Quote:
Originally Posted by Catlady
Do you have any basis for your statement that "publishers are becoming increasingly reluctant to pay for copyeditors"?
|
Yes, I do. I've been in the publishing industry for over 20 years, and I'm a member of several trade groups and forums. Over the past few years, I've seen increasing (admittedly mainly anecdotal) evidence that work for these people has become more difficult to come by. Many of the big publishers' websites now carry details of editing services, and the publishers actively encourage the authors to do this. Annoyingly, most of these are large companies, and mainly overseas; the publishers seem very reluctant to even put up links to organisations such as the Society for Editors and Proofreaders, which would benefit individual freelances and smaller companies based in the UK.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Catlady
There's copyediting, and there's proofreading. Proofreading has become somewhat iffy. Plus there may well be greater time constraints for copyeditors, and a lot of subpar copyeditors.
|
Quite right, and for a while, copy-editing (or what some publishers tried to call 'onscreen proofreading' so they could pay it at a lower rate) seemed to be considered enough - of late, even that isn't being done. And yes, I agree with you about both the time and the quality.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Catlady
But my objection was mostly to the notion that copyediting and proofreading are done or not done based on the author's star power or lack thereof.
|
I do think there is an element of that - an author who brings in more money will have more clout. Of course, they have to be aware of the importance of copyediting/proofreading first in order to know that they want it!
Quote:
Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks
I know of one author who was told it would not be done (either the proofreading or the copyediting). This was five years ago and she had to hire her own. She had a small publisher, not one of the big 6. I know of two authors who were with the big 6 who were told the book would go straight to copyediting and get no other editing steps due to time constraints (I believe the books were read by said editors and deemed good enough.) One of those authors had it happen within the last 2 years and the other was probably 7 years ago. I was at a conference when one author giving a talk (he was with the big six) said that after his original editor left, his book received no editing at any level. He got galley proofs and had only that chance to make his own final changes. No copyediting, not proofing, etc.
That is commonly known in the industry as "orphaning."
|
Sounds familiar! Although as the later post points out, orphaning often refers to the 'editor', which is more likely to be the commissioning or possibly developmental editor than the copyeditor.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks
Also beware of what is expected at the different levels of editing. Some copyeditors do not consider things such as "eye color went from blue to green" to be part of copyediting. Yet some proofreaders consider typos and grammar part of the job. There are very loose standards in the definitions. This is true in the entire industry these days and never more true than when hiring a contractor. If you're ever looking to hire a contractor be very careful to get an exact description and examples of what types of things the person will be looking for.
|
Excellent advice for any writer. It's worth looking at the trade organisations in your country as well; for instance, the SfEP in the UK has definitions of copyediiting and proofreading, so it does make people a bit more aware of what should be covered.