My original review of The Last Romantics was posted on 10 October 2016. Fareh Iqbal produced her first semi-edited edition less than a month later on 7 November. The following is a report on her second editing job, from an edition dated 24 June 2019. Changes to the text are marked in red. She left no mistakes in the revised text. That said, as this is the edition now made available to the public, I will alter my on-line reviews to reflect the current state of the novel. My own personal web pages will remain as is, yet I will take down my reviews of the substandard editions from all fora. Thank-you Fareh for presenting a flawless work of fiction.
This story takes place in Paris and the French in the text should have been vetted by a native speaker or at least a fluent speaker first. The following are the faux pas en français:
“It was known as Place de la Revolution…” (p. 65). It should be Place de la Révolution.
–now Place de la Révolution (pagination change puts it now on p. 66).
“…the soft crooning of Edith Phiaf…” (p. 66) and “…merrily humming along to Edith Phiaf.” (p. 70). Her surname is spelled Piaf.
–both changed to Piaf (now on pp. 67 and 71 respectively).
Iqbal refers to a male waiter’s blonde hair on p. 69.
–now blond hair (now on p. 70).
A reference to the French dish duck à l’orɑnge (p. 77) yet the à, a later insertion, was not rendered in italics.
–now duck à l’orɑnge yet Iqbal used a double-storey a in à yet a single-storey ɑ in orɑnge. Wait a minute–did she just cut and paste my edit from its original appearance in my blog? My blog text mysteriously metamorphoses double-storey à into single-storey à when I render it in italics in the preview form, yet when I update the draft the single-storey à changes to à (as you can clearly see here).
“…and that French je ne sais quoi..” (p. 160).
–now “…and that French je ne sais quoi.” no longer followed by two periods (now on p. 161).
“Shore-zan, s’il vous plait…” (p. 194) when Iqbal does get it right as s’il vous plaît on p. 201.
–now s’il vous plaît (now on p. 196).
French gaffes now over, here are my notes about the rest of the text:
A flipflop between pajama (p. 1) and pyjamas (p. 13) Iqbal spells it pyjamas on pp. 150 and 157 and pyjama on p. 163.
–The spelling has been changed to pyjama on p. 1.
Ray Driftwood runs a bookshop which is located in England where the pound sterling is the official currency but early in the book Ray conducts a book transaction using euros (p. 7).
–The book transaction has been rewritten: “Eleanor cried out, waving an envelope thick with pound notes in her fist.”
“Jordan pointed to Ray with a long finer adorned with a stack of gold rings.” (p. 45)
–now “Jordan pointed to Ray with a long finger…” (now on p. 46).
“If that’s what you kids are calling it these day…” (first word in the original text in italics; p. 46)
–now “If that’s what you kids are calling it these days…” (now on p. 47).
I rail into authors who render the possessive form of it with an apostrophe S. I have never encountered the opposite of this grammatical gaffe, namely employing the contraction without the apostrophe. Iqbal committed this fault on pp. 139 and 173 (twice).
–corrected to it’s in all three instances (now on pp. 140, 174 and 175).
In my first review I recommended that Iqbal punctuate the sentence below:
“My mouth waters as William carries out the chicken on a platter, followed by Jordan with the pizzas arranged artistically on a pale yellow tray, I trail behind with the salad bowl and as I hear Sophie’s squeal of delight and Jax’s yelp of surprise as she pops a pizza in her mouth too soon, followed by William’s deep laugh and Jordan’s plea for everyone to settle down so we can still catch the fireworks at the Eiffel Tower in the evening, I feel warm contentment flooding in my veins, the dull ache in my heart temporarily forgotten.” (now on p. 152)
She did, but poorly, as:
“My mouth waters as William carries out the chicken on a platter, followed by Jordan with the pizzas arranged artistically on a pale yellow tray. I trail behind with the salad bowl and as I hear Sophie’s squeal of delight and Jax’s yelp of surprise as she pops a pizza in her mouth too soon, followed by William’s deep laugh and Jordan’s plea for everyone to settle down so we can still catch the fireworks at the Eiffel Tower in the evening, I feel warm contentment flooding in my veins. The dull ache in my heart recedes and is temporarily forgotten.”
It has been improved to:
“My mouth waters as William carries out the chicken on a platter, followed by Jordan with the pizzas arranged artistically on a pale yellow tray. I trail behind with the salad bowl and as I hear Sophie’s squeal of delight and Jax’s yelp of surprise as she pops a pizza in her mouth too soon. This is followed by William’s deep laugh and Jordan’s plea for everyone to settle down so we can still catch the fireworks at the Eiffel Tower in the evening. I feel warm contentment flooding in my veins and the dull ache in my heart recedes and is temporarily forgotten.”