We’ve been talking about proposals and reviewing for some time now, and so I thought this week we’d go into a bit more detail on manuscripts. Specifically, what it is that we at Tithebarn Press do with manuscripts once they arrive.
I should stress that whereas in some of my recent updates I’ve talked in quite broad terms about how academic publishers in general behave, this post applies particularly to us. Some of what I describe here would be handled similarly at a large commercial or university press, much would be quite different. I’m not planning to get into that in any detail, not least because my own picture of this is only partial. I have written previously about what makes us different here if you’d like to know more.
So you’ve had your initial discussions with us, written your proposal, had it reviewed, responded to your reviewers and then finished your manuscript. You’ve sent it in to us (shortly before your agreed deadline, naturally), now what happens?
Advisory Edit
I’ve actually cheated a bit here, because we would often start doing this before the full manuscript comes in. It’s a relatively fuzzy and adaptable process. Even so, I think it’s useful to touch on this aspect of the process in this context.
Whether it’s when we receive your full draft manuscript, or on a more piecemeal basis as you’re writing, we’ll undertake a first pass where the aim is to look at structure and style, and assess whether the substance of the text is communicated clearly. We’ll comment on content where we have questions, especially if we think readers would benefit from, for example, more contextualisation or explanation. This isn’t usually a fact check, but if your particular book merits this for some reason, this is when we would do that too.
This stage is very customised to your needs, and so it may be very involved on our part, or fairly hands-off, depending on how much support you need in your writing. Confident authors with native (or equivalent) English and many books under their belt usually don’t need much help here, whereas authors unused to writing at length in English will be given all the help they need to ensure their book says what they want it to.
Copy-edit
In a scenario where we don’t start the advisory edit until we have a full manuscript in-house, these stages will typically overlap, especially if the manuscript doesn’t need a very thorough edit for style and structure.
This is the stage where we’re looking to correct any mistakes, whether that be spelling, punctuation, grammar, keeping references consistently formatted, etc. We’ll do our best to ensure the text flows smoothly and has no typographical errors. It’s generally the closest read that we do, because we’re looking to fix fairly small details, rather than concern ourselves with big thematic and structural issues.
At the end of this stage we will send you a marked-up version of your file, and we’ll need you to confirm (or reject) our proposed changes. A lot of the time this is quite simple, but sometimes we’ll over-correct, or otherwise introduce new errors inadvertently, so it gives you a chance to pick up on any of this before we move forward. It’s also your last chance to incorporate any substantial changes to the manuscript. Substantial generally meaning any changes of more than a sentence or two at a time.
Proofs
Once we have the approved copy-edited manuscript, we will proceed to layout page proofs for the whole book. We will also finalise the cover design (which usually would have been under discussion while you were writing).
This is the stage where you’ll get to see what your text and images look like when laid out as a book. We’ll send you a pdf file to check over in case any errors have slipped in or been overlooked so far, often things do jump out when you see the text looking like a book that were easy to miss when it was a Word document. It’s important to understand that this is not the time to introduce drastic changes to your text. However, because we handle the layout directly, we are able to make more changes than most book publishers would be willing to at this stage. Even so, changing the odd word or sentence here or there is OK, but it really is too late for radical revisions to style or structure.
In the meantime, we’ll also be proofreading the laid-out files, checking for errors and highlighting keywords for the Index.
Index
Many publishers will expect you either to compile your index for yourself, or will give you the option of paying (though often by deduction from your royalties) for a professional to put it together. My advice when I worked for Routledge was always that as the person who knows your book best, you are likely to be the best person to compile an index for it. I still stand by this, and would advise you to consider it. However, I also understand that not everybody has the time or the patience to go through this process, and so we offer a few options:
- You provide us with all the information to compile the index from, so a list of terms, with the relevant page numbers (we can provide a very simple excel template for this).
- You provide us with just the list of key terms, and we do the rest.
- We’ll collate a list of key terms and run it past you to confirm, before we complete the index.
- You can opt to pay a freelance indexer – this is a good option if you want a more complex (perhaps with lots of subcategories, for example) index than you or we are able to prepare.
First Print Copies
Once we have agreed the final complete files and cover design with you, we get them setup with our supplier and order print copies to check. Unless there is an urgent need to make the book available extremely quickly, we try to get copies in your hands and ours before it goes live for sale, to give a visual check that we’re all happy with how it looks. This should really just be a last “just in case”, but it’s still possible to make small changes with our supplier without penalty at this point, so it’s worth being sure.
Go Live
Now that we’ve al signed off on the first print copies, we can go live with our distributor. This will make all print versions of the book, as well as the ebook, available to purchase. They should start appearing in all the places you would expect online, and in the database of books that bookshops can order from. We will also have purchase links up on our site for customers to buy directly.
The next step, of course, is to promote the book, ensuring that as many people are aware of it, and excited about it, as possible. That, however, is a topic all of its own for another week.
Hopefully reading through this update, and its companion pieces from previous weeks, has given you a good sense of what our process looks like and what we in particular can offer. If you’d like to discuss a book project with us, please do get in touch on simon.bates@tbarnpress.com.
