An oopsie is a mistake in the story. An anachronism would be an oopsie, but a typo or spelling error would not. I sent the following list to Liz Braswell, author of "The Nine Lives of Chloe King," now showing on the Disney Family Channel. She had graciously replied to my email about a small oopsie in her first book of the series.
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Many good authors have an oopsie or two in their books. I'm kind of starting to collect them.
I have two by J.K. Rowling which have already been corrected in the latest editions. In the first volume, "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone," Nearly Headless Nick (the ghost) said that he had not had anything to eat in almost "400" years (later corrected to "500"); but in volume two, "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets," NHN has his 500th death-day party. In volume 4, "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire," The Ghost-echoes of Harry's Father and Mother came out of Voldemort's wand in that order, supposedly in the reverse order of their deaths, but they were actually killed in that order. In later editions the ghosts come out Mother and then Father. It was a really neat (tidy) piece of editing.
I have two oopsies by Caroline B. Cooney which have not yet been corrected. In her book, "The Voice on the Radio," Janey's boyfriend says he did not use last names when he broadcast her story over the radio, but when you look back at the broadcast dialog, he says both Janey Johnson at one time, and Jennie Spring another time. Then in her latest book, "Three Black Swans," she has the father saying he has not yet seen the (youtube) video, but he had actually looked at it when his wife sent it to him over the phone.
It may be debatable, but I think Jennifer Lynn Barnes had a couple of oopsies in her book, "Raised by Wolves." She has Bryn almost cutting her best friend's "Achilles heel" when it should have said, "Achilles tendon." She has Lake asking if Bryn wanted to see her put a "bullet" through a guy's coke (cup, using Matilda, her double-barreled shotgun when shotguns almost always shoot "shot" and not "bullets"). And she has Lake cocking the "trigger" of the shotgun, when it should have said cocking the "hammer."
I'm not complaining about the oopsies. It is pretty hard to make everything fit together perfectly. In my first book, "Life After Life," (which is Christian Fiction, and I don't even read Christian Fiction as a rule) I put a train stop on the wrong (east) side of the Hospital. I had to go back and change the directions to put it on the west side (because it is based on a real hospital, and a real transit stop, in a real city). So now the Amazon.com and Kindle versions are correct, but the Smashwords and Nook versions are still wrong.
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In addition to the oopsies listed above, I now have a couple more.
This may be debatable, it hinges on whether the meaning of the word "car" includes a pickup "truck." Jennifer Lynn Barnes new book, "Trial by Fire," says on page 240 "I could feel Chase getting closer, moving faster ... Lake had loaned him her truck." But then on page 242 we read, "Chase waited for me to get in the car..." But to me, when I read "car" I picture a generic sedan, not a pickup truck. So, if "car" includes "truck" then this is not an oopsie, but a misinterpretation of the word on my part.
In the book, "Talking to Dragons," the fourth book in the Enchanted Forest series by Patricia C. Wrede, the paperback version, page 100 at the top says, "The King of the Dragons is whichever dragon can move Colin's Stone from the Vanishing Mountain to the Ford of the Whispering Snakes." But the first book in the series clearly says that it is "... from the Ford of the Whispering Snakes to the Vanishing Mountain." Not vice versa.
What was the oopsie in Liz Braswell's book, "The Nine Lives of Chloe King: The Fallen," now reprinted in your local bookstore? It is in the first chapter. Read the book and you'll find it. (Fair warning: the books contain some swearing.) By the way, that whole scene was not included in the new T.V. show.
Read well,
Logan
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