Working with your publisher's copyeditor on book edits

Before I get to the topic of today's blog, I'd like to tell you what I did yesterday afternoon. I was invited to speak to the Writers' Guild and the Fantasy Book Club at Davis Drive Middle School in Cary, NC. It was an honor, a pleasure, and so much fun to talk to and answer the questions of this amazing group of fantasy fans and future authors. I loved it! Thank you so much for inviting me!

Since I'm doing the final proofing on Armed & Magical this week, I thought I'd tell you about the book editing process from my point of view. In yesterday's blog, I talked about working with my editor Anne Sowards to edit manuscript content. Today I'll tell you what happens in the final two steps of the process -- copyeditors and proofreaders. Thank you, Tia of Fantasy Debut for the topic suggestion! ; )

Once I've finished any manuscript revisions with my editor Anne, a printout of the book is sent to me and to my publisher's copy editor. This gives me a chance to read over it not only for typos, but to make any final tweaks to the copy. For example, in Armed & Magical, I needed to tweak a paragraph to more clearly explain a subplot point (thank you Savannah for catching that one!). This is the last chance an author gets to make big changes like that in the copy, because the next step for the book is typesetting. Once a book is typeset, it is very expensive to the publisher to make changes that could cause copy to reflow. Needless to say, your editor will encourage you to do anything you want to do before the book is typeset.

The copyeditor is also checking for inconsistencies in the copy For example: I referred to there being six Khrynsani shamans in an alley fight on page 36, but when Raine is recalling it later on page 147, I said there were five. (What can I say, I'm a word person, I'm horrible at math.) Book copyeditors are incredible; they catch inconsistencies, logic, when something is unclear, confusing, or contradictory, and yep, they catch a writer's bad math. ; ) This is also the point where you include your Dedication, Acknowledgements, and About the Author information.

Once the corrections/changes are made, the book is typeset. The final step in the editing process is the page proofs. The book is typeset, so it makes it so much easier to find the last of the typos. And since I'm an editor/proofreader in my day job, I'm also looking for bad word breaks, etc. Ideally at this stage, the only changes made should be corrections: spelling, wrong word, character name missing a letter. And as was missed in MLTF, Tam was called "Tom" in one place. Hey, we're professionals, but we're only human. Mistakes happen. ; ). Brownie points to whoever is the first to tell me what page that mistake is on. ACTUALLY, let's make it a contest. I'll send the winner a MLTF cover fridge magnet. It's the same size as the postcards.

Feel free to ask me any specific questions on today's and yesterday's blogs. I only covered the main points. I'd be glad to answer any questions you have. Don't be shy. Either respond to the blog or email me (lisa@lisashearin.com).

Coming up on Friday: When I'm on deadline and cooking dinners, I always make a double batch so I can freeze part of it. That way, Derek and I can have a good (but quick) meal when I need to get up to my office to work. So every Friday for the next month or so, I'll post "Recipes for feeding your family while you're on deadline." I'll post my favorites. And even if you're not a writer on deadline, having something that you can cook and freeze some for later is great time-saver. This Friday, I'll give you my recipe for Cincinnati Chili -- or as Derek and I call it, Chocolate Chili. Yep, it's got chocolate in it, and it is decadent. ; )

Lisa