{"id":1731,"date":"2012-12-04T18:32:02","date_gmt":"2012-12-05T00:32:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.paksworld.com\/blog\/?p=1731"},"modified":"2012-12-06T12:42:03","modified_gmt":"2012-12-06T18:42:03","slug":"page-proofs-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.paksworld.com\/blog\/?p=1731","title":{"rendered":"Page Proofs"},"content":{"rendered":"

I am now spending my days peering carefully, line by line, at the copy of the copy-edited manuscript (on the left) and the page proofs (on the right.)\u00a0 These two stacks of paper, and the “completed” pages of each (to the right of the right stack and the left of the left stack) take up a significant portion of the kitchen table.\u00a0 So far I’ve found only two\u00a0 errors.\u00a0 One where my correction of the CE’s change wasn’t picked up (same change was picked up elsewhere) and one where both the CE and I missed an original error. \u00a0 This is good, and I may skim a little faster later on, even though I know there’s a late change to watch out for.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Kitchen table set up for page proofs: from top to bottom, checked copy edit, copy edit, page proofs, checked page proofs.\u00a0 Pages sticking out toward camera have errors.\u00a0\u00a0 Instruction letters from publisher to the right, with pencil sharpener, also 3×5 yellow card w\/notes. <\/em><\/p>\n

It’s hard work, though it probably doesn’t sound hard, because my eye and brain want to focus on the story, not on the word by word, punctuation mark by punctuation mark sequence of meaningful marks on the paper.\u00a0 I keep losing focus and discovering that I’ve zipped past three or four paragraphs on one or the other stack without doing the careful comparison.\u00a0\u00a0 I’m very glad there’s at least one other proofreader involved.<\/p>\n

Just before these came in, I finished up an essay for a collection of essays by people honoring Anne McCaffrey.\u00a0\u00a0 The changes the editor asked for have passed muster (at least mostly–we’ll be visiting it again in February)\u00a0 but there were some intense days on it.\u00a0 When you care a lot about a person, writing about that person can be very difficult.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It was in this instance, too.\u00a0\u00a0 I had submitted some possible topics (naturally, the editor didn’t want everyone to write about the same thing)\u00a0 and due to email mixups did not receive the editor’s pick of my suggestions until fairly late.<\/p>\n

Anne was not only a writer I had read and admired for decades before I met her, but as the senior writer in our two collaborations, she was both a model of professionalism and a warm and helpful friend.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Generous with her time and with her expertise–I learned a lot from her.<\/p>\n

Anyway…I’m head-down in the page proofs, and so far pretty happy with the text, beyond the “word, comma, word, word, word, word period.\u00a0\u00a0 Open quotes,\u00a0 Word, word, word,\u00a0 comma, close quotes, word word period…” proofing. \u00a0 There are bits I’d forgotten, that I’m thinking “Hey–that was pretty neat, that little bit right there.”<\/p>\n

I hope to finish them this week.\u00a0\u00a0 (I’d better–they’re due back the 13th and shipping this close to the holidays gets weird.\u00a0 I will keep notes on any errors found and be ready to email those with page numbers if necessary.)<\/p>\n

The page proofs as they are will be the basis for the ARCs.\u00a0\u00a0 The corrected page proofs are what should be on the page.<\/p>\n

And now….back to the kitchen table.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Anyone want to start making suggestions on what our contest for an ARC should be this year?<\/p>\n

LATER EDIT.\u00a0 Thought you might enjoy a picture of the workspace.\u00a0 Clearly, we are not eating at the table for the duration.\u00a0 Copy edit and page proof work both take up the only large flat space in the house.\u00a0 For copy editing, the Chicago Manual of Style and a dictionary are also on the table, though only two stacks (unchecked, and checked) of paper.\u00a0\u00a0 I had a photocopy made of the copy edits I returned, and it’s very useful, both for transferring the copy edits to the computer file (when I have time–hasn’t happened yet) and for checking the page proofs against the CE’d version.\u00a0 It also allows me to reference the pages on the CE where the page proofs do not agree, and see what might have caused the confusion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I am now spending my days peering carefully, line by line, at the copy of the copy-edited manuscript (on the left) and the page proofs (on the right.)\u00a0 These two stacks of paper, and the “completed” pages of each (to the right of the right stack and the left of the left stack) take up […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[107],"class_list":["post-1731","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-writing-life","tag-the-writing-life"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.paksworld.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1731"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.paksworld.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.paksworld.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.paksworld.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.paksworld.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1731"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.paksworld.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1731\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1735,"href":"http:\/\/www.paksworld.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1731\/revisions\/1735"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.paksworld.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1731"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.paksworld.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1731"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.paksworld.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1731"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}