'A Steroid Hit The Earth' is a catalogue of errors, omissions, mistakes and other disasters, ranging from the straight typo or the ambiguous statement to the downright bizarre. Each demonstrates a sub-editor or proofreader taking their eye off the ball, to the delight of millions, every single example preserving the humble misprint as a perpetual source of 'schadenfreude'. From the holy typo of 1631, when Barker and Lucas' 'Wicked Bible' exhorted people to commit adultery by omitting a crucial 'not' from the seventh commandment, 'A Steroid Hit The Earth' reaches back in time to the days before modern printing and our own spell-check obsessed age. It is a joyous and irreverent paean to gaffes of all sorts that have caused confusion, consternation and outright offence among readers, incorporating confessions from insiders - retired newspapermen and typesetters - for the inside story on both what was and what might have been. A highly entertaining and deeply resonant book, appealing to the 'there but for the grace of...' feeling in all of us. It will be proof-read six times before publication.
- ISBN13 9781906032432
- Publish Date 10 October 2008
- Publish Status Out of Print
- Out of Print 25 March 2021
- Publish Country GB
- Publisher Pavilion Books
- Imprint Portico
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 192
- Language English