I dropped a thumb drive containing my dad's book off at the editor's home on February 25th, as planned. She indicated that she would need two weeks to do her editing, which was fine as I was leaving for a week's vacation that day. In fact, I got an email from her while on my cruise that she was done with the editing, and that the thumb drive was ready to be picked up. I headed over to her house on March 6th to pick it up.
From the email correspondence I had received, I knew that this editor was going to be way more thorough than the editor I had hired for my first book. And indeed, she was. In addition to the normal items I figured she would be looking at, she also gave helpful suggestions about moving some items around to make the story flow better. Also, I always thought I was the Comma Queen, but she likes commas even more than I do. I probably won't add some of the suggested commas, even if they should be included, because to me they look wrong in the sentence. Particularly in sentences where I already have an abundance of commas due to dates and listings of items.
But the main thing I am struggling with is how to show numbers - numerically or spelled out. There are a LOT of numbers in this book. I have researched this online and have gotten conflicting information. I don't really like the way the editor has indicated I should do them, even knowing that she follows the Chicago Manual of Style. It just seems weird to me to have numbers in the same sentence handled differently - like I couldn't make up my mind or something. I guess these things will be the author's prerogative.
Other than the numbers game, I have incorporated the changes into the manuscript. Now all that is left is to do the indexing. I have emailed the designer to see if he can begin laying the book out before he receives the index. It seems to me that I can't really index if I don't know what page the name will appear on. Right?
1 comment:
Names and numbers are always confusing. And, commas, too. It all sounds like progress.
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