I need some help finishing my new book

[John Holifield]

Would anyone be willing to help me do the final edit of my new book? I'm pretty much done with all the ideas, instructions and references, but I'm having trouble with some articulation, formatting, punctuation and various other things. I'm not a writer per se, I'm more of a teacher and this is where I need help. Would anyone be interested?

John
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Working hard is great. But, it is more productive and rewarding to Work Smart!

[kehaulani]

Are you talking about for a fee or gratis?
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"If you don't live it, it won't come out of your horn." Bird

Yamaha 8310Z Bobby Shew trumpet
Benge 3X Trumpet
Benge 3X Cornet
Adams F-1 Flghn

[John Holifield]

Another problem I'm having is that my previous book, which I self published, is being advertised worldwide and has sold hundreds of copies but I've not been paid. While I'm not happy about it, I'm glad that my material is being used
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Working hard is great. But, it is more productive and rewarding to Work Smart!

[John Holifield]

[stuartissimo]

Have you considered doing something like sending the text to ChatGPT and have the AI take a crack at fixing it? If anything it might be faster…
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1997 Getzen 700SP trumpet
1955 Olds Super cornet
1939 Buescher 280 flugelhorn
AR Resonance mouthpieces

[John Holifield]

[ProAm]

Interesting. How many pages is your book? What kind of a book? Mostly words or mostly exercises?

Are you just asking for editing help on punctuation and wording? You mentioned formatting - what are you using to create your book? 30 years ago I had some knowledge of Framemaker, an extensive program for creating complex documents. Our company had a number of people whose expertise was in document creation with Framemaker. Some formatting programs can require quite a bit of knowledge in order to use them effectively. I may have created the text for a section but another person took it and knew how to insert that text into the larger whole.

Though I am not a professional writer, I think that I have a decent command of the written, English language. My punctuation tends toward an older style using more commas than is popular today. I have written papers using appropriate style books for guidance.

But if you are trying to format text around musical examples, that is something different. I have a friend who has written mathematical textbooks and the tools he uses to insert equations, diagrams, etc. took him a lot of effort and years to develop.

My question summed up is: what kind of help are you asking for, exactly?

[OldSchoolEuph]

[JayKosta]

[Arranger-Transcriber]

I think many us us are still in the dark about your subject matter, the types of editing problems you anticipate, and the scope of your project. Might I suggest that you set aside a couple brief examples of the material you're writing about and offer to send them to those who are interested so that they might gain a more concrete idea of the task involved. Possibly you could offer a larger portion of your previous publication as well. I myself have 40 years of experience as a teacher of writing and as a technical editor. One thing I would caution against is engaging a committee of people for the job. For conistency and control, you need ONE individual.

[John Holifield]

Update: I've had a couple members respond to my plea for help, of which I'm very grateful! Not only did I, with their help, finish and publish my new book, but I was able to finish writing and completed my next book and publish it also. I really appreciate everyone's advice, I read everyone's comments, but I took the advice and help from the members who reached out to me.

John
_________________
Working hard is great. But, it is more productive and rewarding to Work Smart!