Book Update

Quite a while back, I wrote a post about the book that my friend, Robin, and I are co-editing. The project was challenging and a ton of work, but it was also one of the most enjoyable scholarly projects of my academic career. I just loved working with Robin--and with the many authors who contributed to the book. Here we are on the day we signed the book contract a little less than a year ago.






It turns out that editing a book is WAY more work that I'd every anticipated. I had this idea that editing a volume is a little like throwing a house party. You announce the event, invite people to come, provide some drinks and snacks, and count on the partygoers to make the night fabulous. I forgot some things: sometimes guests say they're going to come and then stand you up or arrive late; sometimes they don't bring the things they promised they would; sometimes they show up in crummy moods and and seem determined to poop on your party; and no matter what, you always have to clean up their messes--and your own. Of course, there are fabulous party guest, too. They make the event feel effortless, and in that way, they save the day.

It turns out that our party of an edited volume was a wonderful mixed bag. Robin and I wrote or co-wrote several chapters ourselves, but neither of us had ever edited a book before, so this was brand new to both of us. We worked with a wonderful collection of writers, so that was great. We sent the finished manuscript to our publisher last spring. A couple of weeks ago, the production editor sent us the "redline changes," the things the copyeditor recommended we edit or add. We were thrilled to find that the changes were all really small things--that made our many, many hours of editing back in the spring feel like time well spent. On Thursday, we sent the edited manuscript back. We're told we'll get proofs in early December and that the book will come out in March. Last week, after several rejected versions, they sent us the final cover design! We're getting really close now. I'm guessing that the next time I mention this book on my blog will be the day it's published! Pretty exciting stuff in my little world.

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