I'm available to read and mark galleys and page proof for faculty authors (either instead of or in addition to the author's reading). If you prefer, I'll serve as reading partner. Proofs are given high priority because of the short turn-around time required.
Just bring or send me the proofs (I'm in 113A BIO, mail code 4370, e-mail jkennedy@bio.fsu.edu). Please include all copies of the proofs, the marked typescript if the publisher has returned it, and any instructions the publisher has enclosed.
I provide any level of help the author would like, from simple proofreading through complete rewrite, and I never make any change to a document without the author's approval. Some authors prefer to submit a printout for marking, then to incorporate the changes into the electronic file themselves; others prefer to save time and improve accuracy by having me incorporate the changes. Most frequently, I mark up the electronic manuscript with MS Word's "track changes" and "insert comment" features and return it for the author's approval.
Some commonly requested services are:
It depends on your writing style, of course, but I can often shorten scientific prose from 5% to 20% without removing any information content--it's a matter of long practice. If an editor complains your paper is too long, let me take a crack at it before you start deleting information.
Anyone who has tackled the job of editing, e.g., a multiauthor proceedings volume knows how much detail is involved (e.g., putting all the manuscripts in uniform format; smoothing the abrupt style transitions from paper to paper; making sure every paper uses the same variant of neuron/neurone, focused/focussed, and toward/towards and followed the same rules for "ten"/"10" and the serial comma and capitalization after colons; dealing with the publisher's format requirements; checking all the separate literature-cited sections or compiling one large one; constructing the index). I can free you to make just the scientific judgments by doing all this routine work. Professional editing can also save considerable production time and expense, which can hold down the cost of the published book. If you are contemplating such a project, talk to me about setting up the optimal work-flow and record-keeping systems so that the job can go as smoothly as possible.
Indexing
Authors and book editors can save a considerable amount on publication costs by having the volume indexed in house rather than having the publisher do it.
Database and EndNote library grooming
If you download EndNote or other entries automatically from electronic databases, or if you hire a student to enter them for you, they will be full of errors (particularly in capitalization, hyphenation, abbreviation, and field placement of data), which are then propagated into your literature-cited sections, together with the frequent format errors in EndNote's output templates. I will be happy to proofread your libraries for you periodically, weeding your term lists (particularly the one governing journal names and abbreviations), checking for data in the wrong fields, correcting typos and capitalization errors, regularizing publisher names, etc. I can also edit your output templates as needed, to make them actually match your journals' preferred reference formats.