Working Productively with an Editorial Team

00:00:05:05 - 00:00:31:03
Cathy Hannabach

Hi everyone. Thank you for being here. Welcome to Working Productively with an Editorial Team. I'm Cathy Hannabach, founder and CEO of Ideas on Fire, the academic editing and indexing agency that helps interdisciplinary scholars turn brilliant ideas into publishable and often field-shaping books. And I'm realizing I need to turn on the captions here. There we go.

00:00:31:05 - 00:00:55:16
Cathy Hannabach

I'm really excited to welcome you to this third session in our First Book Publishing Series. This is a six-part series that walks authors through every stage of that first book journey, from proposal to publication and beyond. Across these six sessions, I'm joined by acquisitions editors, editorial directors, production editors, and marketing directors from more than a dozen leading university presses.

00:00:55:18 - 00:01:16:07
Cathy Hannabach

And we all are here to demystify that first book publishing process. At Ideas on Fire, we've helped hundreds of scholars refine their book proposals and book manuscripts, strengthen their arguments, and bring their books into the world. I know how much thought and care goes into first books in particular. They often hold a special place in our hearts as authors,

00:01:16:09 - 00:01:40:03
Cathy Hannabach

and we really love helping folks navigate that process. If during the webinar you have questions for any of us speakers, you can click the Q&A button at the bottom of your screen and you can enter them there. We'll have time at the end of the session today to get to some of those questions. So I'm very excited to be in conversation today with Miranda Baur, editorial and production manager at Syracuse University Press.

00:01:40:05 - 00:02:08:14
Cathy Hannabach

Rachel Fudge, who some of you already know, is Ideas on Fire’s editorial director. She's also with us and she'll be providing tech support, and she's going to be also be posting resources in the chat. Miranda and I are going to be talking today about how first book authors can work productively with their entire editorial team, not just to survive that process but to understand how the different people involved in that journey work together to get your book out to the world.

00:02:08:16 - 00:02:33:10
Cathy Hannabach

So to get us started, I want to briefly map out some of the various editors that make up an author's editorial team. I find that one of the biggest sources of confusions for first book authors in particular, but not exclusively, is that all of those people are called editors but they end up doing really different work on the book, and they do it at different stages, under different constraints, and in really different contexts.

00:02:33:12 - 00:02:59:10
Cathy Hannabach

Broadly speaking, most scholarly authors work with three different kinds of editors over the life of their book, and together those editors make up your author's editorial team. The first kind of category or group of editors are author-engaged editors. These are developmental editors, copyeditors, proofreaders, and indexers that authors hire directly to support their work.

00:02:59:12 - 00:03:28:00
Cathy Hannabach

For example, editorial agencies like Ideas on Fire and others work directly with authors on all parts of that journey: shaping book proposals, identifying presses and acquisitions editors for a given manuscript, helping authors revise manuscripts before and after peer review, preparing final manuscripts for production, crafting interdisciplinary indexes, and really supporting authors all the way through writing, revision,

00:03:28:02 - 00:03:51:13
Cathy Hannabach

more revision, yet more revision, production, publication, and even promotion and book marketing on the back end. A lot of presses, most presses I would say, strongly recommend this kind of author-engaged editorial support. That's why we work directly with authors who are referred to us by their acquisitions editors, as well as by various members of their scholarly communities.

00:03:51:15 - 00:04:16:23
Cathy Hannabach

The second group of editors that you'll encounter, and Miranda is an example of this, are in-house editors at the press that you're working with on your book. These include acquisitions editors, production editors—which you'll hear quite a lot about—as well as managing editors. These editors are employees of the publisher. Acquisitions editors, who you've heard from in two of the previous webinars in the series,

00:04:17:00 - 00:04:51:22
Cathy Hannabach

they work with you from proposal through publication. They help shepherd your book through the peer review process as well as the internal decision making process that the press goes through in determining whether to accept and ultimately publish your book. Production editors take over once the manuscript is accepted, and they coordinate the incredibly complex process of turning that raw manuscript into a finished physical book that you can hold in your hands and give to people that you care about.

00:04:51:24 - 00:05:15:23
Cathy Hannabach

Miranda is going to have a lot more to say about that role shortly. And third, some presses not all that. Some also hire freelance editors, usually individual copy editors or proofreaders or packaging companies or some combination thereof. Those folks usually complete specific, bounded tasks within the production process. Those editors are working on behalf of the press,

00:05:16:00 - 00:05:42:10
Cathy Hannabach

not directly for authors, so they're focused on the press schedule and scope and process. Their role is quite different from editors that an author hires directly, who tend to focus on the manuscript as a whole. Now often, but not exclusively, authors don't inherently interact with those folks directly, although that does vary by press and process and the particular circumstances of a particular book.

00:05:42:12 - 00:06:21:17
Cathy Hannabach

The key thing that we want to emphasize today is that all of those different editors, number one, they're not interchangeable. They don't do the same thing. They all do different things, but they're all vital parts of your full editorial team. Together, they form a single editorial ecosystem around your book. I find that when authors understand who does what in that process and when they do it and how and where they do it, authors often find that they have less stress around making decisions, about interpreting feedback, and ultimately about getting their book into the world, which is, of course, the goal of the publishing process itself.

00:06:21:19 - 00:06:43:24
Cathy Hannabach

So this is the framework that we're working from today as we talk about how to collaborate productively with that full editorial team. So to start us off, Miranda, I would love to ground this in your perspective as a production editor, because I find that a lot of authors have questions about production editing. It's perhaps less well understood from the author perspective.

00:06:44:01 - 00:07:00:05
Cathy Hannabach

But it's this incredibly vital role in the book publishing process. So as a production editor, what parts of the publishing and the author relationship process are you responsible for? And what do you wish first book authors understood about that process?

00:07:00:07 - 00:07:13:24
Miranda Baur

Yeah, totally. Hello all. Cathy, you just said everything so beautifully. Thank you for speaking with me and letting me be a part of Ideas on Fire. You know, I'm a fan girl. Y'all are great.

