(Previous entries in this series: Pts. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, and 14)

In August, I wrote my last entry in this series on developing a marketing plan for your book. Having implemented many of those ideas, I wanted to give some insight into what has and hasn’t worked for me so far.

Once I had a pretty firm idea of when the book would be out, I began targeting approximately 100 groups and organizations with e-mails about speaking. (I prefer corresponding via e-mail for a couple of reasons: it allows me to preserve an accurate record of who I’ve contacted and what was said and because I’m not sure how many people keep track of snail mail nowadays.) I compiled the list from my professional and personal networks, groups I’ve previously spoken to, groups with a clear connection to Andrew Jackson, and suggestions from other colleagues. I have had a booking success rate of approximately 25%, and I have received answers (either affirmative or negative) from almost everyone I contacted.

Scheduling talks in some organized manner is key. For example, once I booked a talk in South Carolina for spring break, I reached out to other organizations in that area or along the way to see if the timing would work for them. In that case, I was able to schedule four talks in one trip. Organized coordinating has also been important because of my teaching schedule. With limited days on which I can travel, even if it’s in the area, I need to know what dates/times are feasible for me and if I can offer an alternate date for a group if there’s a conflict.

The South Carolina trip I mentioned actually offers a nice segue into a dicey topic: honoraria/travel funds. Some groups are upfront about whether they will offer either of these; most, however, are not. Some have even asked me to name my fee. The best advice I can give is to try to at least break even financially. If you have to travel two hours to give a talk, I don’t think it’s uncouth to ask for enough of a fee to pay for your gas. If the talk requires an overnight stay, requesting lodging shouldn’t come as a surprise to the organization.

Some groups may also put you in a weird spot due to their disorganization. Be proactive in getting the information that you need for the talk, and plan to arrive early to set up, especially if you are using audio-visual aids. That also gives you time to read the audience and setting.  Most attendees probably love history and/or are widely read but aren’t experts on your topic, so give it to them in a form they can easily understand. Also make sure that you respond to the setting. If you are in an open room with senior citizens who may find it hard to hear you, you will need to project more than if you are in a living room speaking to a book club. Use A/V if you can, but be able to talk without it in case something goes wrong.

Another consideration to give some thought is your book’s price point. Finding a price point that makes the book affordable, yet still allows you to turn a small profit is difficult. You have to realize that not many people are going to pay $50 for a book they can buy online for $30. With this book, I discovered that $5 made the difference between attendees balking at or making the purchase.

One final recommendation: seek out non-academic venues to write about your book. I wrote pieces for History News Network and Readex and am currently working on three others. These opportunities expose your book to audiences that you might not reach otherwise but that are likely to be interested in reading more about your topic.

Above all, be friendly and courteous. Send a thank-you note afterwards to the person most responsible for setting up the talk or asking you to submit a piece of writing. It’s not only good manners–that person may just invite you back to speak or write in the future or recommend you to someone else.

You can also see some book-promotion tips in Liz Covart’s summary of last week’s AHA panel on writing and the Twitter timelines of Covart, Becky Erbelding, and Jordan Grant for that panel.

(Previous entries in this series: Pts. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, and 12.)

It’s appropriate that this entry is the thirteenth in the series. Academics generally hate compiling an index, even though it’s one of the most important tools that they (at least historians) use when reading.

There are software programs available that can create a book index for you. I understand that they are good at indexing terms, but not concepts, but they might be useful for you. I know some people also prefer to hire someone to compile the index for them.

I prefer to create an index the old-fashioned way (sort of). My system this time went like this:

• Between the copy-edit and the page-proof stages, I compiled a skeleton index of names and concepts from the copy edits. (The page numbers were still not set at that stage, so it was pointless to include them.)
• When the page proofs arrived, I read through them, highlighting terms in different colors. I used separate colors for Jackson-related events, Jackson-related concepts, non-Jackson proper names, and geographic names. (That turned out to be overkill-see below for why.)
• I then searched the .pdf page proof file for proper names as I came to them in the hard copy of the page proofs. I took this approach just in case I missed something in my skeleton index. (I found a handful of missed terms that way.)
• Once I completed the proper names, I moved to concepts. Searching in .pdf files for concepts will not find every mention, but by this stage, I was familiar with the flow of names, events, etc. That allowed me to do a basic search in the .pdf file for a concept (e.g., kinship), then work from the places in the hard copy where that word (and its variations) appeared.

