I just finished compiling another issue of the SPAWN Market Update for the member area of the SPAWN website. That’s Small Publishers, Artists and Writers Network, http://www.spawn.org.
In so doing, I had occasion to check publishers’ guidelines, their announced calls for submissions and their press releases with some innovative new publishing options for authors. Guess what I read over and over and over again:
“Send your completed manuscript ONLY after it has been professionally edited.”
Yup, this bit of advice can make the difference between a contract and a rejection letter. And it often does.
You hear that publishers will run a manuscript through their editorial department before sending it to the printers. And they do. Most publishers have specific editorial requirements and they want their stable of editors to make sure your excellent manuscript conforms. But a manuscript that is not professionally edited when the publisher receives it, won’t get this far in the process.
After you have gone through your manuscript numerous times looking at it from all possible angles and checking for all possible problems, it is time to hire an editor.
Here are some of the things your savvy editor will look for when editing your perfect manuscript:
• Spacing. It is now one space between sentences, not two!
• Punctuation. Are you using quotation marks and single quotes correctly? Are you creating the em-dash correctly? What about commas and exclamation points? Do you place them only where they need to be?
• Hyphens, etc. Do you know when it is two words, one word or a hyphenated word? (Many authors are inconsistent in this area. For example, they write heartbreaking on page 12, heart breaking on page 76 and heart-breaking on page 101.)
• Capitalization. Do you know when to capitalize Mom, Father, etc. and when not to? Have you been consistent in your capitalization of special words you use in your story or nonfiction book?
• Spelling. Have you triple checked your spelling? Are you consistent in the way you spell names and other specialized words you’ve chosen for your book?
• Mistakes. Have you checked for misused and extra words leftover when you’ve made changes? (These can be really hard to catch.) Maybe you changed someone’s name along the way—did you remember to make that change in all places?
• Clarity. Are your sentences tight, clear and necessary to your nonfiction book or your story? Is there enough explanation? Could someone from Mars read this sentence or paragraph and comprehend it? (Be careful here. Often, folks who engage in muddy writing rarely recognize the mud in the writing. Another good reason to hire an editor.)
• Is your story told or your how-to book organized logically? Does it flow? I can’t tell you how many times I have to help an author reorganize his or her material or story so that it works.
Each phase of preparing a book for publication is important and editing is one of the most important. After you have self-edited to your satisfaction, hire an experienced book editor and see the difference he or she can make with your amazing project.
http://www.patriciafry.com
http://www.matilijapress.com
PLFry620@yahoo.com