00:07:14:01 - 00:07:16:01
Miranda Baur

So here at Syracuse University Press, I am taking projects from a copyediting stage, where we've already gone through acquisitions. And they have since transmitted them to us. I'm choosing a copyeditor for the project, and then we're going through layout design, typesetting, proofreading, and indexing as well, all the way from Word manuscript files to a physical book in our hands.

00:07:43:05 - 00:08:08:04
Miranda Baur

One of the first things that I'm doing is having those conversations with acquisitions and seeing who a good fit for a copyeditor would be. We have a really substantial Middle East studies list, and so sometimes we have to find copyeditors who know Arabic because that's really important for the project to do well. Other times we can have a book that, we do translation.

00:08:08:04 - 00:08:34:13
Miranda Baur

So those are more fiction titles. And we really want someone who has experience working in fiction. Choosing the copyeditor sets the stage for the rest of production and what we would be looking for in other freelancers along the way. My hope for first time authors is that they understand that the decisions that we make are all to take care of the manuscript and to maintain its integrity.

00:08:34:15 - 00:08:58:07
Miranda Baur

We are experts in making books, not in your field. So we rely on you for the subject matter things. Any questions that we have come from a place of maintaining style and structure. Sometimes they're just from curiosity. But it's never to poke holes in an argument or anything. It's all from a place of maintaining that style and structure.

00:08:58:09 - 00:09:20:20
Miranda Baur

It's not really a wish but a hope is that first time authors understand that copyediting and proofreading are not same thing. Copyediting is where you're at a sentence structure level saying, “Am I using the right word here? The copyeditor is kind of confused by my very long sentences. Should I shorten them?”

00:09:20:22 - 00:09:42:15
Miranda Baur

Questions like that. And then proofreading is going to happen later on, typically after layout. And that's a quicker check to the pages. Look good. Any factual grammatical errors? It shouldn't be nearly as complicated as copyediting, but I often see from first time authors where I'll say, “Okay, so next up is copyediting.

00:09:42:15 - 00:10:00:02
Miranda Baur

Here's what's going to happen in the schedule.” And then they're like, “Proofreading, I got it. Right. Okay.” So I think that's a good thing to know for first time authors, especially initially stepping into production.

00:10:00:04 - 00:10:20:15
Cathy Hannabach

Nice. We also encounter a lot of that confusion around the line between copyediting and proofreading. Sometimes authors will ask for proofreading when what they really need is copyediting. Those terms are used in a technical sense in the publishing industry, but they're also used in a non-technical sense outside of that.

00:10:20:15 - 00:10:43:00
Cathy Hannabach

So I find it's it's important for those of us who work on the publishing side of things to remember that while these terms are, you know, we use them in really specific ways, not everyone does. Just being upfront and explaining the differences to authors, I think that goes over really well and it helps them see the value of both of them.

00:10:43:01 - 00:10:43:24
Cathy Hannabach

Right.

00:10:44:01 - 00:10:47:08
Miranda Baur

Exactly. Yeah.

00:10:47:10 - 00:11:07:08
Cathy Hannabach

I find that one of the one of the most common stress points that we find from authors, that we hear about from authors, is around feedback, particularly when it's coming from multiple editors or multiple people in the publishing process. And they're trying to figure out which feedback should I listen to and follow?

00:11:07:08 - 00:11:33:09
Cathy Hannabach

Which can I ignore, which can I just say no thank you, that's not the direction I want to go? And how do I navigate that? All when I'm trying to get somebody to pay a lot of money to publish my book? So I'm curious, from a production perspective, how do you think first time authors can best navigate feedback, particularly if it feels conflicting or maybe overwhelming or even just unclear?

00:11:33:11 - 00:11:51:00
Miranda Baur

I think the first thing is to always ask questions. If you're unsure about something, just reach out or happy to talk about anything. I've never met an editor who wasn't willing to talk about why they made a decision. We're pretty open to that. A lot of our edits are going to be related to style guides.

00:11:51:03 - 00:12:13:06
Miranda Baur

So again if there are questions, sometimes editors will just be like, “Well, according to Chicago Manual of Style 8.4. it's something like that.” We're certainly happy to explain it. But again, at the end of the day, the author is the subject matter expert and what we don't want to do anything that changes or alters the meaning of the text.

00:12:13:08 - 00:12:35:21
Miranda Baur

Authors know their fields best. Editors honor that. It's their name on the book. That's how I have approached it, especially having been a freelance copyeditor. If an author's like “This isn't the change that I want to make.” I see your name on the book, and I trust you to know your field and know your audience better than I probably do.

00:12:35:22 - 00:13:05:07
Miranda Baur

I know the Chicago Manual of Style weirdly well, not whatever the topic of this book is. As an example, I had a weird conflict with an author when I was a very green, fresh little copyeditor. I was working on a project where the author was writing a section about a Greek playwright, Aeschylus, and it was spelled in a super weird way where I sort of had to go get the context.

00:13:05:07 - 00:13:32:09
Miranda Baur

And I was like, “Yeah, I know this is Greek playwright Aeschylus, we all learned about this in school.” But the name was spelled differently. And so baby copyeditor me changed it to how I knew how to spell it, which the author did not take well. It turns out that her first language was German, and Aeschylus is spelled differently in German.

00:13:32:11 - 00:13:59:11
Miranda Baur

So we were both right. But because I didn't communicate, we didn't quite understand how this happened. It was to meet the standards of the Merriam-Webster Dictionary. Your copyeditor is hopefully is not not in that situation. I mean, they might be a little baby copyeditor or we don't know. But if they are, ask, “Hey, why did you make this change?”

00:13:59:13 - 00:14:27:03
Miranda Baur

It generally should be harmless. I think it's important to go into all stages of editing with an open mind. And this is what Track Changes are for. We use Track Changes when we're working in your files. It's so easy to accept or reject our changes. I've never been offended by someone rejecting a tracked change, and I don't think it would be in the nature of an editor to be offended by that.

