The Final Touch

I am so delighted to share with you the promo video for a soon-to-be-released book I’ve had the honor of edit­ing. Author Bathsheba Smithen is only in her mid-20s, but she has wis­dom beyond her years. Watch the video (Bathsheba is the first indi­vid­ual in it)… and then read the book’s Fore­word, below, which she also gave me the priv­i­lege of writing:

Editor’s Fore­word

“All is van­ity and a chas­ing after wind. … So I turned to con­sider wis­dom and mad­ness and folly…” (Eccle­si­astes 1:14 and oth­ers; 2:12, NRSV)

When Bathsheba Smithen first invited me to write this Fore­word, I replied with a laugh, “You want a pasty white girl from small-town Min­nesota to intro­duce a book by an African Amer­i­can from Wash­ing­ton, D.C.?!” Read the rest of this entry »

The fol­low­ing video pretty much speaks for itself. There are vary­ing view­points about whether an edi­tor should post his/her rates on a blog/website, but some of you have a gen­uine need to know, and your ques­tions gave me a great oppor­tu­nity to try out using video as a way to answer ques­tions. It was fun to do, though the learn­ing curve (at least for me) was a bit steep! Par­don the imper­fec­tions! (I do like, and I hope you will as well, the “inten­tional imper­fec­tions” of the Ani­moto* back­ground I opted to use — I think they make the whole thing artsy and fun!)

Oh, by the way, for those of you who don’t know me very well yet, the fact that my eyes dart back and forth is NOT because I’m speed-reading cue cards! It’s because I have a con­gen­i­tal con­di­tion called nys­tag­mus that affects the mus­cles of my eyes. Sorry it doesn’t look like I’m mak­ing eye con­tact with you!

Please let me know if you have any fur­ther ques­tions about how I might assist you with your writ­ing. And remem­ber: not just books; I’ll be glad to help with ad copy, school papers, resumes, let­ters, and more.

I invite you to view this and other videos on my YouTube chan­nel, “Final­TouchEdit.” If you find some­thing you like there, please click “Like.” I’d also love to hear from you, so please leave a com­ment here and/or on YouTube. And if you know some­one else who might be inter­ested in learn­ing about my ser­vices (or in see­ing the dar­ling cat video on my chan­nel!), please pass the links/URLs along to them. Thanks!

* http://​cmp​.ly/5

I’m get­ting really excited for June 27! That’s the day I’m attend­ing an all-day work­shop called “Edi­to­r­ial Boot Camp” in Min­neapo­lis, led by two women with years of pro­fes­sional expe­ri­ence in the copy­edit­ing field. Not only will they cover some aspects of proof­read­ing and copy­edit­ing, but they’ll also help par­tic­i­pants look at var­i­ous prac­tices for mak­ing the most of one’s own edi­to­r­ial busi­ness. I’ve been “learn­ing on the job” so far, as far as run­ning my own busi­ness goes, so I’m eager to gain some time-tested insights from Laura Poole and Car­olyn Has­sett, who have a com­bined 30+ years of editorial-business expe­ri­ence. I’ve already been get­ting to know Laura a bit via email and can sin­cerely rec­om­mend her, and this work­shop, to any of you who might have an interest.

Here is some info that comes directly from Laura and Carolyn:

Come to this unique, inten­sive pro­gram designed for those want­ing to break into the pub­lish­ing field as a copy edi­tor or proof­reader – and also for those who sim­ply want to boost their skills.

Sun­day, June 27, 2010 | 9am-6pm
Mall of Amer­ica (North Shore Room) | Min­neapo­lis, MN
Cost: $450/person (includes mate­ri­als)

Reg­is­tra­tion is now active, and we have room for 25 atten­dees; reg­is­ter now to reserve your space! (Scroll down the page a bit; their July work­shop is listed first, then the June 27 one.)

This will be a jam-packed full-day, hands-on train­ing. Here’s what we’ll cover (and more!):

• Overview of the Pub­lish­ing Process
  Style and Ref­er­ence Guides | MS Word Opti­miza­tion, Cus­tomiza­tion, Plug-ins, and Shortcuts

• Copy­edit­ing
  Spelling | Punc­tu­a­tion | Gram­mar | Style | Fact Check­ing | Queries | Author Voice
  Copy­righted Mate­r­ial | Style Sheets | Online Tools | Topic Specialties

• Proof­read­ing
  Stage of Proofs | Mark­ing | Mate­ri­als | Style and Spec Sheets | Steps | Tools | Spe­cialty Work | PDF Proofing

