The Abbey of Saint Zosimos – Focused Developmental Editing Letter and Manuscript Markup – Cozy Fantasy

The Abbey of Saint Zosimos by Anna Shomsky is Ooligan Press‘s latest acquisition. It should launch in winter 2028. One of the people in my cohort described it as “a funny silly goofy good time,” and that description has stuck. It takes place in an abbey of magicians on Vashon Island who use spells and potions for such serious business as changing the color of slugs and elongating nose hairs.

For the developmental edit, we were divided into teams and asked to write letters of only 1-2 pages, focused on our specific focus. So, this is (much) shorter than a full DE letter.

Here’s my focused DE letter about Narration (POV) and tone:

DE Letter – Abbey of St Zosimos – Tone and Narration – BuckleyDownload

Along with the letter, we each marked up a full manuscript with focused developmental editing comments. Many of mine centered on tracking the POVs in each chapter and noting when they shifted, briefly or for longer stretches. I also included tone comments.

Here’s a sampling of my manuscript markup:

Pages from DE_Abbey of Saint Zosimos_BuckleyDownload

This book likely won’t get a cover for quite some time, given the long publication timeline, but when it does I’ll come back and add that and link to the cover designer.

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Published by Chrys Buckley

Chrys Buckley was born with albinism, which means she has no pigment and she’s legally blind. Chrys has bachelor’s degrees in Arts & Letters, Micro/Molecular Biology, and Biochemistry. She endured approximately ¾ of medical school before breaking free to focus on writing and disability advocacy. She’s currently in the Book Publishing graduate program at Portland State University, pursuing concentrations in Book Editing and Book Design. Chrys is the manager of the Digital and Audio departments at Ooligan Press. Her nonfiction has appeared in The Sun, Shark Reef, and Aerial. She was a finalist (twice) in MTV’s “I’m from Rolling Stone” writing contest. She has won the R.L. Gilette Scholarship and the Sophie Kerr Gift in English Literature. Her debut collection Invisible Violets: A Mixtape in Lyric Essays is forthcoming from Wandering Aengus Press. Chrys lives, works, walks, and writes in Portland.

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