00:14:27:04 - 00:14:41:17
Miranda Baur

So it's it's all sort of conversation and bids and understanding that our goal is to make your work better. So yeah, teamwork.

00:14:41:19 - 00:15:13:05
Cathy Hannabach

I like to explain it to authors in terms of considering which type of expertise the different types of editors are bringing and what problem they're trying to solve in the moment. So in the example of the spelling of a name, the problem that you're trying to solve is this potential conflict between the style manual that you need to follow according to the press and the dictionaries versus a subject matter, and even kind of a language, particularity

00:15:13:06 - 00:15:33:18
Cathy Hannabach

that the author is an expert at. And so just talking about that and thinking about which problem are we both trying to solve in this moment and then figuring out what's useful. For instance, acquisitions editors are experts in audience. This is what they do.

00:15:33:18 - 00:15:52:23
Cathy Hannabach

This is their thing, this is what they're there for. They are experts in list fit, how a book fits with, the other books in their lis. And they’re experts on market, what sells in this area? And what doesn’t sell, even though it might be an excellent topic but it just doesn't sell in this market for whatever reason, good or bad.

00:15:53:00 - 00:16:22:03
Cathy Hannabach

And so when you're getting feedback from an acquisitions editor on those issues—about scope, about framing, about market—it's really worth taking that guidance seriously because this is their thing. A developmental editor can offer advice on some of those topics, but they're not an expert on necessarily whether this particular book will sell under this particular set of circumstances by this press, because they focus on something else.

00:16:22:05 - 00:16:43:16
Cathy Hannabach

So if you're an author and you're receiving multiple forms of feedback from different kinds of editors, think about what problem is that editor trying to solve in their specific wheelhous? And maybe give more weight to those issues in that context than some other stuff. And that, again, helps you figure out,

00:16:43:18 - 00:16:55:15
Cathy Hannabach

“Maybe I should listen more to the copyeditor on this topic, and the acquisitions editor more on that topic, and the developmental editor more on this topic.” Again, because they're trying to solve something particular.

00:16:55:17 - 00:16:59:12
Miranda Baur

Yes.

00:16:59:14 - 00:17:22:12
Cathy Hannabach

I also was hoping we could talk a little bit about where communication sometimes breaks down or where things go off the rails a little bit with book publishing, not because those things are inherently super common and definitely are not inevitable, but I find that a lot of them are quite preventable if you just talk about stuff ahead of time.

00:17:22:14 - 00:17:43:24
Cathy Hannabach

I'm curious from a production perspective, looking across the full publishing timeline, where do you most often see some of those breakdowns or communication challenges happen between authors and editors? And what do you notice seems to cause them? What are the patterns that you've found?

00:17:44:01 - 00:18:13:24
Miranda Baur

I think one of the parts specifically in production is in between the copyediting and the proof stage, where maybe there were some things that you didn't consider at the copyediting stage, and now we're at proofs. So we've gone from those Word files to the PDF pages and potentially part of the breakdown is, I hate to say, not understanding what all needs to be considered in copyediting, but that might be a part of it.

00:18:14:01 - 00:18:44:20
Miranda Baur

Or letting questions build up. The minute that you have a question, please ask it, even if you've already done your final check of copyedited files or whatever. It's important that we can make those changes to the Word files while we have them. It's much easier, specifically, for our translated titles. We have situations where if it's a transliteration, for example, and certain spellings were used for certain terms that the author wants to change.

00:18:44:22 - 00:19:15:04
Miranda Baur

That can get messy pretty quickly. If significant changes are needing to be made at proof, then you run into indexing errors or the proofreader getting confused, and then typesetting gets mixed up and it snowballs. So yeah, when files are in that Word stage, when they're in that copyediting stage, that's when authors need to give 100%.

00:19:15:06 - 00:19:30:12
Miranda Baur

I mean, they should do the whole thing, but that's the big push for copyediting, where it's a place for me to really be sure that this is in a good shape for the rest of the process.

00:19:30:14 - 00:19:46:03
Cathy Hannabach

I agree, I agree because you don't want to get to a point as an author where you get page proofs and you're like, “I need to make a ton of changes because I forgot or didn't think about it or whatever.” And then it's like, too bad you can't. Let's just avoid that.

00:19:46:05 - 00:20:07:02
Miranda Baur

Right, right. I mean, you want the manuscript review and you want the book to be the best possible version. And you don't want to send something to the printer that the author feels any sort of regret about. We take on a lot as a production team when situations like that happen.

00:20:07:02 - 00:20:25:16
Miranda Baur

And I'm very sort of guilty of being like, “Oh yeah, sure we will solve this.” And you just want to prevent it when possible by knowing what needs to happen at the copyediting stage.

00:20:25:18 - 00:20:50:10
Cathy Hannabach

Yeah. I also find that one of the areas of confusion or maybe misaligned expectations has to do with editing scope provided by the press versus provided by author-engaged editors. I know a lot of first book authors tend to assume that once their manuscript is under contract,

00:20:50:10 - 00:21:20:07
Cathy Hannabach

it’s accepted by a press, they often assume that in-house editors of the press will provide deep page-by-page, super detailed developmental editing and comprehensive lydetail copyediting across the entire book. And they're often really disappointed to learn that that's not the case. Obviously presses are working within really specific production models, compressed timelines, and particularly these days, really challenging circumscribed budgets.

00:21:20:09 - 00:21:58:19
Cathy Hannabach

That means that the editorial work that they provide has to be focused on the things that make that process go right. And of course, that's where editorial agencies like Ideas and Fire and others can help supplement that process. I find that authors feel a lot of relief and gratitude when they realize that they can hire developmental editors and copyeditors to do that kind of detailed page-by-page, sustained, book length work before it gets into the production stage, or sometimes alongside the production process, depending on which type of editing we're talking about.

