Artists self-publishing e books- proofing and editing

Portrait of An Artist © Maud Guilfoyle, ball point pen and pencil, 6.5 x 6 inches

If you self-publish, you get to wear all the 'hats' including proofing, editing, design, formatting and marketing. In the beginning it is important to just get your thoughts down in an outline and first couple of drafts. Don't worry about punctuation, grammar and spelling at this point. By the third draft start spell checking and checking the grammar and punctuation. Read your work aloud to yourself to see if it flows. Proof it again then ask a friend to proofread it for you. Find someone who will work with you on this and who will read it more than once. If you can afford it, this would be a good time to hire a writer to read it and proof it. This can be valuable to help clarify your thoughts and eliminate wordiness. Then if time permits, take a break from it for at least two weeks and come back to it with fresh eyes. Remember to keep spell-checking as you revise. In your last proofing, mix it up, read it from the end to the beginning, section by section. Then you are ready to send it off to be formatted, or, directly to the retailers (kindle, ibooks, nook, etc) if you are formatting yourself.