I have to admit that when Lea Schizas from Museitup Publishing asked for all eight books in the series I sent them off with a little hesitation. I wrote them for an Australian audience using our special brand of spelling.
Changing five hundred thousand words from Australian English to USA English can be done with Find and Replace on MS Word. That's not a huge problem, but for my own peace of mind I needed to go through each book and find those pesky little words that fall under the radar.
So, since Sept 10th till last night I have been working frantically to correct any imperfections. The manuscripts have already been sent away, but I hope the corrections will help smooth the editing process.
Meanwhile it is exciting to find the books are quite readable. After being away from Caleath's world for a year or so, I returned with relief. The story is not too shabby! I believe they will find acceptence among readers. Other than those few who have read them and are impatient for the next installment.
More than anything I am excited to have others read and enjoy the story. Now I feel it is polished and in the right language for the majority of readers, I can relax and focus on promoting and when the time comes, editing.
Now I feel my work is worthy of the wonderful photos I have for cover ideas, website and promoting. Thanks to Matt and Rachel, it makes working on the books such a pleasure!
Can't wait for the new website to be up and running. Thanks to Mick and Tim. I will be able to host blogs and have excerpts and interviews and things there.
Now I am excited!
Oh, and still working on the map idea. Hmmm....
Ramblings from Lady Rosalie and her guests...concerning new releases, life as a published writer and general stuff...
3 comments:
Ah-h ... the joys of translating our erudite Aussie lingo into some North American babble!... I've struggled with the question of WHY should I have to change what is in fact proper English to a goodly portion of the planet just to placate those yankee publishers who are owned by off-shore conglomerates anyway!....
.... and although I jest in the above paragraph (mostly) I do understand why, so I and my spell-check are working through 60,000 plus words to make sure they are grammatically.... (I can't say 'correct' I just can't) ... americaneze!
It really feels wrong to allow some of their spelling through. What drives them? I like that.. Americaneze. A new and particular language.
Do we have to change the "_" inverted commas too? I guess I will find out soon enough.
That could be fun. Does 'find' and 'replace' do them?
What happens to the books we want to sell down under? Our lovely loyal Aussie readers must learn Americaneze?
HUGE congrats on selling your whole series, Rosalie - that's an amazing achievement and what a tribute to your writing!
But ah, the spelling question! Yes, been there, and it irks a bit....thaough like Widdershins, I can understand that we need to settle on *something.* But how come when I read books by US authors released (usually much later) in the UK, the spelling is....American?? ;-)))
Jane x
Post a Comment