00:21:58:21 - 00:22:32:11
Cathy Hannabach

For instance, hiring an experienced copyeditor who can focus closely on prose, on sentence structure, on consistency, on spelling, and on how that fits with an audience, particularly if they're fluent in the fields that you want to be speaking to as an author. It really can transform your whole experience with production. Just the idea that you can hire someone to format your entire book according to the press's often very detailed style requirements.

00:22:32:13 - 00:22:38:10
Cathy Hannabach

They'll fix all your citations. You don't have to. Authors are so excited to learn about this.

00:22:38:12 - 00:22:39:24
Miranda Baur

We’re excited too!

00:22:40:00 - 00:23:04:17
Cathy Hannabach

Seeing how all of these different worlds fit together and then where as an author, you can bring in the support that would make your life and your experience better is part of what I want this webinar to focus on, but it's also what I think makes the publishing process more pleasurable for folks.

00:23:04:19 - 00:23:24:19
Miranda Baur

Yeah. Agreed. 100%. I mean, when we do have manuscripts that we can tell some developmental work has been done on them, we're like, oh, it's going to be smooth. So there's an energy from the press where we're like, “Oh, okay. We know we'll be in good shape.”

00:23:26:08 - 00:23:59:23
Cathy Hannabach

It's very helpful for sure. You know, let’s talk about timelines because I think that is also something that authors have a lot of anxiety about but then also sometimes some unanticipated worry about down the line. So I'm curious again, from a production standpoint, how do you think authors should think strategically about managing the timeline across their entire editorial process, not just production but including production, so that things don't pile up at the end

00:23:59:23 - 00:24:03:19
Cathy Hannabach

and they have that freak out moment when everything is due?

00:24:03:21 - 00:24:28:04
Miranda Baur

Yeah. First of all, I always say give your self more time to do something than you think it's going to take. I do it to myself all the time to where I'm like, “Oh, you know, there's not going to be any issues with this.” And then there inevitably are some speed bumps. So try not to procrastinate.

00:24:28:06 - 00:24:58:07
Miranda Baur

But authors also need to keep editors aware of schedules as much as editors need to keep authors aware. It's it's a two-way street. Here at Syracuse, it's such a small team that when we lay out our schedule at the beginning, when we're talking to authors about copyediting and what's to come and proofreading, we're saying mid-months in the future future, in a specific month, be looking for contact from us

00:24:58:09 - 00:25:21:03
Miranda Baur

and some sort of progress report or this is where you're going to need to step in so that you have something on your radar for what's coming up. It's important that authors let us know about any plans or things that they have going on in their lives. You don’t have to give specifics, but if you say in this chunk of time, I won't be available or something, or it will take me longer to do certain tasks,

00:25:21:09 - 00:25:52:03
Miranda Baur

that’s really helpful for us. I had a situation where a book was about to go to the printer. We were a couple days away, and we realized that there was a chart in it, and some of the information on the chart didn't add up. And so I reached out to the author. It turns out, I learned later, that the author was camping in the woods with no cell service. So I had to pull some Indiana Jones moves so that we could maintain our scheduled release date and get the chart corrected before the book came out.

00:25:52:05 - 00:26:20:08
Miranda Baur

So keeping in touch up until the time when that book is going to the printer is really important. And if your editors, you haven't heard from them in a while, just shoot them an email or something. Keep yourselves in touch with each other. In terms of how long things are going to take, proofreading does seem like it should be a pretty simple task, but it can turn into something bigger pretty quickly.

00:26:20:10 - 00:26:37:01
Miranda Baur

You never want to be crunched for time, as much as you can, and editors will give you as much of our time as we can. I'll take from my time bucket and give it to the author as needed. But then there are points where I can't pull from any more buckets.

00:26:37:03 - 00:27:02:02
Miranda Baur

I can't change a printer schedule. Or a typesetter schedule. And so it's important to try to frontload as much work as you can. I would say the minute that a marketing department reaches out to you, there's probably a schedule for your book, if you don't already know that there is one. And once that release date is set, you're in motion.

00:27:02:04 - 00:27:03:23
Miranda Baur

And there are forces beyond us

00:27:06:10 - 00:27:30:20
Miranda Baur

that we need to respect and honor when it comes to time. And, of course, things happen. Life gets life-y. We as editors try to absorb that and help you out and give you cushion where we can. So it's just a matter of communication and being honest and open with your editor, even if it's just, hey, it's a bad week.

00:27:30:22 - 00:27:38:03
Miranda Baur

We'll accept that. That's great. We'd rather know than not and just have an author go dark.

00:27:38:05 - 00:28:01:12
Cathy Hannabach

I would definitely second that idea of everything will take longer than you think it will, which is just part of life in general, obviously. But it is central to the publishing industry and the publishing process in particular. Part of that is because of the complexity of the production process and literally how many people and entities are involved.

00:28:01:14 - 00:28:28:17
Cathy Hannabach

When you create that complex a system, timelines get messy because, as you're saying, if you take time from this bucket over here, it shifts all the other buckets that are involved. Even if you never interact with those people or know they exist, they do. And that can be managed but it requires communication. I do think that one of the many, many benefits of engaging with editors really early on in the process,

00:28:28:19 - 00:28:46:04
Cathy Hannabach

whether you're revising a dissertation into a book or whether you're writing a book from scratch, the earlier you can start to work with editors in some form, like developmental editors. At that point, you're probably you're not really ready for copyediting, but manuscript reviewers, beta readers, whatever kind of format of editors you bring in at that point.

00:28:46:06 - 00:29:20:19
Cathy Hannabach

One of the benefits that they can provide is to help you map out the entire production timeline because it gives you a sense of how long all of this will take. It will shift, obviously, over the course of the years that it takes your book to come out. But getting at least a first sense of, oh, this whole thing is going to take me about five years earlier on is better, particularly if you're dealing with tenure timelines, which are unforgiving and you don't get to control in the same kind of way that you get to control other parts of the process.

00:29:20:21 - 00:29:38:20
Cathy Hannabach

Some of the other things that come up in that process that I find authors are often surprised and didn't budget time and energy for are things like realizing that they, authors, are the ones who are responsible for securing and paying for copyright permissions. That's not the job of the press. That's the job of the author.

