Yay! Read all about it here.
We just hit 1700 members, and counting…
(Thank you, C!)
writing life
It’s SHE WRITES’ one-week anniversary, and, thanks to the fact that so many women — including many GWP readers — have joined, we are on the MAP!
Friend of GWP and now SHE WRITES member Jessica Wakeman gave us a fabulous shout out this morning over at The Frisky! The post “fell off” the front page over there already (content flies!) but if anyone wants to go over there and leave a comment on it, it would end up back on the front. Just sayin 🙂
Every day over here is turning into a new adventure with this new venture. I’ve got some exciting tricks up my sleeve to announce soon over here at GWP, as well. Some new bloggers are joining us. Stay tuned!
You may have noticed that it’s been a little quiet over here. I’m finally resurfacing–breathlessly!–to tell you why.
On Monday, Kamy Wicoff, Nancy Miller, and I launched a new social networking site for women writers called SHE WRITES. You can find us at: www.shewrites.com. OMG. I’m struck with how fast this is catching on. We just hit 400 members and it’s only been 48 hours!!!!!
If you are a woman who writes (and that means MANY of you!!!), please join. It’s easy, it’s free, and it’s an enactment of the philosophy that I’ve always subscribed to here at Girl w/Pen: a woman writing need not write alone.
I’ll be migrating much of the consulting I’ve been doing — writing coaching, workshop leading, etc — to SHE WRITES. Look for future workshops under the SHE NEEDS HELP tab. The site is changing every minute, as more and more people sign on and get active over there. I hope you’ll join us and come see what it’s all about. The GWP community has been so sustaining for me over the years it’s been here, and in so many ways, YOU, the GWP community, are what led me to want to throw my all into the creation of an even wider community of women writers.
There’s so much more to say about this exciting new project, and I’ll share it all soon, but in the meantime, let’s just say I’ll see you there! Â And, of course, here at GWP.
Know anyone who’d be right for this?! My latest venture… Thanks for passing it on!
SUMMER INTERN POSITION
She Reads / She Writes, an emerging women-owned, online-based start-up, seeks tech-savvy MBA student or recent MBA graduate to begin work 10 hours/week. Excellent opportunity to acquire hands-on experience in early-stage entrepreneurship, working closely with creative, energetic team of author/entrepreneurs to create preparatory materials for angel investors. Position begins in June 2009 and continues through August 2009, with the possibility of expanding into Fall. Internship is unpaid, however intern may be asked to continue with the Company after formal internship period ends.
Company description:
She Reads / She Writes is a young company seeking to create an online destination for literary women. Created by writers, the site will offer a new way for women readers and writers to form communities, read, write and share content, and lead the way in creating a new paradigm for publishing in a Web 3.0 world.
Traditional publishing houses can no longer afford to promote and support authors as they once did. Web 2.0 has resulted in an abundance of content and a lack of oversight. The result is a new Wild West, in which readers sort through millions of voices to find writing worth reading, and writers are isolated, self-funded solopreneurs.
She Reads / She Writes will leverage the existing power of women readers and writers as both producers and consumers of books to create a portal for literary women, one where quality writers are supported and hungry readers receive guided access to the literary content they seek.  Through curated content, social networking, and the latest in content delivery vehicles, readers will receive personal recommendations, access to authors, community, guidance for book groups, and content they can read in forms that fit their lifestyles. Writers, in turn, will receive networking with peers, services and support (such as instruction in new media forms), classes and coaching on topics related to their craft, and access to readers.
The social networking aspect of the site is in private beta; launch expected in January 2010.
more...
I’ll be teaching next at Woodhull’s Raise Your Voice: Non-fiction Writers’ Retreat. If you haven’t been to one of these and have wanted to, here’s your next chance!
WHEN: Friday, May 29 at 12:00pm – Sunday, May 31 at 6:00pm
WHERE: Ancramdale, NY
WHAT I’M TEACHING THERE (the third person description):
How to write a book proposal: In this module, instructor Deborah Siegel will teach the group how to take a subject about which they are passionate and generate from it an exciting, marketable, serious non-fiction book proposal. She will cover the proposal itself, the chapter outline, the bio, and the marketing section. (This module, like the op-ed and the feature article, simply expand and develop the core skills of the outline section). Deborah will then walk the participants through the cycle of submission to an agent; the agent’s submission of the proposal to multiple houses; the bidding process; the signing of the contract; the writing cycle; the editing and copy editing and fact checking cycle; the publishing cycle and the publicity phase of the hardback non-fiction book. She will show participants what the common mistakes are that writers make in crafting book proposals and will demonstrate the difference between an unpublishable and a highly commercial book proposal both of which are based on an identical subject.
