Deborah Cooke: Author

I’ve probably talked about this before, but I have page proofs to read this week, so that makes me think about it again.

One of the things that I try to get aspiring authors to do when I teach workshops is to figure out how many books they can comfortably write per year. This is a useful thing to know, because it can help that author make informed decisions. You have to be reasonably prolific to write for two houses, for example, or to write category. In both of those cases, frequent publication is a big part of success. Authors who write more slowly might do better writing longer books, single title books, mainstream books or in genres other than romance – which is probably the most geared to frequent publication of all the genres.

But there’s a big squish factor in that calculation, one that is hard to grasp for aspiring writers. That variable is the time commitment required from the author to aid in the production process of the sold book. Authors sell a book manuscript to a publishing house, but that manuscript has to make its way through the production cycle to become a book. Along the way, the author’s input and involvement is expected. It’s hard for authors who have never gone through this production cycle to anticipate how long it will take to do each step, which makes it hard for them to add enough buffer into their own expectations of how many books they can write per year.

So, let’s look at the production cycle of a print book and get a better idea of what the author needs to do at each step of the process.

1/ Revisions

Once upon a time, revisions only occurred when there were major changes to be made to the book manuscript. If the editor thought the hero was unsympathetic, for example, on a delivered book, and that hero needed a personality transplant, a revision would be requested. Smaller items, like clarifying the timeline or how characters got from point A at the end of chapter 3 to point B at the beginning of chapter 4 (usually resolved with a single sentence) were left for the next stage of the production cycle, the line edit. As print publishing has moved to digital delivery, though, it has become increasingly common to make ALL changes, even teeny ones, before the book manuscript is transmitted to Production.

This means that revisions used to happen once in a while. Now they happen every time. There’s always something small to tweak or clarify.

In terms of timeline, it’s typical to hear back from an editor 4 to 6 weeks after delivery of the manuscript. At this point, the book will already be on the schedule, so there will be deadlines from Production to be met in order to ensure that there are printed books in the stores on time. Deadlines from Production trump everything. For a major revision, the author will be allowed about a month to deliver a revised manuscript. If the author can’t do the revision in that time – which might involve rewriting the entire book – the publication slot will likely be pushed out into the future. Minor revisions will be given a week or two. Generally, the book manuscript will be transmitted to Production about 11 months before the on sale date.

2/ Copy Edit and Line Edit

These are two separate processes, which are viewed by the author at the same time, when both have been completed. A freelance copy editor is hired by the house to read the ms for continuity, grammar, house style, etc. etc. The line edit is done by the acquiring editor, and is more focussed on broader issues – does this book adhere to reader expectations for this sub-genre, for example. In reality, both editors mark anything they see as a problem.

Once upon a time, the copy edit was returned to the author in physical form – it was the printed manuscript that the author had originally delivered (or a photocopy of it) marked up in red pencil by the copy editor and regular pencil by the acquiring editor. The author must review the edits, answer queries, clarify as requested or STET changes to which he or she does not agree, then return the copyedited manuscript to the house.

Once again, there are deadlines provided by the Production department. It is typical for the copy edit to turn up 6 or 8 weeks after the author delivers the revised manuscript. It will be expected back in Production in about two weeks. When a physical manuscript was involved, the transit time between house and author often came out of the author’s two week review period. Couriers got lots of business out of this process.

Now, many houses work digitally, so the copyedited manuscript is transmitted to the author by email in a great whonking attachment. It must be reviewed by the author and returned to the house, usually with a similar two week window.

Some houses send the worksheet done by the freelance copy editor. I really prefer to see this, as it cites the reference sources used by the copy editor (which dictionary, for example, as well as NYT or Chicago Book of Style). The copy editor makes a list of the first mention of all characters, often referring to previous books in the series, citing spelling of their name and some pertinent detail(s). There’s also a vocabulary list, which includes spellings favoured by the author (when there’s a choice) and the spelling of words manufactured by the author. (Like dragonfire, or angelfire, in my respective cases.) And it lists style choices, like the fact that the role of each member of the Pyr is always capped (the Smith, the Wyvern), that Pyr and Slayer are set in italics, that Pyr is both singular and plural, but that Slayers is in italics with a roman “s”.  Any errors found in the style sheets and marked up can be repaired globally in Production (we love “search and replace”!) and will be carried forward to the style sheets for subsequent books.

The author is not the only one reviewing the manuscript at each of these phases. It is also read inhouse – changes from both copy editor and author are reviewed by the acquiring editor, and the manuscript is read for clarity in Production, as well.

3/ Page Proofs

About 6 – 8 weeks after the copy edit has been returned to the house, the manuscript will turn up again on author’s doorstep, as first pass page proofs. (Some writers call this the Boomerang Effect. Each time an author sends the book back to the house, in 6 – 8 weeks, it boings right back again!) These pages look like the finished book’s pages.

Once upon a time, these proofs were from typesetting – now they are from digital conversions of the files to the final format. The author must read the page proofs for typographical errors, again in time to meet a deadline from the Production department. It’s also the last chance for catching continuity errors. Page proofs remain physical proofs – at many houses, the author is required only to send back those pages with corrections. Some people fax them, depending upon how “clean” the proofs are.

Things like lost page breaks or scene breaks become apparent in the page proofs. With my angel series, for example, we have a lot of font changes – the information that appears from databanks or in newspaper articles is set in a different font than the rest of the book, and starts on a new page. Inconsistencies in this become clear in the page proofs and can be corrected then. Things like dedications and acknowledgements can be added at this point. Since every single page of the printed book is included, the copyright registration can be checked, as well as the front matter – these are the pages before the book starts and often include review quotes or excerpts. The end matter – the pages after the end of the book – is not usually included. End matter is often advertising for the author’s own books or similar books from the house. Maybe it’s not included because people are still deciding upon it.

The Production department also reads the page proofs simultaneously, and reads them again after the author’s changes have been integrated into the text.

When there are Advanced Reading Copies made for the book, they are always made from the first pass page proofs. So, an author will often receive ARC’s – if there are to be any – while he or she is reading page proofs, or just after he or she has sent them back to the house. This means that if no one will tell you for sure whether there will be ARC’s – they might not know – by one month after you read page proofs, you will know for sure. You’ll either have them or not, and that will be that.

4/ Finished Books

The next time the author sees the book, it will be a finished product. These will likely be the author’s complementary copies, the quantity of which has been stipulated in the contract. Some houses ship comps in advance of publication date. Some ship them on publication date. Some editors are sweeties and send an early copy to the author so the author can see it sooner. Sometimes the first time an author sees his or her own book is displayed in the bookstore.

5/ Implications

So, what does this mean, in terms of the author’s time? More importantly, what does it mean in terms of the author budgeting that time, in making commitments for deliveries in advance? Is there any way to get a grip on the squish factor?

This post is getting quite long, so let’s have a look at those questions tomorrow.