00:29:38:22 - 00:29:58:03
Cathy Hannabach

It takes a long time, and it can get very expensive depending on what kind of images you want to include. Knowing that up front, working with editors up front who will tell you that and maybe warn you away from including every single image by this artist that you can ever come across, that's useful information earlier on in the process.

00:29:58:03 - 00:30:25:23
Cathy Hannabach

And then you can make your authorial decisions, about how much money and hassle and time you want to spend on that. Maybe it's super important for your book and your vision for the book to include a large number of images. That's perfectly fine. There are beautiful books that are super image heavy and presses like publishing them within reason when they can afford it. But knowing that you're going to have to pay a lot of money and a lot of time upfront to make that possible just helps you make better decisions

00:30:25:23 - 00:30:48:17
Cathy Hannabach

as an author. Hiring indexers is another thing that I think people don't realize they need to do much earlier than they think they do. The minute you have a production timeline from your press, that's when you research and you hire your indexer, not when they send you page proofs. By the time you have page proofs in hand,

00:30:48:18 - 00:31:13:02
Cathy Hannabach

it is much too late to hire a good indexer. You might be able to find someone, but chances are they're not going to be the best indexer for your book because indexers tend to book out months in advance. So again, earlier in the process, more information. Ask your editor. Ask your press contacts. The more you can do that earlier on, the more pleasurable and easier the whole process is going to be in terms of timeline.

00:31:15:15 - 00:31:37:15
Miranda Baur

Absolutely. And yeah, just to build on the indexer bit, let's say there is an indexer who specializes in your field and you really want to work with them, but they're not available until however far out, maybe don't give up right away. Talk to your press because maybe they built in enough time that you could Indiana Jones it, you could get it in there.

00:31:37:17 - 00:31:48:24
Miranda Baur

So, just again, have those conversations. If there's something you really want, we might be able to make it work. It's just we have to know.

00:31:49:01 - 00:32:11:14
Cathy Hannabach

For sure. I'm curious, of the books that you've worked on over the course of your career, the ones that seem to move really smoothly through the production process versus those that hit some hiccups or maybe struggled a little bit. What have you noticed in terms of how authors plan for time, for energy,

00:32:11:16 - 00:32:26:08
Cathy Hannabach

and particularly for competing responsibilities? Because of course, authors are often teaching and parenting and partnering and have lives and stuff happens. What are those kinds of patterns that you've noticed?

00:32:26:10 - 00:32:47:15
Miranda Baur

I think copyediting is your number one place to invest. If the energy of the copyediting is good, then there's really good potential for everything else to go really smoothly. Proofreading should be easier. Indexing will go well. If the text is in great shape, you know it's going to be all right. Even if this means taking extra time at copyediting.

00:32:47:15 - 00:33:09:17
Miranda Baur

Have those conversations with your copyeditor. The closer that we get to that deadline of needing to have your book at the printer, the less time that we have. So we need to frontload at copyediting. I'm not saying like take two months to spend with the text or whatever, you should be in better shape at copyediting.

00:33:09:17 - 00:33:32:04
Miranda Baur

But, you know, take the time that you need to do it right and to be thorough. And also authors who stick to the instructions, of course. We provide instructions and as far as I know, other presses do as well. We expect authors to be the content experts, not experts on how to make a book.

00:33:32:06 - 00:33:58:15
Miranda Baur

So we will give you guidelines for copyediting. Here's what's going to happen. Here's what you need to look for. And that happens at the proofreading stage as well. It prevents authors from getting really overwhelmed or veering off into other directions. When in doubt, find the instructions, read the instructions, try to stick to them.

00:33:58:17 - 00:34:24:15
Miranda Baur

Authors that keep in touch with us, their projects are often in the best condition. So if you're going to be in the woods for a couple of weeks, let us know. And we can work around life-y stuff, too. The earlier that we know the better. Even if it's just saying I'm going to be a little slower at this time, that makes a big difference at the end of the line.

00:34:24:17 - 00:34:46:17
Miranda Baur

So we can adjust our schedules internally, we can adjust our priorities. So that's important to know as well. And sometimes we have projects that have a later release date, but we need a bound copy so that an author can take it to a conference or something like that. Let us know, and we'll do our best to make that happen.

00:34:46:19 - 00:34:57:12
Miranda Baur

It's not always possible, but engaging with your editorial team and sticking to instructions are two big things that can make a difference for sure.

00:34:57:12 - 00:35:17:11
Cathy Hannabach

For sure. And asking if anything in those instructions is unclear. Editors’ job is not punitive. Their job is actually to make your job as an author easier. So if anything is confusing or you're not sure what they mean about a specific thing you're supposed to pay attention to, just ask. We're happy to clarify anything for sure.

00:35:17:12 - 00:35:37:00
Miranda Baur

Yeah. It's generally people in-house writing these instructions, so we probably are using some jargon. So please ask. That helps us as well to make sure that we have really clear guidelines for other authors going forward. It's a community effort for sure.

00:35:37:02 - 00:35:59:11
Cathy Hannabach

Before we turn to some of the questions that are in the Q&A already, I want to zoom out one last time and ask what is one mindset shift or practice about working with an editorial team that you think would immediately make the process less stressful for first book authors in particular?

00:35:59:13 - 00:36:07:07
Miranda Baur

Yeah. So just everybody just unclench when I say this. Publishing is a group project, but it's a group project where nobody on your team is a slacker. We all know what we're doing. And we all have a place that we know our work fits into. And we're really good at staying in our lanes, we’re really good at making books. I mean, 40 hours a week, we are making books.

00:36:33:23 - 00:36:53:17
Miranda Baur

Your role in this group project is to be the subject matter expert, to be the author and the person who's going to make some judgment calls that we will present to you. And if you ever feel alone in the process, check in with your editor, because we're doing something on our end to help your project.