To see more details and sign up, click here, or follow the Facebook link:http://www.facebook.com/n/?event.php&eid=76369983156&mid=77cad7G1e120b00G1ae0659G7
I just hung up the phone with a new author who has a book project that I’m very excited about. I can’t tell you much about her project just yet—I’m trying to keep it on the down low for as long as possible—but I’ll say this: it kicks some serious bottom, and I can’t wait to work with her on it in the next handful of months.
I was telling her exactly this when she asked me The Question. “So,” she asked, “are you my editor?”
I don’t like this question. It makes me feel stuck somewhere between Kierkegaard’s Who am I?! and that PD Eastman book where the bird falls out of the tree and thinks the bulldozer is his mother.
I also don’t like the question because I tend not to handle the answering of it very well. I usually say something like, “Well, yes and no … ” Sometimes I say, “Well, no and yes …” Because that can be true, too.
Being a writer and all, I know my author can handle irony. But she didn’t seem too happy with me. So I did what I often do when I get asked The Question: I launched into an excessively detailed exegesis of the variations on Editor, and I’ll share it with you now so you never have to suffer the way my poor author did today.
As an author, you will likely have many editors. Some of them will edit your manuscript—that is, they will actually read what you have written and make suggestions for improvements to the language, pace, tone, and scope of your writing. Other editors will not edit your manuscript, but they will still be your editors.
The first editor an author meets is almost always the acquisitions editor. This is the person who is responsible for making a contractual offer for your project and negotiating the terms of the contract until it’s agreed upon by the publisher and the author. Some acquisitions editors only acquire, while others do other kinds of editing as well. Therefore, your acquisitions editor may or may not also be your …
Developmental editor. The developmental editor is the person who works with you to shape your project into a final and complete manuscript. A DE might make comments such as, “Have you ever thought about adding directions for a knitting project to the end of each chapter? Knitting is very in” or, “Chapter 12: more sex.” This is the most intensive/creative edit your book will get, though not all books even require a developmental edit. If yours does, your DE may or may not also be your …
Project editor. The project editor—also called your “in house” editor, or your shepherding editor, or your championing editor, or more often than anything else, generically “your editor”—may or may not actually do any editing of your book. She will, however, be the publisher’s point person for your project and, hopefully, an advocate for you and your book. She’ll discuss with you such things as cover design, deadlines, and your pub date, and she’ll convey any feedback the other staffers may have about your book (i.e., “Marketing says that Eat, Pray, Schlep isn’t really working for them as a title.”) Your project editor will likely oversee the descriptive copy that’s written about your book for publicity and catalog purposes to ensure it’s in line with what your manuscript will be delivering. Your project editor is most likely not also your …
Copyeditor. The copyeditor reads your manuscript and makes edits in accordance with such wonkiness as house style, grammar, and consistency. She may also ask you questions such as, “Re Charlotte Sometimes reference on page 233: Is this a reference to the time-travel YA novel by Penelope Farmer or the B side of The Cure’s Splintered in Her Head? Please clarify.” The copyeditors are actually the most underappreciated of the bunch—they are the unsung heroes of the editorial team, often a freelancer who polishes your manuscript until it shines and then disappears into the night. A tip: Ask your project editor if you can write a brief memo to the copyeditor before she begins her pass. That way you can flag any special words (“please stet spelling of golldangit”) or styles (“I prefer to refer to characters by a single capitalized letter and a long dash, as in ‘M—’, even though critics will likely find me affected for doing so. Please stet.”)
One more editor who will get her hands dirty on your book is the proofreader, who will review your book for accuracy after it’s been laid out. (Another tip: Ask your editor—you’ll know which one to ask when the time comes—if you can see the pages after the proofreader has taken her pass. Your editor may hate you for it, but it’s the only way you’ll see the absolutely final pages before they’re printed. She may say no—there often isn’t time for this extra step—but if you ask very, very nicely and promise to return with edits within, say, 24 hours, you might just get a yes.)
And now you know why The Question is so stressful. Why yes and no is accurate, as is no and yes. My recommendation: offer each so-called editor at your publisher a checklist and ask them to check all that apply.
SO EXCITED bout this: Girls Write Now will be featured some time this week on NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams reported by national correspondent Amy Robach. Tune in or set your DVRs to see some familiar faces! And please spread the word!
NBC Nightly News airs daily at 6:30 PM Eastern/Pacific, 5:30 PM Central. Check out your state’s local listings.
