If I’m quiet lately, it’s because I’m busy. I started a side project just for fun, and sure enough, as soon as I launch into that particular project…copyedits arrive!

That’s all right, though, because I’m quite happy to get my copyedits out of the way.

It’s funny, because when copyedits were originally mentioned to me, I had the notion that someone would send me a big long print-out of changes to make to the manuscript. Then, I’d have to take each page and make the changes on my document. After all the endless changes were done, I’d print out a fresh one and send it back to my publisher.

Apparently, I was not the only one with this misconception. The letter on top of my manuscript says, quite clearly (and possibly in bold AND capslock) – make the changes on this document. Do not print a fresh document. We need this document back. Lose it and die.

(Okay, so maybe the last part is not on there)

I was also provided (very thoughtfully!) with a green pencil. At first, this amused me. They’re sending my copyedits…AND a green pencil? Some sort of weird two-fer deal? But the green pencil is very important. My copyedits are marked up with red, grey, and blue already. I have to use a different color so my changes stand out.

Armed with my green pencil, I dive in to see what a copyedit is all about. Turns out…it’s about reading other people’s marks to my manuscript to see if they make sense. Some of them are punctuation related. Once upon a time (and even today) I loved me some extra commas or em-dashes. My copyeditor does not like them so much, so there’s a lot of them marked out. Other punctuation changes. Deleting unnecessary words and sentence tags (there’s an embarrassing wealth of this).

I also have in the margins several notes about things to clarify. “On page 12, you said it was a diner. On this page you say it’s a café. Which is it?” So I correct the item and write ‘fixed’ over the note. The bigger changes, I’m making a note to go back and fix at the end. For now, I’m still re-reading.

Did I mention this is a long, time consuming process? The first few days, I had no clue what I was doing and didn’t know what half the marks meant. Took me 2 days to get through 25 pages. (Did I mention I have to have this turned in ASAP?) Luckily, I’m getting more confident with the changes as I go, and was able to make a big leap in progress yesterday. I should have no problems finishing on time, which is nice.

After all this is turned in, about a month later, I get galleys! I have to admit, I’m really excited about seeing galleys. That’s when all the fonts and styles are set, and the book starts to look like a real book instead of just my old manuscript.