Editing and Proofing the Novel

This is kind of the crazy part of being an author publisher – wearing many hats through the work day is stimulating and exhausting – and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I am at the final leg, the home strait now, doing the fun part of book covers and book formatting, after struggling through the editing phase. All the while, also writing part two of Isobel and Dylan’s psychological tale of horror.

Finding a good editor is tough! There are plenty out there who, having realized there’s good money to be made in the new publishing paradigm, have hung out a shingle in the form of a blogsite. I went through many of these sites and eliminated those that had typos in their own web copy – one even spelt a menu item incorrectly! – and those who offered a ‘before and after’ example edit that showed no improvement on the original. After emailing a few, many were booked up months ahead (probably the good ones).

I had to go through a double trial and error with two different women, before finding the wonderful guy who completed the task in record time.

The first copy-editor sent me an invoice for a deposit without offering a sample edit. This should have been my first indication to run screaming the opposite direction, but I was getting desperate (Note to self : haven’t you learned yet that this is the point where fatal errors are made?) This woman was not only condescending in her notes on the first three chapters I’d sent, she thought it her task to rewrite my novel to her preference. I sent a polite mail. I received a response that did not address my concerns, itemized my personal faults and also threw devaluing blame in my face “We know you don’t like to be edited” – How did “we know” this and why was I paying hundreds of bucks for editing if I didn’t want it?

Narcissist alert.

I sent a polite mail back. As ever, not accepting my gut feeling that this person was not right, that somehow it must be me who was in error. She invoked some instance when she’d posted a rewrite of the blurb for “Magic” on her Facebook wall and some flying monkey said she liked it. She also demanded another payment.

Funny how the Universe continues to send reminders of the people we should not be maintaining in our lives. I cut my losses and made sure to request a sample from the next editor. The World Web is a marvel but some people make use of it in order to reduce their workload to a fraction while pretending to be a professional. When she finally sent me a mail, asking if I had sent the entire Doc as it seemed to cut off mid-scene, I hit the road again. And found the brilliant Martin.

A super job of copy-editing, a lesson that it’s okay to move away from people until you find the right match, and on to the next stage – formatting both print and E-book and getting the cover finished. Here I experienced another little blip – questioning whether I should split the 86k words of the novel into two parts of 43k for the start of a five-part serial. Although this is being heavily touted as the road to success by every author treading the boards, I decided against, feeling that a reader wants to be engrossed in a story, not left hanging. In many genres, the short series may work well, but not in contemporary fiction.

Did I make the right decision? Meanwhile, a sample of the cover image came in.

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