In a happy arrangement with our friends over at the blog and editorial collective Feminist Review, GWP is pleased to start offering MORE feminist reviews, courtesy of crosspost! Here is the first, a review of Letters from Black America
(Farrar, Straus, and Giroux), edited by Pamela Newkirk. The review is penned by Brittany Shoot. Here we go…And a big fat shout out to Feminist Review! –Deborah
While it would help to appreciate and admire the historical importance of preserved letters, you don’t have to be history buff or correspondence enthusiast to delight in Letters from Black America. In a time of quickly typed emails and SMS, tangible letters hold weight for many who value thoughtful, deliberate communication. In this compendium, Pamela Newkirk skillfully compiles an assortment of missives from the past three centuries that shine a light on the humanity and continued struggles of ordinary and exceptional African American men and women.
Divided into seven sections, the collection of 200-plus letters examines family dynamics during and after slavery, education as a locus for social activism, and Black military service from the Civil War to Iraq. In everyday yet often poetic language, details are revealed about married couples separated by the slave trade and babies born without the presence of their fathers. Open letters previously published in newspapers are included to showcase a wide range of letter writing and how it can be used as a tool to promote public discourse. Prominent Black artists and academics correspond and share visions of hope. One man proposes marriage and later asks to set a date, confirming his lady’s affirmative answer, though the reader never knows what else was actually said.
While the collection does include an interesting cross-section of letter writers and receivers, many are notable figures in Black history, and many—like W.E.B. Du Bois, Langston Hughes, Derrick Bell Jr., and Booker T. Washington—have letters included in several sections. This is not without merit, but letters to and from prominent, highly educated Black leaders are more common than those passed between ordinary citizens. This does not diminish the significance of the selections. At times, it is rather helpful—if not necessary. The often-lengthy writings of Frederick Douglass, for example, comprise a significant part of the letters about politics and social justice. This is not a burden, but an opportunity. Many of these letters are not easily found, even in a time of ubiquitous technology and information. Each letter is introduced with background about the writer and recipient, and these small but critical details make Letters from Black America an incredible reference guide.
While many of the book’s sections are enthralling—love letters from Martin Luther King, Jr. to Coretta Scott (King) and a coming out letter from Joseph Beam to his parents are particularly noteworthy—the climax of the compilation is the third section, “Politics and Social Change.” Some of the most formative communication of our time is found here, including letters between Shirley Du Bois and Langston Hughes, Bayard Rustin and Eldridge Cleaver, and Toni Morrison to then-Senator and Presidential candidate Barack Obama.
To address the changes in communication over time, the book ends with letters from “Across the Diaspora.” Communiqués between Pan-African leaders of the last hundred years, across oceans and decades, remind us that even as we move into a time when travel and the Internet make our work easier, we have come very far and yet have so very far to go.
–Brittany Shoot
(Crossposted at Feminist Review)
8:25 am. Drive to the office after dropping off preschooler and third grader at respective schools. Discover abandoned baggie of stale cereal on passenger seat under pile of manuscripts. Resist urge to eat. Feel bad that manuscripts are riding shotgun instead of getting read.
8:46 am. Arrive at office. Turn on computer. Read email from accountant, who needs to reschedule appointment (again) but meanwhile wants to know if I have any contacts in children’s publishing who might want to see a book she’s written … Delete. Read email from agent wanting to know if I’d like to look at a proposal for a book about Zen golfing. Close. Read an email from a friend of a friend who met me at a party who has a book that’s just like Eat, Pray, Love only different, would I like to publish it …
9:11 am. Read my google alerts: six about the company, seven about authors or books that are pubbing, one about me. Click on the one about me. Discover there’s another Laura Mazer who took first place in her high school district’s 100-yard dash. Delete all.
9:25 am. Get coffee. Eat Luna bar. Scan RSS feeds. Read Romanesco. Twitter a link to an article that pronounces indie publishers to be the future of literature. Feel smug.
10:00 am. Editorial meeting. Title brainstorming—once again, can’t help but wonder if we’d have better ideas if there were alcohol involved. Listen to debate over whether or not a novel needs to say “A novel” on the cover. Keep a tally in the margins of my agenda of how many times the editorial director mentions books I haven’t read but should. Realize how poorly read I am. Feel crappy about it. Try to redeem myself by offering to ask a past author for a blurb for a new author. Present new cover for lead fiction title. Consensus is it’s perfect but could use some changes.
11:55 am. Meeting over. Three tally marks. Not bad!
12:04 pm. Back in office. Open mail: four brochures from stock agencies, two from photographers, one from an indexer, three invoices from freelancers, and five submissions, including a hand-drawn children’s book with an SASE and a typewritten letter that begins “Dear Mr. Mazer.”
12:18 pm. Read pitch letter from agent for a sports anthology with recipes.
12:25 pm. Go to kitchen to microwave frozen Lean Cuisine for lunch and reheat coffee. Add a little sugar so I can think of it as dessert.