00:36:53:19 - 00:37:13:13
Miranda Baur

We're working on along with you and alongside you. And randomly checking in with questions. We're excited for you. We wouldn't do this work if we didn't believe in your book needing to exist. It’s a group project. You're not alone.

00:37:13:15 - 00:37:40:21
Cathy Hannabach

That’s a really, really great framework and a good reminder that at this point in the production process, if a press has invested this much money—and it's tens of thousands of dollars that they're investing in every single book they publish that they don't earn back on those books. So if they're willing to spend tens of thousands of dollars on your book, they want it in the world because they think it is important and it needs to be there.

00:37:40:23 - 00:38:02:12
Cathy Hannabach

All of us, whether we are in-house or not in-house, are on your side. We want your book to be the best it could be. We want it to be what you want it to be in the world. And we want to help that process. So remembering that, centering that, asking questions from that place, I think, goes a long way in the process.

00:38:02:14 - 00:38:22:02
Miranda Baur

Yeah. I mean, the number of copyeditors that, I send them out projects and they’re like, “This is so cool!” And I'm like, “I know another cool one, can you believe it?” And then I get the feedback back and the copyeditors are like, “I learned so much!” We're all in this because we're curious and we want to learn about anything and everything.

00:38:22:02 - 00:38:26:15
Miranda Baur

There's no bad project.

00:38:26:17 - 00:38:28:10
Cathy Hannabach

No, not at that point, at least.

00:38:28:12 - 00:38:32:06
Miranda Baur

No no, no.

00:38:32:08 - 00:38:52:23
Cathy Hannabach

So, we have a little bit of time for Q&A. If you have a burning question or you think of one, you can go ahead and hit the Q&A button at the bottom of your screen and enter it there. We already have some great questions in here already. So maybe let's start with one person is asking: When is it best to work with a developmental editor?

00:38:52:23 - 00:39:30:06
Cathy Hannabach

Is the book proposal phase too soon, is a partial manuscript or dissertation too soon? When do you recommend bringing in a developmental editor to your project? I think this definitely depends on the project. There's no single right answer to this. If you're working on a book proposal, that could be an excellent stage to bring in a developmental editor to help you either on the proposal document itself, on the manuscript, or on some combination. A developmental editor at that stage, particularly if they are an expert in book proposals and have worked on a lot of successful book proposals that have been

00:39:30:06 - 00:39:49:03
Cathy Hannabach

accepted by the types of presses you're interested in, they're going to have really great advice about framing for that document, about audience, about how to appeal to a particular acquisitions editor that they may have worked with in the past or press that they may have worked with in the past and know what they're looking for.

00:39:49:05 - 00:40:08:13
Cathy Hannabach

They're also going to be able to help you explain the arc of the book and the stakes of the book really well. Those are really important for the book proposal stage because you're trying to convince a publisher that your book needs to exist, and it needs to exist now, and it needs to exist being published by them.

00:40:08:15 - 00:40:37:18
Cathy Hannabach

Your proposal is really that opportunity to convince them of that. And so a developmental editor who has a lot of experience working on proposals will be worth their weight in gold at that stage of the process. But you can also bring in a developmental editor earlier on, for instance, if you're looking at an unrevised dissertation. Let's say you just finished your degree 4 or 5 months ago, any earlier than that, like if you just finished it last month, you're not ready to revise yet.

00:40:37:20 - 00:41:12:18
Cathy Hannabach

Put it down for a minute, take a breath, orient yourself, celebrate the fact that you just finished your PhD. Congratulations. But a few months later, you might be ready to return to it and see if it's something that you would want to revise into a book. In that case, bringing in a developmental editor to provide a manuscript review or a beta read can be really helpful in terms of giving you a holistic assessment of the text and helping you figure out exactly what would need to be revised to turn it from a student exercise of a dissertation into a book manuscript that a publisher

00:41:12:18 - 00:41:38:02
Cathy Hannabach

might be interested in. Different editors structure their manuscript review services differently. At Ideas on Fire, we do a holistic assessment, so we're looking at broad patterns across the text as a whole, as well as very specific chapter-by-chapter revision recommendations. That kind of feedback at that stage can help you figure out what would I need to revise.

00:41:38:04 - 00:41:58:02
Cathy Hannabach

Do I want to make those changes? Do I have time or energy or investment to make those changes? Or do I maybe want to pull some pieces from this and add a bunch of new material to turn it into a different kind of a project, which is a very, very common thing that people come to when going from dissertation to book.

00:41:58:04 - 00:42:14:15
Cathy Hannabach

It depends on the project. But a developmental editor can be really helpful in both of those contexts. Do you have any ideas on this from a production side of things, when it could be helpful to bring in a developmental editor?

00:42:14:17 - 00:42:40:21
Miranda Baur

Yeah. I think you're spot on. The last press that I worked at was Human Kinetics, which has more science books, kinesiology studies. We actually had developmental lectures in house. So if we really wanted the project and we knew we wanted to work with an author, they would have an extra step working with that developmental editor before they came to production.

00:42:40:23 - 00:43:04:19
Miranda Baur

I think, early, as early as possible is best. Worst case scenario, you submit a proposal to a press and they say this is a really great project. This is a really great idea. We would love it, but we think it needs some developmental work, and you're still on their radar. You've still got the attention of a press, and that's awesome.

00:43:04:21 - 00:43:17:11
Miranda Baur

So I think earlier is better. But if it turns out you need some developmental work, that's okay. You've still in the eyes of a press, which is great.

00:43:17:13 - 00:43:47:05
Cathy Hannabach

And being able to say to that press, to follow up and be like, “I followed your advice, I engaged this developmental editor, this editing team, and we made these revisions. Thank you for your advice. My manuscript is much stronger. I've changed it in XYZ ways. Would you consider looking at the revised version?” Acquisitions editors are going to be much more positive toward that manuscript because they know you've done the work, they know that you heard them, that you listened, that you valued their advice and that you took action.

