Today I recieved the first proof copy of my book. (I am resisting the urge to splurge on at least a couple of exclamation marks here. Oh what the heck:!!) Last week, after I finally finished formatting and checking through my draft, made the PDF and pressed ‘send’ to email to the printer I was left feeling decidedly flat – what an anti-climax after over six years of work!
However, a courier arrived a short time ago with the first, pristine copy of the REAL book, and suddenly I felt overwhelmed: I have finally got there! It is printed, bound, shiny and new. A quick flick through and it looks pretty good, even if I do say so myself. Amazing that this part of the process is so quick, when the design, layout and graphics took over six months of hard graft on Indesign, Illustrator, Photoshop (and my friend Google when I couldn’t fathom how to get the blessed thing to do what I wanted).
So much frustration and mutterings such as ‘why on earth did I ever think I could do this?’ ‘whose idea was this anyway’ and plaintive wails of ‘when will it ever be finished?’ not to mention late nights hunched over the keyboard, promising the ever patient spouse that I would ‘just finish off this page . . .’ , copious amounts of coffee and chocolate, and many many hours later, and here we are.
Now I will sit down and carefully proof-read it all, make adjustments and corrections ready for the actual print run. Once everything is in place and the final quote from the printer is in, I will be taking for orders, so watch this space. Exciting times!
Proof:
noun: evidence sufficient to establish a thing as true, or to produce belief in its truth;
Written in Ink and Stone 