clean proofs

I’ve already sent them back, because they were a nice, clean set of proofs that I was able to check in less than half a work day. Nicely prepared by zerO.

zerO Books has the most elaborate authorial web interface I’ve ever seen. The idea, apparently, is to minimize the energy drain of one-on-one communication, thereby allowing them to handle more books than their staff size would normally allow. Most foreseeable questions are already handled in a massive FAQ document prepared by the publisher, and even the submission and correction of manuscripts is done through the web interface rather than through personal dialogue. I can see why it might not be for everyone, but so far I really enjoy the seeming hyper-efficiency of it.

I have to admit that for about the first 15 or 20 minutes, I found the sheer size of the web interface to be demoralizing. But really just for 15 or 20 minutes. After that my attitude completely flipped, and I found myself excited by the leeway it gave me for working hard and quickly on all the pre-publication documents, instead of having to wait for “permission slip” e-mails to move onto the next stage. In fact, given how impatient I am capable of being, the zerO interface is ideal for me.

I haven’t actually seen any physical copies of their books yet, but the PDF of the proofs looked mighty fine.