diff --git a/backend/README.md b/backend/README.md
index 9eeeb64..2b1f97a 100644
--- a/backend/README.md
+++ b/backend/README.md
@@ -8,7 +8,7 @@ and initialize it with the `sql/init.sql` script:
 $ cat sql/init.sql | sqlite3 users.db
 ```
 
-You also need to create a `.env` file with the following variables:
+You need to create a `.env` file with the following variables:
 
 - `JWT_SECRET`: Required. A cryptographically secure string used to encode
 tokens.
diff --git a/backend/user.go b/backend/user.go
index 2a63882..95f1ef4 100644
--- a/backend/user.go
+++ b/backend/user.go
@@ -55,7 +55,7 @@ func NewUserHandler() (*UserHandler, error) {
 	jwt_secret_str := os.Getenv("JWT_SECRET")
 	// Return any errors
 	if jwt_secret_str == "" {
-		return nil, err
+		return nil, errors.New("no JWT_SECRET provided in .env")
 	}
 	jwt_secret := []byte(jwt_secret_str)