1:18 pm. More email: Manuscript arrives from supercool new author. Read revised intro. Love it. Write effusive email saying so. Delete some adjectives so I don’t sound fawning. Make notes for copyeditor (“Please retain all instances of the word vomitudinal.”) Glance at last page to see if I am included in the acknowledgments. (I am!) (Not that it matters or anything.)
1:35 pm. Phone rings. It’s the cover designer working on the lead fiction title. Tell her we love her design and we want very little changed, in fact she should pretty much keep it exactly the same, maybe just play with the type and the color scheme, and possibly experiment with the cover image, and could she change the title treatment hierarchy? But really, that’s all, it’s gorgeous just as it is …
1:50 pm. Launch Excel so I can start charting out editorial schedules for the fall titles. Set deadlines for each stage of each book, taking into account authors’ schedules, copyeditors’ schedules, proofreaders’ schedules, cover designers’ schedules, interior designers’ schedules, sales reps’ schedules, printer schedules, shipping schedules, national holidays, religious holidays, three-day weekends, and Mercury’s chances of going retrograde. Get halfway through before computer crashes. Resist urge to cry.
2:55 pm. Take Alleve. Eat another Luna bar. Tell myself it’s OK because they’re healthy.
3:08 pm. Read email from agent shopping a self-help memoir with recipes.
3:45 pm. Get intern to recreate my excel doc. Spend more time explaining how to recreate it than it would take to actually do it. Give her a submission from slush pile to review for the rest of the afternoon as reward for babysitting me.
4:10 pm. Work on catalog copy for new acquisition. Won’t have a manuscript until after catalog goes to press, so will have to crib from proposal but sexy-up the language. Wonder if “breathtaking narrative” is too generic. Wonder if it will have a breathtaking narrative.
4:18 pm. Take call from copyeditor wondering if she should apply standard or secondary rules pertaining to endnotes in reference to works in the public domain, and by the way do I prefer to hyphenate standard vernacular compound phraseology? Make up an answer to the first, tell her to use her judgment for the second, and offer her another project since she clearly knows CMS better than I do.
4:27 pm. Read query letter from author shopping a book of essays about her “musings, meanderings, and observations on life—with recipes.” She is sure it’s perfect for Oprah.
4:48 pm. Remember page proofs needed to go to author overnight, also realize FedEx pickup was an hour ago. Crap! Email author, asking if he could print the pages from an emailed PDF. Make vague reference to “working green” so he’ll think it’s for the environment.
5:22 pm. Run out the door for school pickups, late as usual. Drive a block, remember manuscript for tomorrow’s author call is still on desk. Curse at steering wheel. Risk illegal U-turn, run inside office, grab MS, get back in car. Add MS to pile on passenger seat. See cereal baggie. Eat cereal on way to preschool, wondering if there are any recipes in the passenger seat that might be good for dinner.
* Several months ago, Publishers Weekly printed a very funny piece called “A Day in the Life of a Book Publicist.” Thanks go out to the author of that piece for inspiring this post.
Today marks the launch of the best little darn thing, IMHO, to come out of this damn recession so far: GWP readers, please meet Recessionwire.com.
It’s the upside of the downturn.
This new pop-up site promises to chronicle these tough economic times until they end. Content is aimed at urban professionals looking for news, inspiration, advice, cultural insights, and a dose of humor. Think of it as your user’s guide to the recession.
Here’s how it all began, as described on the site:
A party, wine, conversations about layoffs—it was so very holiday ‘08. It was also where Lynn Parramore, a freelance writer who had lost several gigs to the downturn, and Laura Rich and Sara Clemence, who had just been laid off from Condé Nast Portfolio, decided to turn misfortune into opportunity. Inspired to capture the stories and improve the lives of urban professionals who, like them, were getting effed by the economy, they founded a website in early 2009. And that’s how Recessionwire was born–as a pop-up site™, ready and willing to die.
The editors’ vision was so in sync with my own–the desire to do something creative with misfortune, the impulse to make lemonade from shit–that I just had to be a part.
As ya’ll know, I just haven’t been able to stop writing about gender shakeup in the wake of recession after Marco got laid off. So now my musings have a home. I’ll be writing a regular feature for Recessionwire called Love in the Time of Layoff. It’ll appear every Thursday. The first installment–“Honey, They Shrunk My Job”–is now live.
In addition to my rather personal (ahem) take on the ways and woes of relationships in tough economic times though, please look to Recessionwire every day for perspective, work (or out-of-work) advice, spending tips, and more. Other regular features include:
Recession Briefing: A daily roundup of the news you need to survive and thrive
Lemonade Makers: Spotlights on people seeing opportunity in this economy
Redux: A cultural series that looks into history to see the path ahead
Retooling: Profiles of companies working out New Reality strategies
Recession Lexicon: The new terms, expressions, euphemisms that are coming out of this economy
Recession Concessions: Peeks at what people are giving up as they cut back–and the luxuries they won’t concede.
