This month I have spent most of my time creating an index for a client who had written his family history and was keen to get it published. I copy-edited his book a few months ago, and he later decided he wanted an index – a good choice, given that the book is almost 600 pages long!
It got me thinking – many people have thought about writing their family history, and haven’t done so. There are several reasons why stories are left unwritten, and some of the main reasons include:
- Time constraints – usually the biggest issue. Finding the time to write can feel difficult, as life gets in the way.
- Confidence in writing ability – often people want to tell their story, but lack confidence in their ability to find the right words, or to put the words in the right order.
- Doubt – is the story interesting enough? Will people read it?
Do any of those reasons sound familiar? Time will always be an issue, and all I can advise is that if you have a story to tell, then try and find the time – an hour a week is better than nothing, so try and factor that hour into your diary.
Confidence in writing ability is something that can be addressed by using the skills of a professional, and I will outline four stages in the writing process where professionals can help.
Doubt about whether your story is interesting enough or whether people will read it – think about why you want to write. Do you want to document your family history and have a record for others to view in years to come? If so, don’t worry about whether people will read it. Someone somewhere will be interested in what you have to say.
I mentioned four stages in the writing process where professionals can help, and those stages are Development Editing, Copy-editing, Proofreading and Indexing:
Development Editing
If you have written your family history based on facts, your story might read something like this:
John Smith was born in Burton-on-Trent in 1845. He married Mary Jones in 1866 and they had six children. John was a carpenter and he died in 1906.
The story is factual – a development editor will help you to expand the story, and might suggest something like this:
John Smith was born in 1845 in Burton-on-Trent, a town dominated by the brewing industry. In 1866 he married Mary Jones in All Saint’s Church, Newborough, a neighbouring parish where Mary was born. The 1881 census indicates that they had six children, and that John worked as a carpenter. John died in 1906, and he was buried in St Werburgh Church, Hanbury, a village close to Newborough.
The story is still factual, and all facts must be referenced, but the story has grown and developed – information has been added, and the story has instantly become more interesting.
A development editor will help a story to evolve – facts will be referenced, and the story will be expanded, to include details such as facts about where a person lived, what society was like at the time, or what John’s role as a carpenter might have entailed.
Consistency will be checked – if a seventh child is mentioned four pages later, then something is factually wrong, and a development editor should pick this up.
The development editor will make your story consistent, and will develop each character within the story. The flow of the text will be addressed, for example if the passage about John’s marriage appears after discussion about one of his children, then the ordering of the story will be reworked.
If a person is described as having brown hair, and black hair two paragraphs later, this should also be picked up by the development editor.
The aim is to develop the story, and check for flow and context consistency in detail throughout.
Copy-editing
Once you have written your story and you feel happy with it, a copy-editor can check that it is grammatically correct, consistent, and that everything contained within your story is referenced correctly.
The copy-editor will read through your story and establish a style – whether you are using UK or US spellings, double or single quotes, whether punctuation sits in or outside of quotation marks, that spellings of names, places, abbreviations and so on are consistent, and that the story reads well.
Styling in terms of font, text size, paragraph styling, bullet and number list layout, headers, notes, and reference styling are also reviewed. A good copy-editor will check for consistency throughout the story, and will raise any queries with you.
In my view, copy-editing is the most important part of the process – whether you are writing your family history or writing an article for a journal or magazine, attention to detail, accuracy and consistency will always make your work more appealing. Copy-editing is usually done in Word, so that errors can be amended directly, before the work is typeset.
Proofreading
This stage takes place once your work has been typeset, and is usually done in PDF format, so that the proofreader can carry out checks such as sequential numbering of pages, sections, headers, figures and tables, and check that any changes made during the copy-editing stage have been addressed correctly.
A proofreader is a fresh and final pair of eyes. Copy-editing and proofreading are usually done by different people, so that any additional changes can be spotted at the proofing stage. The proofreader will read through your story and make any final amendments deemed necessary. If spacing or formatting issues have crept in during the typesetting stage, they will mark them up. A proofreader will also check for style, so that if the copy-editor has missed anything, or if errors have been added because of the copy-editor’s queries, those errors can be addressed at this stage.
Proofreading is the final stage before publishing, and is an important process if you want to publish work of a high standard.
Indexing
If you want to publish your family history, please consider including an index. Think about your reader – it may be a stranger reading about your family for the first time, a genealogist searching for a certain person within your story, or a family member looking for a certain ancestor, for example.
An index is a helpful tool for a reader: if, as a genealogist, I want to find John Smith in your story, I want to consult an index which will tell me exactly where to find him. If I am a family member looking for Great Uncle John Smith, and I think he may have served in the Boer War, for example, I want to see entries for John Smith and entries for the Boer War in the index. If I am looking for an ancestor and I can’t remember their name, but I know they lived in Oxford, I want to see Oxford in the index.
Indexing is my favourite part of the process. It is creative, but subjective. As an indexer, I may decide that ‘beards’ needs to be indexed because beards have been mentioned in detail, or ‘poverty ’ needs to appear, because there have been discussions around lack of money and hardship. The entries are subjective because they are terms I feel carry some importance, and might be something the reader will search for.
Indexing can be done ‘coldly’, and I am referring to embedded indexes here. There are two main ways of creating an index (in fact, AI is presenting a third way, but that’s a discussion for another day): embedded indexes produce ‘cold’ indexes, in my opinion. To create an embedded index, the indexer will ‘tag’ names and phrases as they appear in the Word document. The index is embedded within the Word document, and this has an advantage – the index can be auto-generated, and page numbers are allocated automatically to index entries. It’s a quick way to index, and terms are indexed as they are tagged. In my opinion, context is lost. If I read a paragraph which, for example, talks about a burial, I might tag ‘John Smith’s burial’, which will then appear in the index. The paragraph might tell me about the weather, for example, but I can’t tag anything which will give me an indexing term relating to the weather at the burial. In that way, the index feels ‘cold’ and without context.
The second way is to use specific indexing software. I use old software called Sky Index Professional, and I read through the text in the PDF (so the story has already been typeset and page numbers allocated). I decide on an indexing term, and then type it into the indexing software. I build up the index as I enter each term, and at the end I can then edit the index, and remove any duplicate entries, merge entries, add any sub-headers if needed etc. It’s a very long process, however I feel it produces a better index.
How to find a development editor, copy-editor, proofreader or indexer
There are many websites out there where people will offer to edit your work, or proofread your document, and there are many websites where you can list your requirements and people will give you a price for doing the work. Effectively, work is usually allocated to the lowest bidder.
So, how do you find the right person? I suggest two routes:
- Find someone who has taken the time to become qualified in the field. Many qualified professionals will be registered with a reputable organization, where their qualifications have been verified as part of the entry requirements for that organization.
- Websites – look for editors, proofreaders and indexers that have their own website. If they are experienced, you will be able to read testimonials and see examples of their work.
Two organizations you could consult are:
The Chartered Institute of Editing and Proofreading (CIEP). Consult this organization if you are looking for a development editor, copy-editor or proofreader. I am a Professional Member of this organization, and I qualified as a copy-editor and proofreader almost 20 years ago. Their website is: https://ciep.uk
The Society of Indexers. Consult this organization if you need an indexer. I am a qualified indexer and used to belong to the Society, however I let my membership lapse. Their website is: www.indexers.org.uk
I hope this blog helps you – whether you are just thinking about writing and need to know what help is out there, or whether you have written your family history or an article, and feel that you need some assistance to fine-tune your work, please consider contacting a professional.
One final note and a plug for myself – I am happy to take on copy-editing, proofreading and indexing, so if you feel I could help, please get in touch.
