FROM THE ARCHIVES OF PRAGPUB MAGAZINE DECEMBER 2017
Writing: What to Expect from the Publishing Process (It Takes a Team)
By Brian MacDonald
Your proposal has been accepted. Now let Brian tell you what the next six to nine months of your life will be like.
Congratulations — your proposal has been accepted! If you’ve made it this far, you’ve probably done a good bit of pre-writing, and you’re probably anxious to get started writing. What happens next varies from publisher to publisher, but I’ll lay out the basic form of what you can expect.
How long all of this takes depends on the length of your book, and your personal writing speed. Personally, I like an interval of six to nine months for writing the first draft. That’s not pushing the author unreasonably, but any longer than that, and you might start to lose interest, or prioritize other things.
Acquisitions Editor
The Acquisitions Editor (AE) is the person you’ve probably been talking to while you created your proposal, or the first person who contacted you after you sent your proposal to the publisher. They’ll probably handle the next few steps immediately after your proposal has been accepted, specifically, setting you up with a contract. Contract negotiations are a whole different topic that I won’t go into in detail here. In general, how much room you have for negotiation depends on the publisher. Smaller publishers may not have the leeway to alter their contracts very much at all (they may not have in-house legal staff to handle it). For larger publishers, they may have so many projects going at once that it doesn’t make sense to give one author specialized treatment. In short, your choices in contract negotiation may be “take it or leave it.” By all means, ask your editor questions about anything in your contract that you don’t understand. Just don’t expect to be able to choose your own terms.
You’ll probably be asked about projected deadlines, or at least milestones, at this point. Most publishers will be at least somewhat flexible with these. Unexpected things can happen while you’re writing a book — your kid might get sick, you might change jobs, you might win the lottery — all of which affect your writing time. Most publishers aren’t going to hold you to the exact date of your writing deadlines, but they’d like you to be close, so they can plan their schedule. Try to be as realistic as you can with your dates, and let your editor know right away if any obstacles come up.
Once the contract is signed, your acquisitions editor will probably fade into the background. They’ve got lots of books to sign, and that’s where they need to focus their attention. Fortunately, they’ll hand you off to a new primary contact.
Development or Project Editor
The title varies depending on the publisher, but the Development Editor (DE) or Project Editor (PE) will be your primary point of contact throughout the writing process. If anything goes wrong, or you have any questions, this is the first person to get in touch with. They may not know the answer immediately, but they can probably get it. They’ll likely also coordinate the activities of several other people involved in the process, many of whom you’ll never interact with directly. Exactly what they do depends on their job title.
Development Editor
Not all publishers use DEs anymore, which in my opinion is unfortunate. The DE is the first person who’ll read every word of your book, and give you feedback on it. If you’re very, very lucky, your acquisitions editor will also be your development editor, meaning she’ll have the same vision of the book that you created while you were writing the proposal, but that’s very rare. Usually the DE will have a bunch of questions up front to better understand the audience, the approach, and the scope — all the things you defined in your proposal, so the better your proposal, the better the DE can understand it.
As you write, you’ll notify the DE when chapters are ready for review, and she’ll read them and send you feedback according to the publisher’s procedures. Hopefully, the turnaround time will be pretty short (a week or two), so that you can incorporate the feedback into later chapters as you write them. DEs usually don’t check your grammar; that part comes later. They take a broader view of your manuscript, and they ask a lot of questions, things like “What if we switched chapters 4 and 5?” or “I don’t think this introduction sets up the chapter well; what if you tried this?” or, most commonly, “You lost me here. Did you mean … ?” The DE is the stand-in for your reader; if the DE got lost, the reader probably will too. In technical publishing, the DE usually doesn’t have experience writing code (although some do), but they’ve read a lot of technical books in their career, and they can recognize the patterns of good technical writing. You don’t have to automatically obey any suggestion the DE makes; the writing and editing process works best as a discussion. But you should give consideration to what she says, even if you decide not to make a change. The DE also takes on the project management functions of the Project Editor.
