Book Indexing: A Step-by-step Guide, by Stephen Ullstrom

 As this is a non-fiction book, I'll not bother with the spoilers warning. I've long thought of book indexing as my post-post-retirement job. I admire great indexes and absolutely abhor books with crappy indexes. I didn't even know Indexer was a job. Assumed it was created by either the publishing company or some computer (how else to explain bad indexes?). But no, there are people who actually write these indexes. That was appealing to me, so over the years I've read a few books and many articles on book indexing.

So when an indexer I follow offered up his book on indexing as an advance reading copy, I jumped on it. I wasn't quite sure he'd want me as a beta reader; I've taken block A (of four) of the American Society for Indexing's professional certification course and I've read Nancy Mulvaney's Indexing Books and Do Mi Stauber's Facing the Text. That was enough for Mr. Ullstrom, so I got my pdf of his book. 

Ullstrom's book is divided into nine chapters covering all aspects of book indexing. The book is aimed at both authors who have to write their own index (or find a professional to do it) as well as those of us interested in indexing as a career. He does a good job reminding us that the index serves the reader, and for some is the first entry point to the book. 

Let's start at the beginning. What even is indexing? According to Ullstrom (and I agree), it "is about deconstructing a book into its components and reassembling all that information into an easily searchable format." And an index? "An index is a document created to help users access information." He gets in-depth on how indexes are structured: entries, arrays, main and sub-headings, locators, cross-references. What was new to me (or I did not remember from my previous readings) was supermain discussions. "Supermain discussions...are the key discussions of the book. Supermains flesh out the metatopic..." Metatopic I've heard before ("...what the book as a whole is about.") from Stauber's text. Another new term from Ullstrom is aboutness: "...recognizing what the book, at all levels of the hierarchy of information, is about." 

The book ends with several pages of resources for authors and future indexers: books and article citations, journals and newsletters, and indexing societies. Not to mention a great index.

Aboutness, metatopic, supermains, all help the indexer to develop the structure of the index, "how all the entries and arrays fit together." This is what leads to a great index. One should be able to read the index and grasp the author's argument. Reading Ullstrom's book will help an author, or someone interested in becoming an indexer (moi!), or a new indexer create a great index. And we can all agree, or should all agree, that indexes are integral parts of the books we read. Without a good index, we are left with reading through the entire book or several chapters to find the discussion we're seeking. 

I will be buying a dead-tree version of this book for my indexing/copyediting bookshelf. 

The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, by Stuart Turton

 Fun book. Very creative. 

Spoilers below:

So imagine you're stuck in one day. Yes, like that movie. But each day you're in a different body. Kinda. Instead, imagine eight people. You get to live in each body from waking to sleeping. Or death. You remember everything from the other lives. 

But why are you here? To discover a murdered. The killer of the eponymous Evelyn Hardcastle. You have to report who the murderer is if you want out of this hell. Oh, and there's someone in there with you who keeps waking up herself everyday, she just can't remember anything at first. You want to get her out of there too. 

The author did a great job managing the timeline. I picture him in a basement with a large whiteboard in front of him, tracking the wakes and sleeps off all the characters. And I wonder if he even knew when he began writing if he even knew who the murderer was or if he just wrote and waited till it came to him. The ending was quite surprising, at least to me. 

Spoilers done.

This book was this author's debut novel. Good work, Stuart! Great ride. 

Modern Renaissance Man

 Many, many years ago I dreamed up an idea of a magazine (then webzine) for the modern renaissance man (in the Old English sense of "human being, person [male or female]"). I was trying to come to grips with my many interests (fickle, you say?) and wanted an explanation (later resolved after reading Refuse to Choose). 

By David Martin - The White House Historical Association, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=9390044

Depending where you look, you'll get varied definitions of renaissance man. One I like defined it as a man who "sought to develop skills in all areas of knowledge, in physical development, in social accomplishments and in the arts." Armed with that, I looked at my various interests and decided these are the areas in which I want to be learned:

• Science: ornithology (specifically birds of prey/raptors; corvus [ravens & crows]); fermentation
• Arts: classical guitar (not playing, but knowing); Bruegel, John Currin; Shakespeare; oriental rugs
• Language: English in all historical phases; Esperanto and interlinguistics; general linguistics
• Physical development: Swimming; orienteering; walking; lifting; misogi
• History: Ancient Egypt; medieval, esp. technology, war, languages; politics of language, esp. linguistic discrimination.
• Literature: Mid 20c British writers; English Catholic writers; literature about war.

Thus, here on out, I'll be tagging posts on books that are in the above subjects, with the goal of reading at least one book in each of those bolded areas once per year.

Some recent reads, 26 June to 9 July

 American Pastoral, by Philip Roth. "Read" this on Audible. It was okay. 3.5 stars if I were still doing stars. The best part of the Audible was it was read by actor Ron Silver (RIP, good sir). He was great. The one thing I like about this book is the American Jewish culture. Let me explain. 

When I was living in Moscow, my wife and I were friends with an Israeli embassy couple. The wife and I would talk periodically about our growing up. At one point I told Yael: Italian grandparents and Jewish grandparents, same same. And we'd laugh about it. Because it was true. My grandma not talking one morning because she'd overheard my grandfather complaining about how much she talks. Yael had the same stories.

This was that book. And the majorly best part. The story, the family, not that good. I'm sure that's what Roth was aiming for, but doesn't mean I have to like it. 

The Comfort Crisis, by Michael Easter. Preaching to choir, of course, but still a great read. (My wife has argued for decades, seriously, that we're all getting too comfortable. This book could have been written by her back in 1996.) Yes, Audible again. A book about what Denis Leary complained about years ago when he mocked people spending time on step machines (link to YT video). 

What's next? Leary asked. A chairmaster? I sit down, I get up, I sit down, I get up.

Or, the better comparison: the movie Wall-E was very prophetic:

I did learn about misogi in this book. I guess I do one of these serious challenges every year with my long swims, although they don't meet the requirement of a 50% chance of failure (granted, out of the 11 marathon swims I've attempted, I've DNF'd 4 of them). But since reading this book all I've thought about were crazy challenges that I'd like to do here in my local area. And in the spirit of misogi, I won't tell you about it. 

La horo 25, de Constantin Virgil Gheorghiu. Bonega libro, denove, pri mia plej ŝatata temo. En ĉi tiu libro, la primara karaktero estas rumana, kiu estis ĵetita en malliberejon komence de la dua mondmilito. Unue, en koncentrejo por judoj, sed finfine li estis en pli ol 20 koncentrejoj dum 13 jaroj. Amikoj mortis. Familianoj mortis, divorcis. Infanoj naskiĝis, mortis, brulis. Teruraj tempoj! Rumana klasikaĵo.