The plural of book is NOT book's!

I have a new grammar pet peeve: the use of a possessive apostrophe to denote a plural. In just the past few weeks, I’ve seen the following on signs, menus and posters around New York City:

Great gift idea for teacher’s
Open Sunday’s and Monday’s
We print on tank top’s!
Banana’s and mango’s on sale this week

I have no idea why this has become so popular, but it’s everywhere I go, and it drives me nuts! I even saw it in a self-published book last week, in which the narrator mentioned how she had consulted with various doctor’s. Yes, doctor’s. I was annoyed but kept reading, only to be distracted by countless other grammatical blunders throughout the book. The storyline was interesting, but it was completely overshadowed by the errors that popped up on every page. Every single page. Because of that, I will not be recommending the book to anyone, which is a lost opportunity for the author because I love to talk about books.

If you’re going to put your work out into the world, make sure the grammar is perfect. If grammar isn’t your thing, hire an editor! Actually, you should hire an editor anyway, because we all need multiple sets of eyes to help catch what ours can no longer see after staring at the computer screen for so long.

In a future blog post, I’ll go over the most common grammatical errors I see. For now, see if you notice the apostrophe overload. Maybe together we can stop the madness!

-Maria

Maria Murnane writes romantic comedies and provides consulting services on book publishing and marketing. Learn more at www.mariamurnane.com

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Comment by dianejwright on February 22, 2012 at 9:40am: "To" and "Too"

Comment by Starla Ramcy on February 21, 2012 at 11:39pm: ow about the difference between 'of' and 'off'?

Comment by mindy trotta on January 17, 2012 at 9:39am: How about incorrectly adding an "s" to a surname? My parents had a sign by their front door that said: "The Klapper's" and I would always ask my mom, "The Klapper's what??" She never seemed to get, and obviously neither did the sign maker.

Comment by dianejwright on November 9, 2011 at 6:56pm: You know who's awesome? Grammar Girl, that's who.

http://grammar.quickanddirtytips.com/

Comment by Starla Ramcy on November 9, 2011 at 4:11pm: Thanks, Olga. That makes it very clear to me.

Comment by Olga Godim on November 9, 2011 at 11:08am: Starla.

'Then' means the time after: I had a glass of wine and then went to bed.

'Than' means comparison: an elephant is bigger than a fox.

Comment by Starla Ramcy on November 9, 2011 at 10:00am: English is my second language and I love posts like this. Particularly since some rules in grammar are opposite from my own native language, Dutch.

Grace Elting Castle mentioned the misuse of "then" and 'than'. I struggle with that big time and have no clue what the difference is. Another one is the use of a comma.

I love language and writing.

Starla Ramcy

Comment by Candice W. Coghill on November 2, 2011 at 6:26pm: oops ... in my excitement, I was typing too fast! I should have written, "I heard 'between' used incorrectly ...' "

Comment by Candice W. Coghill on November 2, 2011 at 6:24pm: Oh, Maria, you're my new She Writes idol for this post! The errors you list have long been major bugaboos for me; they drive me wild! Another that hasn't yet been mentioned is the much-misunderstood difference between ... between and among! :) Not too many months ago, I heard "between" used on one of the major network news shows (60 Minutes, I believe) by a reporter who has been a favorite of mine for years. I just sat and stared at the TV screen in disbelief!

A dear friend of mine who also is a bear on issues of spelling and grammar once took the middle-school parent newsletter, circled in red all of the errors she found and sent it back to the school with a grade of C-Minus and a terse little note ;)

Thanks for a great post!

Comment by Kelli Swearingen on November 2, 2011 at 4:26pm: Bwhahaha I'm so glad I found this thread. The misuse of the possessive apostrophe is one of my biggest pet peeves too. My son came home from school one day with a print out sheet for homework not only did they use the possessive where it wasn't needed it also had a sentence that went something like this: "Stacy liked to borrow books' from the library." I'm no spelling grammar whiz but if I have spot that then something is wrong. Oh did I mention this was a 5th graders homework? Excellent post!