Project Editor
The Project Editor (PE) is the coordinator for your project. If you’re working with a PE, she’s likely the point person for a bunch of freelancers who will be the ones actually working on your book. Odds are you’ll never speak to a freelancer directly, so the PE is your primary contact for everything going on with your book. As such, you want to keep the lines of communication open. The worse thing an author can do is “go silent” on your PE. That works both ways; the PE shouldn’t leave you hanging if you ask a question.
The PE may employ a freelance development editor, or the publisher may decide that your writing doesn’t require development. If a freelancer is used, the PE will likely coordinate any queries and responses during that process.
Other things the PE (or DE) will handle include getting the marketing process started, processing illustrations (if any), and initiating the cover design. Basically, they’re in charge of the details, so you don’t have to be. One of their major tasks involves coordinating the technical review.
Technical Reviewer
The Technical Reviewer (sometimes Technical Editor, or TE) is almost always someone outside the publisher, usually an expert in whatever topic the book is about. Many publishers use just one reviewer per book; some use two or three. A few publishers crowdsource their reviews, for a variety of opinions. Some reviewers are volunteers; others get a small honorarium as a thank-you. Either way, it’s not a replacement income. The technical reviewers are instructed to hit the book hard — test every line of code, try every procedure, consider every opinion, and comment when something’s wrong. Sometimes the feedback can be overwhelming, but that’s for a reason. Either tech reviewers find this stuff now, or customers find it after the book comes out, and comment on Amazon. As with the DE comments, you don’t have to take every tech comment as a direct order. Sometimes they’re just differences of opinion, in which case, the person with their name on the cover gets the last word. But if a tech reviewer says that the code doesn’t work on his machine, that’s worth paying attention to.
Usually you won’t have direct contact with the tech reviewers. Your project editor may ask you for recommendations, especially if you’re writing about a specialized topic. Before you pick one of your friends or colleagues to be a reviewer, consider whether they’ll give you the tough review that will really improve your book. Either way, be sure to thank all your reviewers in the book’s acknowledgments. They’re providing a critical service.
Production!
The Production date is a big milestone in the life of your book. When you get to Production, your book should be “feature complete” — you’ve said everything you want to say, crossed off any TODOs, your DE has read everything at least once, and you’ve resolved any outstanding queries. The publisher will likely treat this deadline as set in stone, because there’s a lot of coordination around the next steps.
Everybody before this point in your book’s life has cared more about the content than the presentation. That is, getting your message across is more important than how you formatted a table, or whether the figure numbers were consecutive. Everybody after this point is concerned with presentation more than content, which is why you need to be “feature complete” at this stage. You won’t normally have the opportunity to write new paragraphs or make major changes to code.
That said, this is tech publishing, and we know that sometimes major changes happen to the product you’re writing about. That’s an emergency, but it’s one we’re used to. The key is communication — if you think a major version of a product is imminent, let your editor know in advance. If there’s a major change that you didn’t see coming, let your editor know as soon as you can.
You may get a new primary contact at this point, probably with a title like Production Editor, although it varies. If there is a Production Editor, she’ll coordinate the next several steps, most of which are done by freelancers. If not, your development editor or project editor remains your primary contact, and should give you an outline of what’s going to happen next. Some of these next steps need your input, and usually have short turnaround times. If you get confused, ask.
Copyeditor
The copyeditor (CE) is the next person who’ll read your manuscript, almost always a freelancer, and she handles the grammatical issues. This is more than just commas, periods, and spelling, though. The CE remembers all the rules of writing that you’ve probably forgotten, knows about dangling modifiers, passive constructions, and when you should use “which” instead of “that.” She’s also going to be looking to improve your clarity, and adjust your writing to keep the reader engaged. Some of these changes can be rewrites. However, a good CE will use queries rather than making major changes that could affect the meaning of the text.
Unlike the DE stage, the CE will likely edit the entire manuscript in one shot, over the course of a few weeks, and you won’t see it until it’s done. Depending on the publisher’s policy, you may be able to see (and possibly change) anything in the manuscript at this point, or you may be asked to just respond to the queries. Most copyeditors do a good job, but if you’re uncomfortable about anything, ask your contact person. If you do see the manuscript at this point, you’ll probably only have a few days with it, so plan accordingly.
