After galley.

by RJ Morris

Production Manager,

Co-Founder, VP, The Wild Rose Press, Inc.

What happens to your baby after galleys? 

You’ve worked hard, you’ve slaved over a hot computer keyboard until your eyes are red rimmed and blurry, your fingers are numb, your back aches, and your legs don’t remember what it means to stand.  Your editor, whom you’ve blessed and cursed in the same breath, finally announces that your manuscript has completed the galley stage and is ready to go to production.  

You lean back in your chair that gives an audible complaint from over use and debate on whether or not to break out the champagne or wait until you have a release date.  You decide to field the question to your editor, who gives a patient, but obviously pat answer that it could be days, perhaps weeks before a release date is decided upon.  

“Why?” you ask.  The hard part is done, the text is flawless, even your dedication, carefully crafted to include everyone in your family that supported you during this long and often painful process, including the dog, is perfect.  Why would a release date take weeks to receive? 

Well, I’ll tell you.  There are a dozen things that must take place before the rest of the world can read your wonderful prose.  Electronic devices abound in this day and age, so your story must be formatted in specific ways to display properly on these devices.  Each one has its own unique way of handling text, so a good deal of care must go into this technical process.  If your book is to be printed, other formats must be created to align with the manufacturers’ specifications.  Many days of preparation for the distribution of your book must take place.  Then once these often tedious but necessary steps are taken, a release date can then be assigned to your book.  

“Finally!” you say.  “I’ll get a date and it’ll be just around the corner.”  

Um, well no.  As you were slaving at your keyboard, there were other manuscripts moving into production, also ready for dates and final formatting.  Therefore, your story must get in line.  

“But it’s an electronic book, why can’t it go out the minute it’s complete?” 

For The Wild Rose Press, Inc., we intentionally limit the number of releases per week so that each title gets a full day in the sun (2 weeks on the front page of our website).  If we were to release stories as quickly as we received them, then your wonderful tale and its lovely cover would be but a blip on the screen.  Literally.  So we limit ourselves to an average of five per week, which puts our releases about six months away from galley completion. 

Although you are saddened by this delay, you’re a savvy author and realize this allows you the time to promote your work and gather the crowds for the unveiling of your latest book.  It will be an event to remember, and an accomplishment to be proud of. 

So although you’ve slaved away and used your vivid imagination to create this fabulous piece of work, there are invisible steps and countless people required to get your book to the top of the publishing mountain. 

I hope this has enlightened some of you, and that you might consider saying a simple thanks now and again to those invisible people who work very hard to make your book the best it can be.  And as spokesperson for the invisible people, I say, thank you, for allowing us to be a part of your publishing life.