Best book mistakes

In the book Teabing is a die hard British patriot, yet he refers to the sport of soccer. NO Englishman would use the word soccer for the game of football. [People keep trying to correct this - you've really got to accept it. It's nothing to do with Teabing being older - soccer may have been used in the very early days of the game, but the governing body of the sport in the UK is the Football Association, formed in 1863, demonstrating how that was the accepted word for the sport even then (otherwise it would be the Soccer Association). Likewise the international governing body, FIFA (Fédération Internationale de Football Association), formed in 1904 - no mention of the word soccer there either. And it won't be him changing it for Langdon's benefit, considering a) Langdon's intelligent enough to know what he means, and b) he's so determinedly English about everything else.]

During Priori Incantatem, Voldemort's victims come out in reverse order. However, James comes out before Lily. He should come out last, because he was killed before Lily. (Corrected in later versions of the book).

Before Harry and Hermione go back in time, it mentions that Buckbeak is tied to a tree. But when they go back in time, Buckbeak is tied to a fence.

How can Ron and Lavender be in a 'prominent corner' of the Common Room when in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, it says it is a circular room?

While being sorted into houses, Harry looks up at the Sorting Stool, and there are only three people left to be sorted. Professor McGonagall then calls out the names of four more kids.

Eddie's broken arm changes around, sometimes it's the left arm that's broken, sometimes it's the right.

When Arnie and Leigh gives the hitchhiker a ride, on page 265 (Chapter 34), it says that the hitchhiker opened Christine's rear door. But Plymouth Furies of that era had only two doors.

Dumbledore tells Harry at the end that Lord Voldemort is the last remaining ancestor of Salazar Slytherin. But ancestors are in the past - he means Voldemort is the last descendant of Salazar Slytherin. Not a mistake Dumbledore would have made. (Corrected in later printings.)

The pickup truck with the painting of the Gypsy woman and the unicorn in Chapter 6 changes into a VW microbus in Chapter 18.

When Julius is going after Pompey to Asia Minor and he reaches the harbor in Greece he tries to talk to the sailors but they don't speak Latin. So he asks Adán to translate for him, but he is unable to since he hasn't learned Greek yet. But Julius is fluent in Greek himself, he was taught as a boy and uses the language on several occasions throughout the series, including in this book. Why couldn't he just talk to the sailors in Greek himself?

Spiro's vault can only be opened by Spiro himself, but the guards change every hour and Spiro doesn't go to the vault every hour of his life to let the guards in, so how do they get in?

Petra is reading some details about the size of a murder weapon used to commit 6 similar murders. The diameter of the weapon is estimated at 77 centimeters. It says according to Petra's ruler, 77 centimeters is 3 inches. This should be 77 millimeters as 77 centimeters is about 30 inches.

In Part 3, Chapter 33, two news reporters come to see Annie and interview her about the missing policeman. She walks out with a shotgun full of "double-ought buck", fires a warning shot, and then when she re-enters the house she magically has a rifle, not a shotgun.

In the start of Part 6, the men let Percy out of the closet. They take the tape off his mouth and he starts to rub his lips, then lowers his hand to speak. Problem is he's still in the straight-jacket at this point.

In Chapter 5, Koontz explains how Grandma Rowena started smacking her lips while eating, at the age of 75. He then says this same event happened "halfway between her seventh and eighth decades". But at 75, she is actually halfway between her eighth and ninth decades (or, if you prefer, halfway through her eighth decade) - much like the 1700s are the 18th century, not the 17th.

The Longsword Fighter that landed in Ascendant Justice's hangar bay is repeatedly referred to as a Pelican on pages 75, 93, 95 and more.

The age of Tom Hagen when he moved in with the Corleones is never consistent. At the start of Book I, Michael says Tom was 12 when Sonny brought him home and demanded they take him in; later in Book I, Tom says both he and Sonny were both 11. Then, in Book III, when recounting how Sonny had taken part in an armed robbery when he was 16, Don Corleone says that Tom had been living with them for three years at this point, which would place Sonny and Tom at 13 when Tom moved in.

In chapter 18 Scudder visits Dr. Nadler at his Manhattan office but in chapter 32 we hear that Nadler was in Martha's Vineyard at the time.

The main reason the antimatter bomb was not found, according to the book, is because it is small enough to be hidden anywhere. However, there was a wireless camera watching the bomb all the time. The wireless camera, just like any wireless device, is basically a radio transmitter and receiver, so all they would need is a device displaying the signal strength coming from the camera (having no such device, the CERN could probably borrow some). Where the signal is the strongest, there is the bomb. It is improbable that there wasn't a single person understanding how wireless devices work.

This is from the American hardcover copy, near the end of the book. On page 283, Opal says "Whoever is passing wind, please stop it, or I will devise a fitting punishment." Then on page 297 (it is the same time, but from Mulch's point of view instead of Opal's) Opal says "NOW, whoever is passing wind, please stop it, or I will devise a fitting punishment." Since it is the same time on both pages, she should say exactly the same thing.

When Clay and Tom are threatening to break into the hotel, Tom says "I'm going to grab a kerbstone and smash the glass", but Clay says "A curbstone?" Since they both say it, there should be no spelling error.

Near the beginning of the book, an imp says 'Are you going to warp today, Runt, or will pink flowers grow out of my armpits?' But later on in the book No. 1 says 'Pink! We don't have a word for that colour in the demon commonspeak'.

On Page 69 (Part One: Blood Sport) the Owner of the Kelly Fruit Company is called Hubert, but on page 217 (Part Three: Wreckage), his name changes to Henry.

Diana Foxton's hair goes from blonde to brunette and back again over a couple of pages.

When Lowrie first shows Meg his wish list, she says that they would have to travel the length and breadth of Ireland to complete them. However, she doesn't know what two of them mean so how does she know that they're going to travel that far.

When Mulch helps Holly and Artemis from the trunk of the car, when they've gone back in time, it says that he burps. Yet in the first book it says that all dwarf wind is passed down, soMulch is incapable of burping.

Anything that is not a living part of the Invisible Man is visible; for example, the food he eats is visible until it is digested. However, for some reason his hair, beard and the tips of his fingernails, though nothing more than dead cells, are invisible. Several scholars have noted this as a mistake.

Among the monkeys and apes waiting in Africa to be cured by the doctor, orang-utans are mentioned. But orang-utans are not native to Africa, and it is highly unlikely that they might have crossed the Indian Ocean all the way from Borneo.

In Chapter 4, Garraty thinks about Jan and her long, dark hair. Later, in Chapter 6, he once again thinks of her, this time with her long, blonde hair.

When Fitz and the Fool have swapped bodies, after Fitz repairs the Fool's body, he "uses their combined strength" to lift himself - in the Fool's body - up to touch foreheads with his own body. Then he and the Fool go into their proper bodies. However, Fitz then says that he "straightened up and looked down at the Fool in my arms." This isn't possible, because the Fool's body had moved upward, but Fitz's hadn't moved downward. Yet the Fool doesn't move, Fitz does.