Proofreader
Some publishers employ a proofreader, but not all do. This role is almost always a freelancer, again, and her role is to function as another set of eyes on the book before it’s done. There have been a lot of changes through the development and copyedit stages, so the proofreader makes sure that nothing got dropped or moved around that shouldn’t have been. She usually reads the book from beginning to end, and flags anything that doesn’t look right, including any grammatical errors that got missed. If this goes well, there shouldn’t be any queries, so you’ll only see the manuscript again at this point if there’s a serious problem.
Layout Specialist
Somewhere during this process, your book will go through “layout” — the process of making your text look like a finished book in the publisher’s house style. Exactly how this works depends on the publisher’s toolchain. Some publishers, especially in tech, have scripts that will take your raw text files and turn them into a good approximation of the house design, in PDF form. You may have had access to them while you were writing. Other publishers will work in Microsoft Word or another tool until after copyedit, and do the layout at that point. Either way, at some point a layout technician will go through the book and fix its visual appearance — making sure figures are near the point in text where they’re discussed, making sure code blocks stay together, adjusting any spacing issues, and other things unique to the layout stage.
You should have a chance to see the book once it’s been laid out. At this point, you’re only concerned with visual issues, not what the text says. If the wrong figure was inserted, or lines of code are getting cut off, or chapters accidentally got out of order, that’s what you need to point out now. You’ll probably have a very short time to do this review, often just a day or two.
Indexer
Even in this age of ebooks, indexes are still important, and they’re still created by humans. The indexer comes in as late in the book as possible, so that any changes in the copyedit or proofreading stage will be resolved. Indexing takes special training, and I don’t advise that you try to do it yourself, even if the publisher offers. Instead, I suggest you make a list of the 10 to 12 items that absolutely must be in an index for your book. When you get the index for review, make sure those items are there, skim over the rest, and trust the indexer. You’ll probably have about a day to review the index, so it’s not in your best interest to obsess over it.
Off to Print
Once all of the Production tasks are done, the book is finished. Usually the publisher will release the ebook right away, and make an official announcement about it. You’ll have to wait a bit for your print copies, though (and that’s what you’re really looking forward to, right?). The same files used for the ebook are sent to a printer (or a print-on-demand service), and it may take anywhere from a few days to a few weeks before you get a copy, depending on the exact process, the size of your book, and how many are being printed. However it’s done, one of the first copies off the press should be sent directly to you, and you should absolutely celebrate as you see fit when you get it.
Marketing and Promotion
Once you have the book, you’re done, right? No, of course not. Depending on your publisher, they may or may not have a marketing department to assist you in promoting your book. No matter how much your publisher assists, though, your biggest weapon is: you. You know the most about the book, and you’re best suited to spread the word.
Fortunately, the best thing you can do to promote is be a good member of your community. Make yourself visible, not as a person selling a book, but as a person who contributes and shares. Speak at conferences or meetups. Answer questions on Stack Overflow (or whatever forum is appropriate for your technology). Be active on social media, talking about issues that relate to your technology. After you’ve contributed and helped someone, you say, “And if you’d like to know more, I’ve written a book about this,” and provide a link. If the content you’re providing is valuable, potential customers will seek out your book. It sounds grass-roots and maybe a little old-fashioned, but the best way to sell your content is to prove that your content is valuable. Your publisher will have other suggestions, and maybe even specific plans, but participating will get you better results than just sitting back and waiting for the royalties.
About the Author
Brian MacDonald has been an editor of technical publications for over eighteen years. For most of that time, he ran his own business, with clients including O’Reilly, Wiley, Apress, Wrox, Osborne, and Manning. He also spent a few years as a technical writer at Microsoft. He has co-authored two editions of Learning C# and Learning ASP.NET for O’Reilly. He lives in southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and son. You can follow him on Twitter at @bmac_editor.
Brian was the Senior Acquisitions Editor for the Pragmatic Bookshelf when he wrote this piece.