I promise you will find some solace here, or at the very least a snort or a laugh. Personally, this site has made my month. I can’t wait to share it all with you. Do take a look, and then please please pass it on!
It’s SHE WRITES’ one-week anniversary, and, thanks to the fact that so many women — including many GWP readers — have joined, we are on the MAP!
Friend of GWP and now SHE WRITES member Jessica Wakeman gave us a fabulous shout out this morning over at The Frisky! The post “fell off” the front page over there already (content flies!) but if anyone wants to go over there and leave a comment on it, it would end up back on the front. Just sayin 🙂
Every day over here is turning into a new adventure with this new venture. I’ve got some exciting tricks up my sleeve to announce soon over here at GWP, as well. Some new bloggers are joining us. Stay tuned!
You may have noticed that it’s been a little quiet over here. I’m finally resurfacing–breathlessly!–to tell you why.
On Monday, Kamy Wicoff, Nancy Miller, and I launched a new social networking site for women writers called SHE WRITES. You can find us at: www.shewrites.com. OMG. I’m struck with how fast this is catching on. We just hit 400 members and it’s only been 48 hours!!!!!
If you are a woman who writes (and that means MANY of you!!!), please join. It’s easy, it’s free, and it’s an enactment of the philosophy that I’ve always subscribed to here at Girl w/Pen: a woman writing need not write alone.
I’ll be migrating much of the consulting I’ve been doing — writing coaching, workshop leading, etc — to SHE WRITES. Look for future workshops under the SHE NEEDS HELP tab. The site is changing every minute, as more and more people sign on and get active over there. I hope you’ll join us and come see what it’s all about. The GWP community has been so sustaining for me over the years it’s been here, and in so many ways, YOU, the GWP community, are what led me to want to throw my all into the creation of an even wider community of women writers.
There’s so much more to say about this exciting new project, and I’ll share it all soon, but in the meantime, let’s just say I’ll see you there! Â And, of course, here at GWP.
Know anyone who’d be right for this?! My latest venture… Thanks for passing it on!
SUMMER INTERN POSITION
She Reads / She Writes, an emerging women-owned, online-based start-up, seeks tech-savvy MBA student or recent MBA graduate to begin work 10 hours/week. Excellent opportunity to acquire hands-on experience in early-stage entrepreneurship, working closely with creative, energetic team of author/entrepreneurs to create preparatory materials for angel investors. Position begins in June 2009 and continues through August 2009, with the possibility of expanding into Fall. Internship is unpaid, however intern may be asked to continue with the Company after formal internship period ends.
Company description:
She Reads / She Writes is a young company seeking to create an online destination for literary women. Created by writers, the site will offer a new way for women readers and writers to form communities, read, write and share content, and lead the way in creating a new paradigm for publishing in a Web 3.0 world.
Traditional publishing houses can no longer afford to promote and support authors as they once did. Web 2.0 has resulted in an abundance of content and a lack of oversight. The result is a new Wild West, in which readers sort through millions of voices to find writing worth reading, and writers are isolated, self-funded solopreneurs.
She Reads / She Writes will leverage the existing power of women readers and writers as both producers and consumers of books to create a portal for literary women, one where quality writers are supported and hungry readers receive guided access to the literary content they seek.  Through curated content, social networking, and the latest in content delivery vehicles, readers will receive personal recommendations, access to authors, community, guidance for book groups, and content they can read in forms that fit their lifestyles. Writers, in turn, will receive networking with peers, services and support (such as instruction in new media forms), classes and coaching on topics related to their craft, and access to readers.
The social networking aspect of the site is in private beta; launch expected in January 2010.
more...
I’ll be teaching next at Woodhull’s Raise Your Voice: Non-fiction Writers’ Retreat. If you haven’t been to one of these and have wanted to, here’s your next chance!
WHEN: Friday, May 29 at 12:00pm – Sunday, May 31 at 6:00pm
WHERE: Ancramdale, NY
WHAT I’M TEACHING THERE (the third person description):
How to write a book proposal: In this module, instructor Deborah Siegel will teach the group how to take a subject about which they are passionate and generate from it an exciting, marketable, serious non-fiction book proposal. She will cover the proposal itself, the chapter outline, the bio, and the marketing section. (This module, like the op-ed and the feature article, simply expand and develop the core skills of the outline section). Deborah will then walk the participants through the cycle of submission to an agent; the agent’s submission of the proposal to multiple houses; the bidding process; the signing of the contract; the writing cycle; the editing and copy editing and fact checking cycle; the publishing cycle and the publicity phase of the hardback non-fiction book. She will show participants what the common mistakes are that writers make in crafting book proposals and will demonstrate the difference between an unpublishable and a highly commercial book proposal both of which are based on an identical subject.