A word of caution:

When searching .pdf files, make sure to use every variation of a term. For example, searching simply “secession” would miss “secede” and “seceding” (and “Secession” if you were using the “match case” search function”). The same goes for proper names. For example, I used both “Andrew J. Donelson” and “Andrew Donelson,” so searching for only one variation wouldn’t have worked. You also have to be careful if there are brackets within a word (e.g., “[J]ohn Donelson”).

The index that I completed for Andrew Jackson, Southerner isn’t as detailed as the one for Old Hickory’s Nephew. To keep from having lots of extra blank pages, which looks unsightly and adds to the book’s cost, the publisher gave me the following parameters: 34 manuscript  pages, 25 lines per page, 41 characters per line. That comes out to ten published index pages, which isn’t a lot for a history book. My original index manuscript was 52 pages, so I had to eliminate a lot of detail to make it under the required length. In hindsight, I spent a lot of time on detailed entries that won’t appear in the book’s index. That’s unfortunate, because conceptual indexes are more useful, in my opinion.

Since I’m not an indexing expert, you might find find it useful to search for threads on the topic at the CHE forums. Seniorscholar‘s system, for example, is very much like my own. I would also be interested to hear readers’ experiences with what works and doesn’t work for them when they index.

Pt. 14 is here.

(Previous entries in this series: Pts. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, and 11.)

Working with the page proofs of your book is a daunting task. As your publisher will tell you, the only possible changes are editorial, factual or typesetter errors. So, that sentence that doesn’t quite read right? You’re stuck with it. The additional research that came to light after you submitted the copy-edited drafts? Write it up in a journal article.

Despite not being able to significantly change the book at this point, paying close attention to the page proofs is important. There will always be mistakes that need correcting, and it’s your final chance to catch them and ask for them to be addressed.

LSU Press sent me a checklist that seems pretty standard from my experience:

1. Make sure chapter titles in the table of contents and the runningheads are correct.
2. Verify that the endnote numbers in the text match up with the endnotes section at the back of the book.
3. Check the page numbers in the table of contents and supply the page numbers for the runningheads in the endnotes section.
4. Read the text carefully for the three types of errors that can be corrected.

Understand that your published book will still have errors in it. Old Hickory’s Nephew has two obvious ones that I pointed out on the page proofs, yet they still made it into the final product. It’s unfortunate, but human errors happen.

You might find this thread on the Chronicle of Higher Education‘s Research Questions forum helpful as well. It even discusses indexing, the topic of my next post.

Note: As the publication date of Andrew Jackson, Southerner approaches, this series is also nearing its end. I plan on writing 2-3 more posts following this one.

Pt. 13 is here.

(Previous entries in this series: Pts. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10.)

Mary Beard recently explained how her most recent book cover design evolved. My experiences have been a little bit different. I’ve been fortunate enough to have had great designers at LSU Press. Amanda McDonald Scallon designed the cover of Old Hickory’s Nephew (OHN), which I think brilliantly captured how Jackson haunted Donelson for his entire life. I gave no input about how the cover should be designed. For the Andrew Jackson, Southerner cover, I suggested the portrait that graces the front but gave no other direction.

For the most part, academic publishers want to be left alone when it comes to design. They have marketing specialists who know what they’re doing when it comes to creating a book cover that will sell. It behooves authors to remember that fact. At the same time, my impression and experience is that it’s okay to indicate preferences for things. For example, with OHN, I told LSU Press that I didn’t like a certain bland book design that I had seen on their books. This time around, I suggested the portrait that they decided to use, but I understood that it was only a preference and that their designer had the final approval on whether to use it.

One other important thing to remember: If you want to use a certain image on the book jacket, understand that the image owner will not only have to grant you permission but will also likely require a rights fee or some other kind of compensation. Thankfully, The Hermitage owns the Jackson portrait for the forthcoming biography, and they were willing to allow its use (as they did for those on the OHN cover) for reasonable compensation.

Pt. 12 is here.

(Previous entries in this series: Pts. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8.)

You might be asking why I’m talking about the doldrums that set in following submission of the manuscript now instead of after its publication. From my experience, the real emotional letdown occurs once the manuscript is submitted to the editor for copy-editing. There is nothing yet tangible to point out to family and friends or to include in annual faculty activity reports.

I don’t know how others deal with this emotional gap, but here are a few things that I’ve done.

