A US Copy Editor's Perspective: Styles

I am lucky to have a CP who has coding experience with HTML and can transform a Word doc into MOBI and EPUB formats. It's a very detailed process. Takes confidence and patience to finish this endeavor. In August of this year you may have read about the formatting problems within a George R. R. Martin book where the header info appeared within the body of the text.

Remember the mistakes that could happen when auto replacing within Microsoft Word (MSWord)? Can is a verb, sure. But it's also the ending on pelican. Globally switching out all the can occurrences to cannot means pelican becomes pelicannot. Yeah. And even worse substitutions can be made. So things like that happen.

But the purpose of this post is to show how, even within the confines of MSWord, you can create a doc that holds up under MOBI and EPUB constructions. It won't be fancy with drop caps and embedded fleurons for time breaks, but it will not be flawed either.

It's called styles.

There is info on the Internet if you don't already have working knowledge of MSWord's styles.

Use them for your chapter headers, your front matter, your back matter, your subheads, any bolding or italicizing. But once you've seen a professional formatter, like my CP referenced above, deal with special features like italicizing, you may think twice about how many times you use that function.

In some cases it is content over presentation. But since Indie authors are coming under harsher reviews at times, it is best to have your form in good order too.

It's also called page setup.

We'll get into this in more detail in another post. But in general, don't use tabs within MSWord. Set up your ruler or your paragraphs for auto indent whether hanging or otherwise. Or use a table when needed.

It's further called previewing.

When you first upload to Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo and your other online venues, take the time to preview in each format offered, like the plain Kindle, then the Paperwhite, etc. I find that any wonky chapter breaks can be fixed with some time to play around with my Word doc. Then I keep uploading the new, improved version until they present properly.

So plan to have a few hours set aside when you upload if you are doing the plain-Jane formatting I speak of above.

Denise Barker, author + blogger + copy editor

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NaNo Update

I really hate to abandon NaNoWriMo 2012, but I have chosen to. In my perfect future, my NaNos are not cut short and I get to attend at least one of my local Nights of Writing Furiously. Or the original Night of Writing Dangerously. Sigh.

Sometimes decisions entail choosing between something bad and something good. Boy, are those ever easy to pick. And then they work up to harder selections, like mine. Both for the best. Both within my author purview and both would move me forward.

But...

You knew that was coming, didn't you? Among all the November activities anyway—not to mention freelance jobs—I signed up for two online classes and have been enjoying both, mostly lurking. However the creativity class by Mary O'Gara has opened my eyes.

Why do we not see clearly what is right before us?

Anyway, through one of the homework assignments, I discovered I had seventeen WIPs. Eighteen if I count this 2012 NaNo idea. More than double the eight I kept talking about.

So, yes, I have yet another novel idea for NaNo 2012 and I will finish it, after I get some other projects finalized.

As an Indie author, with no extra time or money, I wear all the hats. So the creating part, the new novels, is just one step in a multistep process, which entails:

1. CREATING. Enough said.
2. EDITING. Checking for plot holes and irrational stuff that screams, What were you thinking?
3. COPYEDITING. Grammar and whatever else cleaned up.
4. ADDING. Front matter, such as your blurb/description and your copyright info page for each of the online venues you choose to use. I have my offerings on Amazon, B&N, Kobo and Smashwords; therefore, I make four separate title pages to accommodate each. Back matter, including your links to ALL your other books. (FYI: I previously listed each item grouped by website; now I just have a link to each store that leads to my author name search page.) Add in any free stuff from your own writings, like your prose poem or your inspirational article. Also social media links to Facebook and Twitter and Pinterest, if you like.
5. CATEGORIZING your current work, the two-to-four genre headings you wish (depending on the online store), along with seven tags, for use when uploading and coordinating with your title, your blurb/description, etc. Think SEO.
6. BEAUTIFYING with styles applied to your chapter headings and openings and time breaks.
7. SIMPLIFYING with a Table of Contents and links to each chapter. For your reader's ease in jumping around. Probably better used in nonfiction, unless you've compiled a collection of fiction (like short stories or whatever). I'm now inclined to add one no matter what.
8. WRAPPING with cover art (adding in your tagline, title and author name via GIMP 2 or whatever software you choose).
9. UPLOADING. Set aside a good chunk of time for this so you don't get frustrated. Let me amend that. Setting aside ample hours at least lets you not get antsy about the time running out too soon. There are still plenty of other details to ignite your ire.
10. PREVIEWING. This is where I spend a couple hours at best fixing any visual problems with my upload. Remember, I'm a do-it-yourselfer. For those of you who have someone who formats for you for all the venues, I bow to you. You are The Man.