To see more details and sign up, click here, or follow the Facebook link:http://www.facebook.com/n/?event.php&eid=76369983156&mid=77cad7G1e120b00G1ae0659G7
I just hung up the phone with a new author who has a book project that I’m very excited about. I can’t tell you much about her project just yet—I’m trying to keep it on the down low for as long as possible—but I’ll say this: it kicks some serious bottom, and I can’t wait to work with her on it in the next handful of months.
I was telling her exactly this when she asked me The Question. “So,” she asked, “are you my editor?”
I don’t like this question. It makes me feel stuck somewhere between Kierkegaard’s Who am I?! and that PD Eastman book where the bird falls out of the tree and thinks the bulldozer is his mother.
I also don’t like the question because I tend not to handle the answering of it very well. I usually say something like, “Well, yes and no … ” Sometimes I say, “Well, no and yes …” Because that can be true, too.
Being a writer and all, I know my author can handle irony. But she didn’t seem too happy with me. So I did what I often do when I get asked The Question: I launched into an excessively detailed exegesis of the variations on Editor, and I’ll share it with you now so you never have to suffer the way my poor author did today.
As an author, you will likely have many editors. Some of them will edit your manuscript—that is, they will actually read what you have written and make suggestions for improvements to the language, pace, tone, and scope of your writing. Other editors will not edit your manuscript, but they will still be your editors.
The first editor an author meets is almost always the acquisitions editor. This is the person who is responsible for making a contractual offer for your project and negotiating the terms of the contract until it’s agreed upon by the publisher and the author. Some acquisitions editors only acquire, while others do other kinds of editing as well. Therefore, your acquisitions editor may or may not also be your …
Developmental editor. The developmental editor is the person who works with you to shape your project into a final and complete manuscript. A DE might make comments such as, “Have you ever thought about adding directions for a knitting project to the end of each chapter? Knitting is very in” or, “Chapter 12: more sex.” This is the most intensive/creative edit your book will get, though not all books even require a developmental edit. If yours does, your DE may or may not also be your …
Project editor. The project editor—also called your “in house” editor, or your shepherding editor, or your championing editor, or more often than anything else, generically “your editor”—may or may not actually do any editing of your book. She will, however, be the publisher’s point person for your project and, hopefully, an advocate for you and your book. She’ll discuss with you such things as cover design, deadlines, and your pub date, and she’ll convey any feedback the other staffers may have about your book (i.e., “Marketing says that Eat, Pray, Schlep isn’t really working for them as a title.”) Your project editor will likely oversee the descriptive copy that’s written about your book for publicity and catalog purposes to ensure it’s in line with what your manuscript will be delivering. Your project editor is most likely not also your …
Copyeditor. The copyeditor reads your manuscript and makes edits in accordance with such wonkiness as house style, grammar, and consistency. She may also ask you questions such as, “Re Charlotte Sometimes reference on page 233: Is this a reference to the time-travel YA novel by Penelope Farmer or the B side of The Cure’s Splintered in Her Head? Please clarify.” The copyeditors are actually the most underappreciated of the bunch—they are the unsung heroes of the editorial team, often a freelancer who polishes your manuscript until it shines and then disappears into the night. A tip: Ask your project editor if you can write a brief memo to the copyeditor before she begins her pass. That way you can flag any special words (“please stet spelling of golldangit”) or styles (“I prefer to refer to characters by a single capitalized letter and a long dash, as in ‘M—’, even though critics will likely find me affected for doing so. Please stet.”)
One more editor who will get her hands dirty on your book is the proofreader, who will review your book for accuracy after it’s been laid out. (Another tip: Ask your editor—you’ll know which one to ask when the time comes—if you can see the pages after the proofreader has taken her pass. Your editor may hate you for it, but it’s the only way you’ll see the absolutely final pages before they’re printed. She may say no—there often isn’t time for this extra step—but if you ask very, very nicely and promise to return with edits within, say, 24 hours, you might just get a yes.)
And now you know why The Question is so stressful. Why yes and no is accurate, as is no and yes. My recommendation: offer each so-called editor at your publisher a checklist and ask them to check all that apply.
SO EXCITED bout this: Girls Write Now will be featured some time this week on NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams reported by national correspondent Amy Robach. Tune in or set your DVRs to see some familiar faces! And please spread the word!
NBC Nightly News airs daily at 6:30 PM Eastern/Pacific, 5:30 PM Central. Check out your state’s local listings.