00:43:47:07 - 00:44:02:02
Cathy Hannabach

And knowing that you worked with a professional editor that you hired yourself lets them know that you're going to automatically have a stronger manuscript than someone who is maybe sending a completely unrevised manuscript for the first time.

00:44:02:04 - 00:44:07:11
Miranda Baur

Yeah, we love that. We would think so highly of that author.

00:44:07:13 - 00:44:30:23
Cathy Hannabach

Okay, another question here. Do you need a completed manuscript before submitting or creating a book proposal? This is actually a topic that our previous webinar on book proposals talked about extensively. But I think it's a continual question that folks have, and it's a good question. You do not inherently need a complete manuscript before you write your book proposal.

00:44:31:00 - 00:44:58:07
Cathy Hannabach

Particularly if you're going from a dissertation to a book or you’re drawing on a dissertation in some form or another, chances are you are not going to have a complete manuscript before you write your book proposal, partly because your book proposal is where you're pushed, you're forced to think about the arc of the project, the stakes of the project, and the audience of the project in a way that in dissertation form, you never had to care about.

00:44:58:09 - 00:45:16:15
Cathy Hannabach

So a book proposal can actually be a really helpful tool. Writing it can be a really helpful tool for an author, even if you don't have a full manuscript, because it forces you to articulate to yourself as well as to other people: What do I want this book to be, what would make it interesting to somebody?

00:45:16:17 - 00:45:44:03
Cathy Hannabach

And then you can use that book proposal document to frame the revisions that you make to the text itself. Some people do have a full manuscript and then they write their book proposal. But I often find that particularly for first book authors, writing a version, at least, of the proposal earlier can help you frame what the book actually becomes in a more direct way.

00:45:44:05 - 00:45:50:08
Miranda Baur

Beautifully said. Yes, that's so, so smart to use the proposal like that.

00:45:50:10 - 00:46:15:07
Cathy Hannabach

Because it's a tool. It forces you to think and to see your text in a way that that you're not really used to seeing it. Somebody else asks: If I can only afford to hire my own editor for one part of the process, which one should I prioritize? I love this question.

00:46:15:09 - 00:46:40:24
Cathy Hannabach

Everyone's working with a budget. No one's working with unlimited funds. Every single person, every single author, is in this situation. And so, yes, you are smart to think about prioritizing and kind of getting the most bang for your buck. It does depend on you as a writer, you as an author, and the status of the book manuscript as it is in your situation.

00:46:41:01 - 00:47:07:24
Cathy Hannabach

If you, for instance, have the primary focus of your concerns or your questions, your anxieties, or the areas that you want to focus on, if they're about argument, if they're about scope, if they're about audience, if they're about structure and examples, analysis—really the content and ideas—I would put your money toward developmental editing because that's exactly what developmental editing focuses on.

00:47:08:01 - 00:47:35:11
Cathy Hannabach

If you're like, I can figure out the citation and grammar stuff later, even if it won't be excellent, then developmental editing would be where I would recommend you put your money first. In contrast, if maybe English is not your first language or you have more concerns around language or sentence structure, if, for instance, you know your super wordy—we all have writing idiosyncrasies, it's okay.

00:47:35:13 - 00:47:55:21
Cathy Hannabach

I am one of these super wordy writers. I have to do a lot of revision to get my writing to something that I would want to share with other humans. And so if that is where your concerns lie, if you're like, “I think the contents good. I like my argument, my examples work. Maybe I'll change some stuff about organization, but it's not really where my my primary anxieties live.”

00:47:55:23 - 00:48:29:14
Cathy Hannabach

Then maybe you put that money toward copyediting. So I would think about where your pain points are personally and start there. And also realize you don't have to spend all of your money on one kind of editing. Maybe you get two chapters developmentally edited and the full book manuscript copyedited, or vice versa. So thinking about what makes sense for you and where your concerns are, let that guide where you put your money.

00:48:29:16 - 00:48:49:15
Miranda Baur

Yeah. I completely agree. I also think that depending on where you are in the publishing stage, this might be a great question for an acquisitions editor and asking what's coming up? Or if I decide to work with this press, what am I expected to pay for? And what is paid for by the press?

00:48:49:17 - 00:49:13:14
Miranda Baur

Here at Syracuse University Press, we pay for copyediting. So that's not on you. So then your costs would either be for if you want to hire a proofreader or not. And if you want to hire an indexer, or if you want to do that work yourself, which we have instructions for both. If you decide to take that route and you feel like you've got it.

00:49:13:14 - 00:49:22:03
Miranda Baur

So that would be a conversation that you could certainly have with your press as well, and what they recommend and what's included.

00:49:22:05 - 00:49:45:05
Cathy Hannabach

Somebody else is asking: How do I find an editor who's a good fit for me and who understands my field? Also an excellent question. If you're talking about in-house editors, obviously the press itself is going to organize that. So they're going to put your book in front of the editors on their team

00:49:45:07 - 00:50:04:20
Cathy Hannabach

that work on the books in your area. So they're going to take care of that. But I think perhaps what this person is asking is how do I how do I find and hire an external editor who's a good fit for me? I always like to say, ask people in your scholarly community first.

00:50:04:22 - 00:50:25:04
Cathy Hannabach

Word of mouth recommendations are the best way to find this out. Ask your peers. Ask your colleagues. Ask your coworkers. Read the acknowledgments sections of books you admire, even if they're slightly outside your field. Books that you think are good books and you would like to write a good book like that, read their acknowledgment sections.

00:50:25:04 - 00:50:50:23
Cathy Hannabach

They often thank their developmental editors, their copyeditors, their indexers, and they often rave about the ones that they feel passionately about. I will also say ask in your scholarly networks. Scholarly associations are a great resource for this. At conferences or at webinars or events, publishing panels, if you have publishing panels at your university, either virtual or in-person, this can often be a really great resource.