Rinse and repeat. For each new book. For each online store.

Exhausting, isn't it?

Still, I now have ten steps defined within my Indie-publishing domain. None of that covers dealing with any social media or accounting or researching, whether a topic or cover art, or being sick or having unseen problems to address. Like I cannot find one of my nonfiction books, so will have to type it in from my Kindle edition. Unless I can email it back to me. Hmm. Have to check that out, too.

Stuff like that slows down the process.

The point is: creation is only the first step. Until I get my own assistant (yes, to dream), I must hit each step in the process. I cannot focus merely on creating, creating, creating without getting to all the other levels.

Hence my release of my NaNo participation this year.

It hurts. But I have additional clarity now. While I've already drafted a (very rough) 2013 production schedule, this new overview will help in nailing down the details, the dirty work, the stuff that I don't enjoy the thought of doing, yet feel invigorated once I've chosen to dig in.

I hope this helps someone else out there in Indie-publishing land who is busy, who is focused, who is immersed in the reading, writing, learning...yet not "producing" as in new offerings coming with each passing season.

It is a process.

I'm thinking a physical wall calendar with huge squares to write in to cover yearly/monthly/weekly goals on top of my daily ones will help me.

I'll let you know. Confronting the problem is part of the battle, right?

Best wishes to all you lucky NaNo participants. I'm there with you in spirit.

Denise Barker, author + blogger + copy editor

http://bit.ly/DeniseBarkerBlog

http://bit.ly/AMAZONDeniseBarkerEbooks

http://bit.ly/BNDeniseBarkerEBooks

http://bit.ly/SMASHWORDSDeniseBarkerEBooks

http://bit.ly/KOBODeniseBarkerEBooks

Having Formatting Problems When Previewing Your E-Book Upload?

Want a wonderful formatting tip?   (Many thanks, Vickie!)  Check out the Smashwords Style Guide by Mark Coker, founder, available for free on the Smashwords site.  To get the book, go here:  http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/52.

This one thing solved my recent yet long-standing "unfixable" design problems when previewing my PubIt! upload.

TIP:

If the hidden MSWord codes are making your chapter styles erratic during upload, try this trick.  Copy your whole novel and paste it into Notepad (found in your Accessories folder within Programs).  BEWARE:  It is now stripped of all manual coding, like bold, italics, the other crazy hidden stuff we cannot see and swear we did not put there, etc.  Yet, in my case, the styles still survived.

Copy the Notepad version, paste it into a new MSWord document and give it a new name, like Novel.v2.  And here's the fun part (not):  Now put the bold and italics and other formatting back in.  Instead of reading the book in toto, I just searched the previous version for italicized wording to save me time.

I don't use bold in my novels, except for when a chapter style is applied, so that was one step I didn't have to fool with.

Then look for all your chapter headings.  Even though I used styles with automatic numbering, I was a little surprised they survived the "stripping" process.  So when I hit my preset chapter style, instead of the existing one being centered with a larger font, I ended up with two chapter headings.  Delete one, so long as the remaining header maintains all your elements:  center, consecutive numbering, bold, bigger font, whatever.

Then I applied my page-break styles for my back matter.

If you have charts, bullet points, indented quoted material, or other such whatnots, go fix it.

Yes, a little tedious.  But in my particular example, I had already spent forty-plus irritating hours fighting with my chapter headings to make them consistent after each "fix" and another upload--and I was using styles within MSWord.

So what's another two hours when my document is FINALLY acting like it should during Preview, after a successful upload?

And you just cannot appreciate the feeling of getting one recalcitrant collection of two-hundred-fifty pages under control again.

NOTE:  Oh, yeah.  Remember that PubIt! has both the regular Nook and the Color Nook now, so your previews can be seen in one or the other.  I opted for the regular Nook preview since I figured it would translate "up" better for any Color Nook user, IMO.

Good luck, formatters!

Denise Barker, author + freelance copy editor
Good Ole Boys, a love story
A Copyediting Checklist for Novelists