In a happy arrangement with our friends over at the blog and editorial collective Feminist Review, GWP is pleased to start offering MORE feminist reviews, courtesy of crosspost! Here is the first, a review of Letters from Black America
While it would help to appreciate and admire the historical importance of preserved letters, you don’t have to be history buff or correspondence enthusiast to delight in Letters from Black America
Divided into seven sections, the collection of 200-plus letters examines family dynamics during and after slavery, education as a locus for social activism, and Black military service from the Civil War to Iraq. In everyday yet often poetic language, details are revealed about married couples separated by the slave trade and babies born without the presence of their fathers. Open letters previously published in newspapers are included to showcase a wide range of letter writing and how it can be used as a tool to promote public discourse. Prominent Black artists and academics correspond and share visions of hope. One man proposes marriage and later asks to set a date, confirming his lady’s affirmative answer, though the reader never knows what else was actually said.
While the collection does include an interesting cross-section of letter writers and receivers, many are notable figures in Black history, and many—like W.E.B. Du Bois, Langston Hughes, Derrick Bell Jr., and Booker T. Washington—have letters included in several sections. This is not without merit, but letters to and from prominent, highly educated Black leaders are more common than those passed between ordinary citizens. This does not diminish the significance of the selections. At times, it is rather helpful—if not necessary. The often-lengthy writings of Frederick Douglass, for example, comprise a significant part of the letters about politics and social justice. This is not a burden, but an opportunity. Many of these letters are not easily found, even in a time of ubiquitous technology and information. Each letter is introduced with background about the writer and recipient, and these small but critical details make Letters from Black America
While many of the book’s sections are enthralling—love letters from Martin Luther King, Jr. to Coretta Scott (King) and a coming out letter from Joseph Beam to his parents are particularly noteworthy—the climax of the compilation is the third section, “Politics and Social Change.” Some of the most formative communication of our time is found here, including letters between Shirley Du Bois and Langston Hughes, Bayard Rustin and Eldridge Cleaver, and Toni Morrison to then-Senator and Presidential candidate Barack Obama.
To address the changes in communication over time, the book ends with letters from “Across the Diaspora.” Communiqués between Pan-African leaders of the last hundred years, across oceans and decades, remind us that even as we move into a time when travel and the Internet make our work easier, we have come very far and yet have so very far to go.
–Brittany Shoot
(Crossposted at Feminist Review)
8:25 am. Drive to the office after dropping off preschooler and third grader at respective schools. Discover abandoned baggie of stale cereal on passenger seat under pile of manuscripts. Resist urge to eat. Feel bad that manuscripts are riding shotgun instead of getting read.
8:46 am. Arrive at office. Turn on computer. Read email from accountant, who needs to reschedule appointment (again) but meanwhile wants to know if I have any contacts in children’s publishing who might want to see a book she’s written … Delete. Read email from agent wanting to know if I’d like to look at a proposal for a book about Zen golfing. Close. Read an email from a friend of a friend who met me at a party who has a book that’s just like Eat, Pray, Love only different, would I like to publish it …
9:11 am. Read my google alerts: six about the company, seven about authors or books that are pubbing, one about me. Click on the one about me. Discover there’s another Laura Mazer who took first place in her high school district’s 100-yard dash. Delete all.
9:25 am. Get coffee. Eat Luna bar. Scan RSS feeds. Read Romanesco. Twitter a link to an article that pronounces indie publishers to be the future of literature. Feel smug.
10:00 am. Editorial meeting. Title brainstorming—once again, can’t help but wonder if we’d have better ideas if there were alcohol involved. Listen to debate over whether or not a novel needs to say “A novel” on the cover. Keep a tally in the margins of my agenda of how many times the editorial director mentions books I haven’t read but should. Realize how poorly read I am. Feel crappy about it. Try to redeem myself by offering to ask a past author for a blurb for a new author. Present new cover for lead fiction title. Consensus is it’s perfect but could use some changes.
11:55 am. Meeting over. Three tally marks. Not bad!
12:04 pm. Back in office. Open mail: four brochures from stock agencies, two from photographers, one from an indexer, three invoices from freelancers, and five submissions, including a hand-drawn children’s book with an SASE and a typewritten letter that begins “Dear Mr. Mazer.”
12:18 pm. Read pitch letter from agent for a sports anthology with recipes.
12:25 pm. Go to kitchen to microwave frozen Lean Cuisine for lunch and reheat coffee. Add a little sugar so I can think of it as dessert.
1:18 pm. More email: Manuscript arrives from supercool new author. Read revised intro. Love it. Write effusive email saying so. Delete some adjectives so I don’t sound fawning. Make notes for copyeditor (“Please retain all instances of the word vomitudinal.”) Glance at last page to see if I am included in the acknowledgments. (I am!) (Not that it matters or anything.)
