Besides editing and proofing, my favorite aspect of this internship has been communicating with various authors and the occasional typesetter and publishing company representative. Editors can sometimes be isolated, working on books without communicating with anyone outside the office (which, in FiT's case, has very few employees), so emailing with other people involved in the process provides an opportunity for extra social interaction. There are also some circumstances that require making phone calls when email addresses are outdated.
So far, I've found that most people are courteous, helpful, and even friendly--especially authors. At one point, I had to research some authors who would potentially write blurbs for Boomercise, FiT's upcoming book about exercise for the aging population. Once I found some authors who had written similar books, I emailed them to ask whether they would be interested in contributing a sentence or two of praise for the book, to be published on the back cover. The authors that I contacted were very nice and all agreed to contribute a quote (unfortunately only one followed through).
One of the authors had a question about what compensation he would receive for contributing a blurb--an awkward question since I was pretty sure that there was no monetary payment. I checked with my supervisors and ended up spinning the answer in a way that was hopefully not disappointing to the author. My reply was:
"We sincerely thank you for taking the time to write a blurb for Boomercise. In terms of an honorarium, we will include your name and the name of your published work(s) on the back cover of the book, as well as on our website, fitinfotech.com. We can include a hyperlink on the website that will take readers directly to a page where they can purchase your publication. We will also mail a complimentary copy of the book to you upon its completion."
He seemed to understand and accept the answer, and I hope that he was pleased with the attention that his publications will receive by appearing on the book cover and our website. It's unlikely that a huge number of people will buy his books because of his contribution, but I feel that the free book and publicity are good compensation for the blurb.
One other example of the many email conversations I've had is one with a typesetter that FiT works with often. We're in the process of publishing the 4th edition of a book called Group Dynamics, and there were some extra edits that needed to be typeset. I sent them to the typesetter, who had a few questions about the corrections:
"I got into the additional corrections, and realized I never received the Index or About the Authors. If you have them, can you send them over? We'll have to be careful--the page numbers changed toward the end. I'll review the "GroupDynamics-Book-0707.pdf" and see where that left off. Sorry for the confusion!"
I checked with Matt and found out that the index and about the authors sections still needed to be proofread, so I told the typesetter that we would send them as soon as possible. He actually found a couple of errors, too--a reference out of alphabetical order and a name that had been consistently misspelled (something that happens more often than I thought it would). We had a brief discussion about the errors; I always enjoy talking to people who work in publishing, face the same complications as editors, and understand why it's funny that authors misspell each other's names constantly.
The only time that I've had to make calls to people during my internship was when we were trying to update author bio information for around 40 authors whose various articles are being compiled into a comprehensive sport marketing handbook. Some of the articles are 20 years old, and many of the authors have retired or moved on to different universities. I called the last known university where each of the 'lost' authors had worked, looking for information about where they had moved or any information that could be included in the updated author bios. This communication was probably the most unpleasant overall, since many of the people who I talked to were either unhelpful, rude, or both. There were, however, a few people who understood that I wasn't trying to inconvenience them and tried to the best of their abilities to help.
We ended up getting some updated email addresses, information on a couple of authors who had retired, and a lot of dead ends through our research over the phone and online. One author actually emailed us back to ask that her name be removed from the publication, with no explanation. We removed it, but I still wonder why she wouldn't want her name attached to it--the article was actually very good. Another author had moved to a university in Australia, according to his former employer, and we ended up finding his current email address through the Australian university's website.
I never really considered how difficult it would be to keep updated contact information on every author who publishes an article or book through a company, but then again, I hadn't considered the possibility of republishing 20-year-old articles. Overall, I like communicating with various people, even when they are less than polite; it provides a sometimes-welcome break from hours of editing and helps to build relationships and rapport with both clients and associates.
No comments:
Post a Comment