So... I'm not the only one who has this issue...

Peter Rozovsky reviews Payback by Mike Nicol and comments on the copy editing, or apparent lack thereof.  Read the entire review on his blog Detectives Beyond Borders.

Payback, by South Africa's Mike Nicol, is a terrific thriller: atmospheric, suspenseful, full of dark humor, with likable but dangerous protagonists and as evil (and believable) a villain as you're likely to find anywhere. It's the kind of book one can tell the author had tons of fun writing, and I'm having tons of fun reading it.

But my enjoyment has been marred occasionally by the sorts of errors that suggest the publishers were content to run a spell-check program rather than pay a competent proofreader:...