As a publisher, there is nothing more uncomfortable than a client who comes to see me with a scheduled and planned book launch celebration date, but doesn’t understand the editing process and schedule.
This may cause the author and all members of his team to operate in a spirit of haste rather than a spirit of excellence. Operating in a spirit of haste means mistakes will be made.
Book a content / development editor at least two to three months in advance. Personally, I only take on a certain number of editing projects at a time. I would like to be able to plan your project in advance to make sure I can dedicate the necessary time. Some projects may require a lot of editing, which means that I will have to spend even more time on that particular project.
The content editing phase generally takes three months depending on the length of the manuscript and, again, if intensive editing will be required. I suggest that new authors, or those who have not studied the trade well enough to know the basic rules of grammar / writing, allow a couple more months to go back and forth with their editor.
But wait! Don’t book your launch party yet. You still have to finish editing. I’m a copyeditor myself, but I do a completely separate edit round just for copying. If you work with a development editor that is not also a text editor, you may have to do two or three rounds with your text editor. So, add a couple of months or so to the timeline.
Launch party planning should never precede planning your book production. That’s putting the cart before the horse (BTW: if I were your editor, I would never allow you to use such an unconvincing cliche. Be original!).
So if you are an author who already has your book launch celebration set in stone on your calendar (paid spot, among other things), my advice would be to postpone the release or make it a soft release where you accept pre – only orders. Making your book available for pre-order, as well as having a full-blown pre-order campaign, should be part of every author’s publishing process anyway.
It’s never a good idea to publish a book that hasn’t been professionally edited … even if you have a grammar program that you swear by. Remember, grammar programs can help you become a better writer, but they will never replace a human editor.