Quality of St. Benedict Press/Baronius

[Jackson K. Eskew]

I recently read Benson's Lord of the World, published by Saint Benedict Press in association with Baronius Press. I was disappointed to see numerous typos throughout the book. Is such disrespect for authors characteristic of St. Benedict and/or Baronius? This is the first book I've read by either one of these publishers.

[Revixit]

Free e-books often have a lot of typos as they were copied (typed) from old books by volunteers.  I don't know if any publishers are printing from free e-books, though.  Maybe this is an old TAN book that was copied from a free e-book; I read here recently that St. Benedict or Baronius was taking over TAN, that TAN had gone bankrupt again, something like that.  You can probably find the thread.

But over the past twenty years or so friends and I, all heavy readers, have noticed that brand new books from mainstream big name publishers, books we've bought retail or checked out from the public library have far more typos than they used to.  We have wondered if publishers just trust to spellcheck functions on computers and no longer employ proof-readers at all. 

There are many factual errors in books today, too, suggesting that publishers no longer employ fact checkers either.  Authors really should fact check their work before submitting it, I think.  If you're going to use the name of a product or of a hybrid apple tree, you should be sure that said product and said hybrid existed in the time frame you've used for your novel.  I've seen several such references that were "off" by half a century.

Bottom line, I doubt that St. Benedict and Baronius are much worse than the big commercial publishers about these things but they may not be better, either.



Hugh Benson's books are very good.  Most of them are free as e-books for Kindle, and may be free from other e-book sources, too.  "Lord of the World" is an amazing book, a more insightful dystopian novel than "1984" or "Brave New World" and written decades earlier.  Benson died, as I recall, in 1914.  I'm positive he died before WW I.  I combined my Benson and Chesterton books in one folder on my Kindle and have a total of 43 books, all free for Kindle, in the folder at present. 

I also like Benson's historical novels Come Rack and Come Rope and Oddsfish, set in England when Catholic priests were executed if their clerical status was learned, when Catholics had no rights and were fined if they did not attend one C of E service and take the Anglican Communion once each year.  Some obeyed, others refused and gradually lost their lands due to heavy fines.  If you haven't read them, I think you'd enjoy them. 


 

[jovan66102]

Benson died, as I recall, in 1914.  I'm positive he died before WW I. 

You're close! The War began in August, he died in October! :)

[Scotus]

I recently read Benson's Lord of the World, published by Saint Benedict Press in association with Baronius Press. I was disappointed to see numerous typos throughout the book. Is such disrespect for authors characteristic of St. Benedict and/or Baronius? This is the first book I've read by either one of these publishers.

I bought it 4 years ago and found it almost unreadable. I complained to Baronius but never got a reply. I have never bought another book from them since then.

I can't remember where I saw it but there was a site where someone else brought up the issue of the numerous typos in Baronious Books. Someone from Baronius came on saying that they couldn't give refunds with the excuse that doing so would diminish their ability to make available Catholic books. The implication was that requests for refunds for their crappy editions would be playing into the hands of the enemies of the Church! You couldn't make it up...

[trident59]

I bought a Douay Rheims Bible from Baronius Press 3 years ago and was disappointed in the quality of the binding and goldleaf work. Went to Angelus Press for my 1962 missal and found the workmanship excellent.

[Jackson K. Eskew]

So the typos seem to flow from Baronius. Has anybody read some other book published only by Saint Benedict Press? Typos?