Homophones Hurt Your Writing: Gnu, Knew, New, and Nu

Welcome to this edition of Words For Thought, the blog on wordrefiner.com. Like many of the previous blogs we are looking at homophones. Words that sound the same but have different spellings and meanings. 
I understand how important it is to have an error-free manuscript. With over 40 years of experience, I have found that homophones give almost every writer trouble at some point. Because we sound words out in our mind, it is easy to write the wrong word.
Let’s not forget typographical errors also, a slip of the finger on the keyboard can create a different word that may not be caught by a spell-checker. There are many groups of words that vary by only one letter, such as must, mist and most. These three words have vowels that are beside each other on the keyboard. I have blogged about many of these groups of words.
The correctly spelled word in the wrong context will not be flagged by most spell-checkers. Word Refiner is dedicated to uprooting all of these invisible errors and providing your document free of spelling errors that you want and deserve. I find invisible spelling errors in more than 95% of published books.

Now, onto today’s episode! Number ten in the series about quadruple homophones. #HighScore! #QuadrupleHomophones
Gnu is a stocky antelope living on the plains of east Africa. It’s shaggy, has a beard and curving horns. It is also a minor computer operating system and free software favored by many hobbyists.
Knew is the past tense of know, which has to do with information found through inquiry, observation, or shared. An archaic definition includes use of the word as a euphemism for sexual intercourse.
New is something original, different, previously unknown, or improved.
Nu is the 13th letter of the Greek alphabet. It can also refer to the thirteenth star in an astronomical constellation. It is also a symbol used in equations and stands for frequency. A more common use is as a slang term for “new” used in talking about a variation of music or some other form of art or entertainment. It is even used in the name of a band “Nu Shooz” from Portland, Oregon. Finally, NU is the official postal abbreviation for Nunavut, a group of islands in the Canadian Arctic.
 
There they are, four words with identical sounds.  If you use the wrong word your reader might think they tripped on an unseen bump while reading and lose the momentum you worked so hard to create.  Use every tool available to prevent that from happening, do not give your readers a reason to abandon your story. Use Word Refiner, beta readers, critique partners, proofreaders and editors to ensure that your work is error free and as smooth as possible.
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Thanks for stopping by, I hope you enjoyed this issue of Homophones Hurt Your Writing on Words For Thought.  Follow me on twitter: @wordrefiner, for more information about hazardous homophones search for #HomophonesHurtYourWriting or #TyposHurtYourWriting.
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Remember: Words Have Meaning and Spelling Makes a Difference.
​Copyright © 2018 Mark L Schultz