Ok, so I had gone through my gazillion and one drafts and finally got EOA to the point where I was ready for professional editorial services. Then I found an editor who had great testimonials and reasonable prices. She helped me beef up my content significantly and then did the final proofread. After that, I skimmed through it one more time but didn't do another in-depth edit. This was a mistake. Today my mom was finally reading the book and she sends me about fifteen texts with little mistakes she found, like mixing up 'there', 'their', and 'they're'. Trust me, I know which 'there' I'm supposed to use, but writing late into the nights fueled up on caffeine does a number to the little brain cells, and mistakes always happen. I paid my editor and trusted her to find/correct them. She didn't get it all.
Now I'm upset with my editor, but this is also partly my fault. I guess the reason I didn't do another in-depth edit was, first, because I had just gone through professional editorial services, second, because of excitement :3, and lastly, the thing I always hear people say: there's always something you see that you're going to want to change and at some point you just have to tell yourself that it is finished.
So where does reasonable editing end and overanalyzing begin? I think the best way to know is to go with your gut. If your gut says to do another read-through, do it. My gut said to, but I thought I was being paranoid, and now I'm sweeping up the mess, contacting reviewers and begging them to look at the new draft and not the old, and dealing with the embarrassment of my print book looking sloppy and unprofessional.
My new version of EOA is going to be online in about 48 hours. I hope not too many people noticed the mistakes, or that they just seem like a bigger deal to me than to everyone else. But it is what it is now. Lesson learned. Don't make my mistake.
-Esha
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