00:50:51:00 - 00:51:12:01
Cathy Hannabach

And finally, presses that you like that, you know, this is the type of press that I hope to publish with, see what editors work on successful books that are published with that press. So, for instance, Syracuse University Press is your top press, is your dream press, you really want to get accepted by them,

00:51:12:03 - 00:51:30:11
Cathy Hannabach

take a look at their lists, see what they have published recently, and see who worked on those books. Again, you can often find this in acknowledgment sections, or you can track down those scholars and just shoot them an email saying, “Your book is excellent. Who did you work with as a developmental editor? Do you have any recommendations?”

00:51:30:13 - 00:51:53:20
Cathy Hannabach

Those community recommendations are going to be great because they come from the fields that you care about and the spaces that you care about and the communities that you care about. They're going to have a lot more useful and more relevant recommendations than something like a giant editorial directory where you're like, “You all look fine, but I have no context for this.”

00:51:53:22 - 00:52:03:19
Cathy Hannabach

So I'd say start in your communities. Who's worked on the books that you think are awesome? Start there and then you can branch out as needed.

00:52:03:21 - 00:52:31:15
Miranda Baur

Yeah, absolutely. Acknowledgments are gold mines. So that's a great thing. And even reaching out to a press that you really want to work with and asking for some of those recommendations. The longer that I'm in this field, the more that I'm discovering that authors are editors and editors are authors. That's been an interesting thing to to realize as well, that some of your best editors, turns out, published a book

00:52:33:00 - 00:52:45:22
Miranda Baur

however long ago. Publishers are a great resource for ideas for who to reach out to.

00:52:45:24 - 00:53:10:24
Cathy Hannabach

Are there any other questions that folks want to throw in here so we can get to it? A person asks—this is an excellent segue into our next webinar, so thank you for adding this right at the end here. This person asks: Once the book proposal has been submitted, how does the peer review process work?

00:53:11:01 - 00:53:31:03
Cathy Hannabach

Our very next webinar on February 10th is all about this topic. I encourage you to register for that. I know, that was really good timing. It's all about navigating peer review. I’ll say that, once you submit your book proposal and usually 1 to 2 sample chapters, depending on the requirements of the press,

00:53:31:05 - 00:53:53:02
Cathy Hannabach

to the acquisitions editor, their colleagues are going to look over those documents, and they're going to decide whether to solicit the full manuscript draft to send out for peer review. Very few presses will send out just a proposal and chapters for a first book. They often do it for second, third, or fourth books.

00:53:53:04 - 00:54:12:24
Cathy Hannabach

But it is not as common for first books. And there are a variety of very good reasons for this. But just be aware that if you are writing your first book, once you send in that proposal and sample chapters, you are most likely going to need to provide a full draft to be sent out for peer review.

00:54:13:01 - 00:54:32:05
Cathy Hannabach

As I said, the next webinar will talk more extensively about that process. But once you have that draft ready to go, and when you will have that draft ready to go is one of the things that you list in your proposal, once that is finished, you send it to the press and say, “I'm excited for this to be sent out for peer review.”

00:54:32:07 - 00:54:52:22
Cathy Hannabach

That kicks off that peer review process, in which case the press sends the full book manuscript along with the proposal to usually 2 to 3, depending on the press, 2 to 3 external peer reviewers who then write up the peer review reports, who evaluate the text and its fit for the field that you're writing in as well as fit for the press.

00:54:52:24 - 00:55:15:11
Cathy Hannabach

They write up peer review reports that they send to the press. The press reviews those, the acquisitions editor reviews those. They usually do some kind of translation work or assessment of the reviews themselves, just to make sure that they agree, number one, with what the reviews say and to give you some guidance and direction for how you might want to respond or how you might want to revise.

00:55:15:13 - 00:55:37:02
Cathy Hannabach

And then the acquisitions editor will contact you and say, “Hey, we got all of our peer review reports back. Here's what they say. Here's my summary of what they're saying, and here's my decision as to whether I want to invite you to revise in accordance with the reviews and resubmit for consideration. Or my decision, in which case I say, go forth,

00:55:37:02 - 00:56:02:17
Cathy Hannabach

This is a great text but it's not a good fit for us. I think we're not the right fit, but I encourage you to send it to another press.” The acquisitions editor will explain which of those options they're doing and why. That's a really shortened version of how peer review works. There are a lot of other stages in the process that again, we'll talk about in February, but that's a brief overview of how that works.

00:56:02:19 - 00:56:08:05
Cathy Hannabach

Did you want to add anything to this?

00:56:08:07 - 00:56:22:18
Miranda Baur

If you if you get a peer review back and it says that it wants you to do certain things, and let's say you agree with that, you're like, oh, great point. You do have that opportunity to revise. And then the acquisitions editor might decide to send it back out for another review.

00:56:22:20 - 00:56:34:07
Miranda Baur

There's always a potential for rounds. That’s something to at least be aware of and that that's a very normal thing that shouldn't be feared. That's not scary. That's totally cool.

00:56:34:09 - 00:56:55:18
Cathy Hannabach

Absolutely. We are coming up on time and it looks like we have gotten through most of the questions that are in the Q&A. So as this time comes to a close, I really want to thank all of you for being here. I know it's a very hectic part of the semester as classes are starting, so I really do appreciate all of you showing up today.

00:56:55:20 - 00:57:16:12
Cathy Hannabach

And I want to thank Miranda so much for sharing your expertise and your advice and particularly a behind-the-scenes look into how production editing works. And thank you so much for Rachel as well for helping out with tech support and posting resources. All of you who registered, you'll be receiving recording of this session within the next week or so.

00:57:16:14 - 00:57:35:08
Cathy Hannabach

So keep an eye on your inbox. And please don't hesitate to reach out to me if you have questions about editing support or any of the topics that we talked about today. And finally, one last plug for the next webinar in the series. Navigating Peer Review on Your First Book is coming up on February 10th.

00:57:35:10 - 00:57:47:20
Cathy Hannabach

You can register for that on our website ideasonfire.net. It's totally free. Share with whomever you think would find that useful. And I will see you all next time. Thank you so much.

00:57:47:22 - 00:57:48:20
Miranda Baur

Thanks, everybody.