1:35 pm. Phone rings. It’s the cover designer working on the lead fiction title. Tell her we love her design and we want very little changed, in fact she should pretty much keep it exactly the same, maybe just play with the type and the color scheme, and possibly experiment with the cover image, and could she change the title treatment hierarchy? But really, that’s all, it’s gorgeous just as it is …
1:50 pm. Launch Excel so I can start charting out editorial schedules for the fall titles. Set deadlines for each stage of each book, taking into account authors’ schedules, copyeditors’ schedules, proofreaders’ schedules, cover designers’ schedules, interior designers’ schedules, sales reps’ schedules, printer schedules, shipping schedules, national holidays, religious holidays, three-day weekends, and Mercury’s chances of going retrograde. Get halfway through before computer crashes. Resist urge to cry.
2:55 pm. Take Alleve. Eat another Luna bar. Tell myself it’s OK because they’re healthy.
3:08 pm. Read email from agent shopping a self-help memoir with recipes.
3:45 pm. Get intern to recreate my excel doc. Spend more time explaining how to recreate it than it would take to actually do it. Give her a submission from slush pile to review for the rest of the afternoon as reward for babysitting me.
4:10 pm. Work on catalog copy for new acquisition. Won’t have a manuscript until after catalog goes to press, so will have to crib from proposal but sexy-up the language. Wonder if “breathtaking narrative” is too generic. Wonder if it will have a breathtaking narrative.
4:18 pm. Take call from copyeditor wondering if she should apply standard or secondary rules pertaining to endnotes in reference to works in the public domain, and by the way do I prefer to hyphenate standard vernacular compound phraseology? Make up an answer to the first, tell her to use her judgment for the second, and offer her another project since she clearly knows CMS better than I do.
4:27 pm. Read query letter from author shopping a book of essays about her “musings, meanderings, and observations on life—with recipes.” She is sure it’s perfect for Oprah.
4:48 pm. Remember page proofs needed to go to author overnight, also realize FedEx pickup was an hour ago. Crap! Email author, asking if he could print the pages from an emailed PDF. Make vague reference to “working green” so he’ll think it’s for the environment.
5:22 pm. Run out the door for school pickups, late as usual. Drive a block, remember manuscript for tomorrow’s author call is still on desk. Curse at steering wheel. Risk illegal U-turn, run inside office, grab MS, get back in car. Add MS to pile on passenger seat. See cereal baggie. Eat cereal on way to preschool, wondering if there are any recipes in the passenger seat that might be good for dinner.
* Several months ago, Publishers Weekly printed a very funny piece called “A Day in the Life of a Book Publicist.” Thanks go out to the author of that piece for inspiring this post.
Today marks the launch of the best little darn thing, IMHO, to come out of this damn recession so far: GWP readers, please meet Recessionwire.com.
It’s the upside of the downturn.
This new pop-up site promises to chronicle these tough economic times until they end. Content is aimed at urban professionals looking for news, inspiration, advice, cultural insights, and a dose of humor. Think of it as your user’s guide to the recession.
Here’s how it all began, as described on the site:
A party, wine, conversations about layoffs—it was so very holiday ‘08. It was also where Lynn Parramore, a freelance writer who had lost several gigs to the downturn, and Laura Rich and Sara Clemence, who had just been laid off from Condé Nast Portfolio, decided to turn misfortune into opportunity. Inspired to capture the stories and improve the lives of urban professionals who, like them, were getting effed by the economy, they founded a website in early 2009. And that’s how Recessionwire was born–as a pop-up site™, ready and willing to die.
The editors’ vision was so in sync with my own–the desire to do something creative with misfortune, the impulse to make lemonade from shit–that I just had to be a part.
As ya’ll know, I just haven’t been able to stop writing about gender shakeup in the wake of recession after Marco got laid off. So now my musings have a home. I’ll be writing a regular feature for Recessionwire called Love in the Time of Layoff. It’ll appear every Thursday. The first installment–“Honey, They Shrunk My Job”–is now live.
In addition to my rather personal (ahem) take on the ways and woes of relationships in tough economic times though, please look to Recessionwire every day for perspective, work (or out-of-work) advice, spending tips, and more. Other regular features include:
Recession Briefing: A daily roundup of the news you need to survive and thrive
Lemonade Makers: Spotlights on people seeing opportunity in this economy
Redux: A cultural series that looks into history to see the path ahead
Retooling: Profiles of companies working out New Reality strategies
Recession Lexicon: The new terms, expressions, euphemisms that are coming out of this economy
Recession Concessions: Peeks at what people are giving up as they cut back–and the luxuries they won’t concede.
I promise you will find some solace here, or at the very least a snort or a laugh. Personally, this site has made my month. I can’t wait to share it all with you. Do take a look, and then please please pass it on!
