pages from a nearby title and that would be an unmitigated disaster. There are limits!

   And I can honestly say that I have never sold an ebook for any other writer, (yes, I do sell them written by yours truly) which is almost the complete opposite of actual books where I sell every day by any number of writers, but not so many of my own – weep weep!

   When ebooks and ereaders first appeared I stupidly went on record in saying that they would never catch on, - the machines wouldn’t work in the sunlight, they would forever be running out of juice, and would make readers cross-eyed, all predictions way off the mark that couldn’t have been more wrong and I am happy to set the record straight now.

   Today, I sell ten ebooks for every one “real book” and the odd thing is that though I sell the ebooks for a quarter of the price of an actual book, I make more on an ebook, and I guess that makes sense when you take into account there are no printing costs, no packing and no postage costs, and the buyer receives the ebook within seconds, so there is rarely a problem on delivery.

   So, it’s good to read that “real books” are making a comeback. Personally, I don’t think they ever really went away, for there is something truly special about the feel and smell of a freshly printed book, something that a sterile ereader can never reproduce, though I am now becoming very wary of dissing technology, for before you know it some boffin will invent a smell-o-vision app that can release occasional odours of new book and fresh print, God forbid. Is nothing sacred?

Giant Four-Foot Rat Found Dead in London

 

A giant four-foot rat has been found dead in Hackney in a children’s playground in East London. It was bigger than a cat or a small dog, and was found in an area popular with takeaway restaurants, and it is believed to have beefed up to super-rat proportions on the leftover and discarded chicken curry takeaway meals.

The rat weighed the same as a 4-year old child and no doubt could have done quite some damage if it chose to do so. It was believed to have died after feeding on poison put down specifically to deal with the infestation.

And that leads me on nicely to a mention of my book “Down into the Darkness”. Here’s the booktrailer for that title which you might like to have a look at:

 

 

 

And if you go on to read the book you will better understand the connection between the two!

And while I talking about this title here is an independent book review that I have just noticed on Goodreads.com.

 

The most terrifying horror stories are the ones that can actually happen. They make you wonder and fear that it will happen to you. Stories with supernatural elements are great, but these are the ones that truly get to you. And that's what happened with me and Down into the Darkness, which I got from a Goodreads giveaway.

This is the story of Tony Jenks and he tells it in a very friendly and informal way. It feels like a friend telling you what he did last weekend, as it feels very real. He tells you about the people who live in the other three flats in the Edwardian house he lives in and about his co-worker on whom he has a crush. The pictures he paints of them are very alive with all the details and little things that make them look like real people.

The story progresses and you see the bits and pieces coming together and you know something very not good is going to happen. When it does happen, after all the anticipation, it is horrible (in the good way of horror stories). It scared me then and now I still feel a shiver down my spine when I hear a sound late at night.

That's one of the things that makes a good story: it stays with you. And this most certainly did.

 

Thank you to the kind Carolina for that contribution.

It’s a short book, but a very inexpensive one, and it would make my day if you purchased a copy.

As ever, thanks for reading,

David C.

 

      

 

 

Hampshire Evacuees by Eric Wyeth Gadd - Book Review

 

What a fantastic little book this is.

 

Some of the descriptions of air raids on New Milton brought tears to my eyes.

 

All my dad’s family resided in New Milton throughout the war, except for the “big boys” of course, who were away fighting, including my dad in the RN. - Cecil (Nick) Carter.

 

I particularly liked the description of the cricket match on the Rec sharing the field with the Home Guard who were doing rifle drill, followed around at every step by young boys with their bows and arrows, aping their seniors. Wish I'd seen that!

 

I played cricket and football on that same Rec barely fifteen years later, not having a clue at the excitement and exciting, and downright dangerous times that had taken place on that very same ground.

 

The death through bombing of the evacuated family from Southampton to Vincent Road really cracked me up!

 

If you have any interest in evacuees, World War II in general, or New Milton and Barton-on-Sea, this is an essential little book to acquire.

 

Lest we forget.

 

Highly recommended.

 

Follow me on twitter @TheBookBloke

 

 

 

Dad's Medals - the most important one (the BEM) he gave to the window cleaner to pay the bill when he had no cash in the house!

St David's Day - Super Tuesday - and The Inconvenient Unborn Day!

 

 

Yes, The Inconveient Unborn is out today on the Kindle platform, and that's exciting for me.

 

Here's the book trailer that you might be interested in having a look at:

 

 

 

and here's some Amazon booklinks:

 

     

 

And here's a link to The Inconvenient Unborn page where you can read the first two chapters right now.  Click here.

Hope you like it.

Have a great St David's Day, or whatever it is you are doing today, and have fun!

 

David C.

 

 

Book Review - Beyond the Red Carpet by Debbra Lynn

 

 

Sophia Vaughn is an aspiring screenwriter and moves to Tinseltown, Hollywood, to be close to the action. But like hundreds of others, initially finds film work hard to come by, and takes employment in a catering company, waitressing and serving, to makes ends meet, until her big break comes along.

 

   And it is at a drunken moviemaker’s decadent house party that she first comes across the man of her dreams, assistant director Marcus Donovan. She has never met anyone quite like Marcus before. When he stands close to her every cell in her body tingles, the hairs on her arms stand up, and Sophia is immediately convinced that Marcus is her one and only life partner.

 

   Marcus likes Sophia too well enough, and makes his play, and she can’t say no to him, and within days they set off for Las Vegas, and a small and hasty wedding. So begins Debbra Lynn’s impressive debut novel “Beyond the Red Carpet”.

 

   If you like stories based in Hollywood, full of wealthy and glamorous people and all that goes with it, you will love this. I have to confess it isn’t the kind of book I would usually pick up, but I found this a satisfying read. It is easy to get into, the pace is fast, the dialogue crisp and believable, and the story really rattles along, keeping the reader interested and making it a quick read. Part of the story is set in the present, and some in flashback, a device I have always enjoyed reading.

 

   And do Sophia and Marcus live together happily ever after? I couldn’t possibly say! You will have to get hold of a copy to find out and explore the many exciting twists and turns that are guaranteed to keep you interested till the very end. You won’t be disappointed. A promising debut, with a nice cover too. Recommended.

 

 

 

NOW SCHEDULING:

 

"The Inconvenient Unborn" Book Blog Tour running throughout March 2016.

If you have a bookblog why not take a look at this and access some great new content for your website?

Click here for more information on that.

Hope you'll get on board!!

Have fun,

 

David C.