Jaka's Story final text changes-- Nit-pickers ASSEMBLE!

SEAN MICHAEL ROBINSON:

Hello all!

We are currently wrapping up the Jaka's Story files in preparation for our upcoming print date! (You can still order the signed and numbered edition of the book through your local comic shop. But hurry! The ordering period closes today). As it's such a text-heavy book, the text has been completely set from scratch, using scans of the pages, optical character recognition, and an awful lot of typesetting, proofreading, and hair-pulling.

But we're almost there! Want to help us drag the book across the finish line? Have a lot of opinions about the tiniest details of the written word, and all of those squiggles that sometimes accompany them?

Well, we're here for you!

Below you'll find a list of proposed changes still on the table. These would be changes to the text as it appeared in the original printings. Below each excerpt is who suggested the change (myself, Eddie Khanna, or Jeff Seiler), and sometimes the rationale provided.

Thoughts on any of these? Please let us know ASAP in the comments!

All the best,

Sean

p.s.

page 76. "There was no telling how long the child had been so-engaged; no way to determine the extent of the irreparable damage done."

SMR asks—hyphen or no hyphen here?

Pg 117-- "For their route was carrying them past the playground; a place Nurse had scrupulously avoided since the “scandalous adventuring”

episode."

SMR requests semi-colon changed to a comma.

p 18 -- "shriveled" vs "shrivelled" (American versus UK usage)

p 12 (and about six other locations in the book)-- "T'Capmin" vs "T'capmin"

Eddie says: “Not sure if it's "T'Capmin" or "T'capmin." At first I thought it should be "T'Capmin" but the majority use is "T'capmin" and only in the beginning is "T'Capmin" used, (also in READS it's "T'capmin") so in hindsight, I assume 'T'Capmin" on page 12 is the incorrect form.”

p 120-- "Still, each morning as she waited for Nurse, Jaka pulled and pushed, attempted to rattle, attempted to coax, attempted to dislodge, however temporarily, however marginally, that brass lever inset with sculpted leaves and flourishes."

Original has "pedal" instead of "lever" but Jeff Seiler suggested the substitution.

p 259 "swiveling" versus "swivelling" (American versus UK usage)

p 334 SHE GAZED at the nearly transparent, cream-coloured silk of Astoria’s gown; as she regarded its tasteful simplicity so charmingly unencumbered; except by a single, pale, yellow topaz on a fine chain at her throat; Jaka felt herself sweltering beneath layer upon layer of gaudy trappings as if she were some tapestry salesman’s dray horse lugging his merchandise from market-place to market-place.

Eddie suggests changing semi-colons to commas.

several weeks, Jaka felt her world had been rent asunder by the raven-haired

interloper. Each day (it seemed) brought fresh directives from Astoria’s newly-

inaugurated Department of Women’s Affairs (on pink, onion-skin stationery; each communiqué like a knife in the young girl’s heart).

SMR suggests changing the semi-colon to a comma.

A series of increasingly terse messages were exchanged with the Department over a three-day period: the frequency of messenger comings-and-goings scandalising the general neighbourhood of Jaka’s suite of rooms; until a final communication advised that messenger services were now to be deducted from each individual’s clothing allowance.

Eddie suggests "suite of rooms;" changes to "suite of rooms,"

p423-- As he worked; his hands tucking and pinning, plucking and rolling, shaving and trimming, the carpet around him adorned by those instruments of his trade; he launched into a lengthy and lively monologue alternately extolling and deprecating the tonsorial attributes of Palnu’s Great Ladies.

EK suggests changing semicolons to commas

p 433 "Each of the attendants, in his turn, stepped forward: holding forth for the approval of the florid gentleman a camisole of almost unearthly beauty; sheer stockings and fine, delicate garters interwoven with bright metal; exotic body-wraps and fastenings; several heavy, lace crinolines and petticoats. "

SMR thinks the first colon should be a comma and the rest remain as-is.

P 454 Her hair hung before her face, blocking much of the diffuse light which streamed through a porthole above her. In a very few minutes, her few, random thoughts had fled and she heard and smelled and tasted and saw and felt nothing as Blackness; terrible, calm, resolute, eternal; claimed her for its own, once more.

Eddie suggests replacing semi-colons with commas.

Page 125 balloon 10 Jeff wants to add two commas to the balloon. "Women, dear boy, are unfathomable"