A Book’s Journey: From Manuscript to Shelf

A book undertakes a long journey from the time that it is conceived as an idea in the author’s mind until the time that you gleefully reach for it on the shelf of your favorite bookstore. There are countless people involved in the process—after all, books have to be printed, marketed, and distributed—but today I’m focusing on an editor’s role in the process.

Here are the steps a manuscript goes through on its journey to becoming a book, along with the levels of editing that happen along the way.

1. An author writes a book. (Well done, author!)

2. The book undergoes developmental editing.

3. Once the author is satisfied that this draft of writing is the final one, the book undergoes copyediting.

A copyeditor goes through the manuscript with a fine-tooth comb and interrogates each word. They correct spelling, grammar, and punctuation. They standardize the treatment of numbers and special terms. They check that hyphenation, abbreviations, and acronyms are used correctly. It’s also the copyeditor’s job to check different elements of the manuscript against each other. For example, they check the headings of chapters against the table of contents. In short, the copyeditor is responsible for clarity, continuity, and correctness.

4. The copyedited manuscript is sent to the typesetter/designer to be typeset. This is when the manuscript is designed: it stops looking like a Microsoft Word file and starts looking like the pages of a real book.

5. The PDF of the typeset book is then sent to the proofreader for proofreading.

6. The proofread book is sent to the printer.

Once the books are printed and distributed, us lucky readers get to enjoy them. I hope this description of how a book is edited is helpful for those of you interested in writing a book of your own or getting into publishing. Let me know if you have any questions in the comments below. I’m happy to help if I can!