When you’re first learning how to edit, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed by the learning curve and to wonder when it would be realistic to start charging for your services. The answer is at Stage #3. You don’t know what you don’t know. (Unconscious incompetence) You know you don’t know stuff. (Conscious incompetence) You know…
If your author-client is interested in trying to have their novel published by a traditional publisher, you may be asked to look at the author’s query letter (also called a pitch letter). Query letters are easy to get wrong, so here are some tips for making sure your author hits the mark. The pitch needs…
Beginning developmental editors sometimes ask me how “awful” books make it onto the New York Times bestseller list, and how can we worry about what makes a story “good” when obviously quality doesn’t matter to readers? How do “bad” books make it through the editorial process? In other words, your existential crisis is common and…