• Work Prac­tices
  Tips and Tricks | Time Man­age­ment | Com­mu­ni­ca­tion | Deal­ing with Problems

• Busi­ness Prac­tices
  Get­ting and Keep­ing Clients | Resumes | Sam­ple Edits | Rates and Billing | Follow-Up Options | Net­work­ing | Pro­fes­sion­al­ism | Deadlines

I had seen Laura’s infor­ma­tion on LinkedIn for a sim­i­lar work­shop she was host­ing in North Car­olina in March. I wrote and lamented that I couldn’t make it to some­thing that far away but to let me know if she was ever going to be in Min­nesota. Lo and behold!, a cou­ple months later, she emailed to say they would be in Min­neapo­lis! I know I have some Min­nesota friends who just might be inter­ested in this, so please do check it out if you are one of them!

If this work­shop isn’t some­thing specif­i­cally for you, I hope you’ll still be inter­ested to check back in here in late June to hear about what I expe­ri­enced and read my follow-up thoughts.

Kim Staflund has writ­ten an arti­cle for Suite 101 which may be of inter­est to some of you. It is titled “Work­ing with a Copy Edi­tor to Pol­ish a Book.”

Ms. Staflund makes sev­eral points I greatly appre­ci­ate. One con­cerns the very nor­mal emo­tions a writer is bound to expe­ri­ence upon receiv­ing his or her work back from a copy­ed­i­tor. You’ve sent your “baby” off to a stranger (unless, by chance, you are for­tu­nate to know your copy­ed­i­tor per­son­ally or to have reached the point in your rela­tion­ship where you are more than acquain­tances), and that “baby” has been returned to you with a “hair­cut,” as it were! It’s nat­ural to feel a bit of resis­tance to sug­ges­tions made. Ms. Staflund offers help­ful advice for work­ing through such feel­ings to con­tinue to improve your manuscript.

Another point I am so grate­ful Ms. Staflund made is that, ulti­mately, in the self-publishing world, the final results — text, graph­ics, every­thing — are the respon­si­bil­ity of the author. I live in some dread (fairly slight, but present nonethe­less) that if an author’s book doesn’t sell well, he or she will try to sue me. I don’t know whether that’s ever hap­pened, but I’m relieved to see, in another writer/editor’s words, the same point I always try to express clearly to clients: that I will do the very best I know how for you, but in the end, you have the final call of whether to accept or reject my sug­ges­tions for change — and the final respon­si­bil­ity for the results. I, after all, am just one writer/editor — a good one, if I say so myself! — but just one human being with one opin­ion, no mat­ter how valid I may believe it to be. I’m trained in what I do, but I’m not per­fect. I do pledge, how­ever, to do my best as one part of the author’s “vil­lage” that, together, will raise the “child” — the pre­cious piece of writ­ing — to maturity.

I just dis­cov­ered the Writer’s Digest Com­mu­nity http://​ping​.fm/​Z​JpCT and am excited to link up in yet another way with fellow/sister writ­ers and editors!

It astounds me how much I’ve heard and read in just the past week regard­ing con­nect­ing with oth­ers via social-networking sites! I know all these arti­cles and ideas didn’t just come about this week, so I gather it’s because my mind has sud­denly been opened to the con­cept, thanks to a sis­ter busi­ness­woman who has quickly become some­one I count as a friend (shout-out to Tanya Mor­ri­son: www​.360de​gree​woman​.org !) and who led me, in turn, to link up with Sab­rina Gib­son (www​.Social​Net​work​ingRock​Star​.com) under whose tute­lage I will begin a Social Net­work Max­i­miza­tion men­tor­ing pro­gram in just a cou­ple of weeks.

Social-networking sites have grown by leaps and bounds over the past few years, and they’re not just for swap­ping gos­sip or quips about one’s day any­more! Not that there’s any­thing wrong with that casual social­iz­ing, but I find myself intrigued and fas­ci­nated by the (still rel­a­tively) new oppor­tu­nity for broad­en­ing our com­mu­ni­ties, our busi­ness net­works, the knowl­edge base from which we may ben­e­fit, and — if we are will­ing — our world­views in such a rel­a­tively easy and inex­pen­sive way. Even those of us who are self-employed and fairly “solitarily-employed” are by no means “out here on our own” any­more! In the words of the beloved Mis­ter Rogers, “It’s such a good feel­ing…!” and “It’s a beau­ti­ful day in the [cyber-]neighborhood!… Won’t you be my neighbor?”