MGG - 6.12 - Gloria - editor

Psalm 19:12a

But who can discern their own errors?

I'm not being fair to Gloria, of course.  She doesn't have the opportunity to stop me, and correct me, when I've made a mistake.  And, I know, even dictating this, and even more so editing it, very roughly, to take out the worst excesses of Gboard and my stumbling dictation, that Gloria would do a far superior job of editing it.

Over the years, since I published my first book, people have asked me how you write a book.  The first thing I tell them is that, once you have actually written the book, that's the easy part done.  I also told them that, if you intend to be a writer, when you find a good copy editor, you marry her.  That's not a fair comment either, since when I married Gloria I had no idea that I would actually be writing books.  I also didn't know how much I needed editing.  Fortunately, in the time between we got married, and the time that I started to write my first book, I had learned first, how much editing my writing needed, and second, how great an editor Gloria was.  Not just a copy editor.  She was a terrific copy editor.  She was also a structural copy editor. She is a grammatical copy editor. She is a stylistic copy editor.  She was a developmental editor.  There are at least seven different types of editors, and Gloria epitomized every one.  I dedicated my first book to her, and I said in the introduction, that if it wasn't for Gloria I would never have written a book.  That is, quite literally, true.  I needed her support.  She even supported me by taking my handwritten scribbles, mostly illegible (you will recall from my teaching reviews), and typing them into text, where I could work on them.

She supported me at every step of the way.  When my first book got to the copy editing stage, Gloria copy edited their copy editor's notes.  Her help was invaluable, and I truly mean that.

(During the time that I was doing book reviews, again supported by Gloria, one of the books was on writing and editing.  Gloria, when she typed up my reviews, would make suggestions about how I should be modifying what I wrote, and, since the book was about editing, I asked her if I could just leave in her comments, in the final review.  She agreed.  I sent the draft review to the author, and she responded.  Some of her responses were to Gloria's comments.  So I asked the author if I could include *her* comments.  She agreed.  The final result is http://victoria.tc.ca/int-grps/books/techrev/bkbugwrt.rvw )

I dedicated "Cybersecurity Lessons from CoVID-19" to Gloria.  I did not realize, at the time, that it would be the last book that she would ever edit for me.  I don't know if this memoir will see publication.  I don't know if I can do it without Gloria.

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