1. I organize research. If you’re like me, the final weeks prior to submission were not only spent cleaning up prose but also verifying footnotes. I had stacks of research folders on my desk, so I spent parts of several days refiling them, if I thought they would useful in the future, or scanning them into .pdfs if I wanted to keep them but didn’t think they were going to be important to future projects.
2. I started working on the index. Call me crazy (or call me maybe–that’s my favorite joke right now), but I got a jump on indexing the manuscript. Obviously, page numbers will have to come later, but I had a list of proper names and concepts that I wanted to include, so I organized them. I’m sure I’ll modify the index when the page proofs come in, but at least I’ve saved some time.
3. I started work on other projects. Like many of you, I have a main project (or two) and other minor projects. I was able to spend time on a couple of articles that were in various stages of completion, worked on book proposals for publishers, and wrote a conference paper.
4. I took some time to relax. This is an important one that I sometimes forget exists. I read popular fiction, spent time with family, and helped with home-improvement projects. The last one wasn’t so relaxing, but YMMV.

The bottom line: Stay active in some way, whether mentally or physically. That’s good advice to follow all of the time, but I think academic writers, who can become obsessive, need reminding sometimes.

Pt. 10 is here.

(Previous entries in this series: Pts. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7.)

Another extremely important relationship that you’ll have as you see your book manuscript through to publication is the one with the copy editor. Much of the previous advice I’ve given about referees and editors applies to copy editors as well, but let me expound on this relationship a bit.

All of the copy editors with whom I’ve worked were thorough and pleasant. In fact, they struck me as eternal optimists, as in “These errors can be fixed, and your book will be great.” I’m not sure how I would handle a surly, pessimistic copy editor, and I pity you if you’ve had one.

At the publishers I’ve worked with, copy editors were freelance hires. Sometime after the submission and review of the manuscript in-house, the editor sends it out to the copy editor, who reviews it for errors of style, formatting, citation, and substance. In history, they work with the latest edition of the Chicago Manual of Style and the press’ style sheet of preference. How they juggle and reconcile the two is beyond me, and I’m usually a detail person.

Once the copy editor is finished, s/he will send you electronic and/or paper copies of the manuscript with his/her edits. The author’s responsibility is to go through the edits, indicate acceptance of changes, explain why changes are not necessary, and answer any questions the copy editor had about the manuscript. It is a tedious process that requires substantial time and concentration. For the AJ bio, I spent the better part of three days on this job, but this was my fourth time with a book manuscript. Plan on spending more time if it’s your first experience.

Copy editors are very reasonable people. If there are edits with which you disagree, and they don’t violate the press’ style sheet, they’ll usually agree to your suggestions. But don’t be unreasonable, and for heaven’s sake, don’t boss them around. Also understand that copy editors have their own editing quirks at times. Sometimes the quirks make things better, sometimes they don’t, but remember that they just read through 300+ pages of your own quirky ideas about commas, hyphens, and complete citations.

Once you’ve made the changes, either on paper or via the word-processing program of the copy editor’s choice, you’ll send the manuscript back to the copy editor, who will ready the manuscript for the press. At that point, any major changes to your manuscript will need to be done, since the next stage, page proofs, only allows minor changes and corrections of egregious errors.

Let me close with one final thought about copy editors. They are the last reader before your book is published. As someone who likely is not an expert in your field, they have an eye for whether the book will be able to reach a broader audience. For that reason, listen carefully to any substantive recommendations that they make about content.

Part 9 is here.

What I imagine a book editor’s office looks like

(See also parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 of this series)

The most important relationship you will have as you look to publish is the one with your press’ acquisitions editor. For both of my books with LSU Press, I’ve worked with Rand Dotson.  Rand is a good editor for several reasons, but two stand out to me. The first is that he has a history Ph.D., which means he understands the challenges of the book projects undertaken by historians. The second is that he is succinct and direct in his correspondence.

A second important editorial contact that you might have is with a book series editor. I’ve had the honor of having both LSU Press books published in the Southern Biography Series. Bertram Wyatt-Brown was the editor for Old Hickory’s Nephew; the main title, in fact, was his suggestion. Bert was also editor when my proposal for the Jackson biography was contracted, but he retired in 2009, succeeded by Andrew Burstein. Both Bert and Andy wrote helpful editorial reports that made the manuscripts stronger.

My advice for working with editors is simple:

1. Heed their advice. They are experienced editors and/or senior scholars, and you ignore them at your peril.
2. Treat them with respect. Editors are your advocates with the press board, and they want you to succeed. Missing deadlines without permission, ignoring their suggestions, and acting as if you know more than they do are surefire ways to sabotage what could (and should) be a productive relationship for you both.
3. Communicate. If you encounters problems while writing a manuscript or during the production process, talk to your editor. S/he can intervene in problematic situations that ease your mind and can explain why you can’t emboss your book cover with 24-karat gold.

Part 8 is here.