2+2 and Editing: Oh, the Irony

[Nate.]

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I'd love to hear anyone's thoughts about whether this assessment is fair

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It's not fair and here's why:

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Yes, I'm an editor. Yes, I'm making this post in part because I figure there's a small chance Mason will it and decide to give me some work

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he stopped answering my e-emails. I'm better and probably cheaper than whoever he's employing now.

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I'm sure that no one here will question my judgement in not answering you before. But I'm going to give a very specific answer here.

Unfortunately, not everyone who writes a poker book has the writing skills of a Bill Robertie or Alan Schoonmaker. If this was the case, my job would be a lot easier.

When we receive a manuscript, we have to go through it and and try to make the writing as clear and accurate as possible. Sometimes however, we will return the book to the author. Othertimes, we'll go ahead and work on the writing to improve it.

So far this year we have worked with four different manuscripts and have major delays on two of them. That's because with these two books we felt that they needed complete rewriting of a fundamental nature. We didn't think that the editing process would be enough. So they were returned to the authors for total revision.

On Winning in Tough Hold 'em Games we made the decision to go the editing route. Part of the difficulty with this text is simply that the material is very complex, and it is difficult to completely smooth out material that is inherently difficult. I'm sure if you were to contact either Nick Grudzien or Geoff Herzog, they would tell you that the editing process was far more thorough and comprehensive than they expected, and that far more changes/corrections/edits were made in their text than they thought were even possible.

On the two other books that were returned to the authors for complete rewrites, on one, Alan Schoonmaker has joined the writing team (and I expect to see the final text in a few days). The other has been resubmitted and is now an acceptably written manuscript and will be published in July.

I won't mention the titles of these books here, but I think most everyone knows which of our upcoming books have been delayed, and delays in our publishing field translate to lost sales that we do not fully recover due to the way that some players who would purchase the text drop out of the market. Also, I want to stress that the writing problems we had with both of these texts had nothing to do with the quality of the information they contain.

But next time you take a cheap shot at us, keep in mind that there's a good chance you do not know the complete story. And for everyone else, we at Two Plus Two are committed to producing the highest quality books in all aspects.

MM

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Mason --

Thanks for taking the time to respond. You mentioned that nobody would have blamed you for not doing so, and I'm no exception.

(Also, parenthetically, I'd like to point out that I've worked indirectly with Mason on some stuff for the 2+2 magazine and he's been nothing but courteous, professional, considerate, etc., etc.)

The substance of your reply, however, strikes me as curious. He seems only to emphasize that:

(A) There is some editing process, and
(B) He isn't satisfied with second-rate books, and
(C) The nature of his business makes presents unusual editing challenges.

But none of that changes the fact that 2+2 books, including WTHG, are full of completely preventable errors that mar the book and impair the reader. There were many such errors in just the first few pages. Editors in other fields deal with these same difficulties math textbooks far more successfully, and given that I'm sure there exist fast-working and accurate editors who know both poker material and grammar, I'm not sure what Mason's post amounts to.

Therefore I'm led to conclude that Mason just doesn't care very much about grammar or style. He doesn't seem to consider it an aspect of good bookmaking. Which puts him in the position of a poker player who doesn't care about the math.

--Nate