Jackie asked (probably plaintively, and with a Southern accent): Where on earth was her editor??
The answer, Jackie, is complex and involves a deep and wide knowledge of the publishing industry.
For technical books, editors are chosen for their grasp of the subject, the industry and the audience, and their excellent grasp of the linguistic implications of the author's work.
They work long hours on high stools and sloping desks, under guttering candles or gas lamps, wearing eyeshades and with clips keeping their sleeves from accidentally dipping themselves in the inkwells, and to protect their cuffs from the splatter of hand-ground ink. They are carefully trained to make the most of each goose quill, and little boys are employed for pennies to run around sharpening their pen knives. Your average editor works sixteen hours a day, and is grateful for the few coins thrown to him or her by the grudging employer, who will almost inevitably be called Scrooge, especially at this time of the year. They lie awake at nights worrying about whether the word should be "deoxyribonucleic" or just "oxyribonucleic". They sweat buckets over each misplaced comma or mislaid full stop ("period" to US readers). They use galley slips for toilet paper and to wipe their perspiring brows with shaking hands. They fear nothing but their failure to make each tome produced by their house literally word-perfect.
How am I doing, Wow?
Actually most of the book/journal editors I know have trouble spelling their own names, and have so many publications on the go at once that if they can recognise what the author wrote as being English (or [choose your language]), that's good enough. I'm the associate editor for an information technology publication, and it's hard to get everything right within tight timeframes!
