I received my proof today from Amazon (CreateSpace) and I am glad I looked through it. Mind you, there weren't glaring grammatical errors or anything. Well, I don't think there were - after the editing marathon I went through earlier, I just don't have the stomach to go through a real editing session again.
I did find separators being right justified that should be centered. I also found several last sentences in chapters with just a few words strung across the page to fully justify; the addition of a carriage return before the section break took care of those. I even adjusted a word at the end that had a font two sizes too big. I realized as I went through all this that I was not just being a perfectionist, but I was bringing the book to a state where the reader would not be drawn out of the story by a glaring visual disturbance. Much in the same way as a grammatical edit keeps the viewer from getting jarred from the story because of a misspelled word or a funky sentence structure, so too this step in the process was an effort by the author to engage and treat the reader to something wonderful.
The proofing process is more about making things not be there than the writing process is about putting things in. I hope I've taken away enough and left just the right amount in. Here's to interior literary design!
Regards,
Artemus
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