The final draft that I submitted to the editor/ publisher and the final final draft that ended up as the published version, giving you a chance to see what happens in the editing process.
That's a really great question and the answer has a lot to do with the context of writing this specific book as opposed to perhaps how I'd feel about a different piece of writing. I pitched the book to a company I was doing website writing for at the time who then worked with a publisher so they served as kind of a "middleman" and the writing that I was doing was my writing but it was going to be under their brand as well, which I knew going in. We worked back and forth together to figure out a lot of the details, including which artists could be included in the book, so the entire working relationship was about compromise and making changes, which meant that I was not so attached to the outcome of my exact wording. And also ... the book was supposed to come out right around the time the pandemic hit and everything got super delayed so by the time that the final final edits came from the publisher to my contact and then to me, I had already mentally moved on to other things and probably didn't even read the proofs as well as I could have. So I didn't notice all of the changes until I actually held a published copy in my hands. And then I had mixed feelings because part of me was totally fine with it (and still is) and part of me was angry at myself for not actually reviewing it further because what if I'd wanted to make some changes that I didn't notice? So ... mixed ... but generally all right with everything. Mostly I want to go through and find the things I wrote that I cared about that didn't make it into the book at all and be sure to share those here or elsewhere. But the finished book and the way that the editors trimmed down my often lengthy meandering words to fit inside the pages of the book totally work for me. I don't feel like anything I was trying to convey failed to come across at all so that's happy.
It's so interesting to see the changes that were made. How did you feel about them?
That's a really great question and the answer has a lot to do with the context of writing this specific book as opposed to perhaps how I'd feel about a different piece of writing. I pitched the book to a company I was doing website writing for at the time who then worked with a publisher so they served as kind of a "middleman" and the writing that I was doing was my writing but it was going to be under their brand as well, which I knew going in. We worked back and forth together to figure out a lot of the details, including which artists could be included in the book, so the entire working relationship was about compromise and making changes, which meant that I was not so attached to the outcome of my exact wording. And also ... the book was supposed to come out right around the time the pandemic hit and everything got super delayed so by the time that the final final edits came from the publisher to my contact and then to me, I had already mentally moved on to other things and probably didn't even read the proofs as well as I could have. So I didn't notice all of the changes until I actually held a published copy in my hands. And then I had mixed feelings because part of me was totally fine with it (and still is) and part of me was angry at myself for not actually reviewing it further because what if I'd wanted to make some changes that I didn't notice? So ... mixed ... but generally all right with everything. Mostly I want to go through and find the things I wrote that I cared about that didn't make it into the book at all and be sure to share those here or elsewhere. But the finished book and the way that the editors trimmed down my often lengthy meandering words to fit inside the pages of the book totally work for me. I don't feel like anything I was trying to convey failed to come across at all so that's happy.