Interview: Gabrielle Harbowy, Renaissance Woman, courtesy of The Dead Robots’ Society Podcast

It was a pleasure to meet up with the wonderful crew of the Dead Robots’ Society Podcast this week for an interview. It was a particular honor because the DRS interview with editor Juliet Ulman had been so inspirational for me. Working in an isolated sort of environment like editors do, and doing work that should (if it’s done well) be invisible, doesn’t lend itself to having access to many role models. Hearing Juliet talk about editing and express eloquently so many of the things I believe, or aim to do in my work, or have observed in my own experience so far, helped to affirm for me that I was doing it right — both in terms of how I approach authors and their work, and how I approach my own career.

My interview was a long time coming. Various scheduling obstacles kept getting in the way, but I’m glad that the interest and determination held on both sides. It was a lot of fun, and it turned out to be completely unlike the other interviews I’ve done.

What’s changed? Well… I think… me.

Instead of focusing on how to format a submission, or how to edit, or when to edit, the interview focused on how I balance being an editor, an associate publisher, and a writer.

It was especially interesting because I don’t really think of myself as a writer. Not yet.

I’ve got one story, “Swimming Lessons” up in PG Holyfield’s “Tales of the Children” podcast anthology. That story is on the longlist for a Parsec Award(!).

I have another story — my first professional sale! — which will be appearing in an anthology this December. More news as the date nears, or you can listen to the interview for a couple more hints.

I have a story out on someone’s desk at a major market, and two more in the works.

But editing comes first for me. Though I think I’m constantly learning and improving in all aspects of the business and editing is no exception, it’s where I feel I really shine. And for me, editing blends naturally into publishing. I’m so used to being “hands on” with a novel, having held it from slush pile through editorial, that it seems natural to be the one to take it into typesetting and layout, to discuss promotional opportunities and offer to be the contact person for reviewers and award committees.

Would I be content “just editing”? Could I give those extra responsibilities up? Sure. But I like being busy, and I’m grateful for the opportunity and for the insight I’m gaining into the industry by being able to be more involved in different aspects of it.

I feel the same way about writing. I’m discovering that I enjoy it, and I’m also enjoying the “sensitivity training” that it lends to my editing. I have a different perspective on a lot of things now: I’m more aware of the agonizing wait for authors with work on somebody’s slush pile; I’m more aware of the uncertainty someone feels when they open up a file full of red ink. I feel that I can relate to my clients a little better, because I’m one of them. I understand their half of the experience.

All around, I’d say it’s all easy to balance. Each side of the triangle — writing, editing, publishing — gives me more insight on the other two. All together, it’s an invaluable, ongoing education. Even if I end up focusing more narrowly on one facet or the other down the road, I’ll still be able to bring to it a rounded perspective on the industry that will always inform my actions, no matter what I’m working on from day to day.

Thanks again to the guys at DRS for having me on and inviting me to share my thoughts!

You can follow the Dead Robots’ Society on the web at DeadRobotsSociety.com
on Twitter at @DRSPodcast
and on Facebook at Listeners of the Dead Robots’ Society.

What’s more disheartening to a writer: a rejection letter or a bad review? Both can crush your spirit if you let them. The trick is not to let them.

Tastes are subjective. If they weren’t, we’d all like the same things and there wouldn’t be a wealth of different genres out there to appeal to different audiences, or a wealth of publishers in each genre all looking for slightly different things.

It’s easy to read a rejection from a publisher and think that it says, “No one will like this.” Really, what it says is, “This isn’t for me, at this time.” It’s easy to read a bad review and think that it says, “You’re awful and your publisher was wrong to take a chance on you. And also, you probably smell.” Really, all it necessarily says is, “This isn’t for me.”

If you have been published, you can be confident that your work is good enough to be published. Publishers generally know what they’re doing and have certain minimum standards of quality. People, meanwhile, have individual tastes. They may have higher or lower standards. They may require some certain elements, or require the absence of others, or their tastes may be swayed by personal circumstances or the other media they’ve recently been exposed to.

I was speaking yesterday with the author of a mystery, who said that X number of readers thought that his handling of the reveal was perfect, and Y others thought that he didn’t give enough clues, and Z others complained that he made it too obvious. You can’t please everyone, and you shouldn’t feel pressured to try.

I’m going to divert for a moment, with a disclaimer: This isn’t to say that every manuscript is flawless. If that were true, I wouldn’t have a job. But consider the source and evaluate critically when you receive critique. If your editor or your agent tells you that you have technical issues (plot, grammar, pacing, worldbuilding, point of view) that’s one thing. If the issues are matters of individual preference, it’s okay to stay true to your vision and explain why you’ve done things the way you have. You’ll find that an editor will either work with you to make your vision come across more clearly in the manuscript, or that their vision won’t align with yours. Be as open to their reasoning as they’ve been to yours, and then make your choice: trust someone else’s judgment (with the knowledge that their guidance could make the manuscript stronger), or hold out for an editor or agent who sees things the way you do and agrees with your choices.

So, okay. For the sake of argument, we’ve established that your book is as good as it can be. Your publisher raves about it, your editor loves it, and your legions of fans are plucking it off the shelves faster than it can be printed and telling their friends how great it is. Maybe it’s even up for some awards.

Once you’ve moved past the opinions of publishers, editors and agents, and on to the opinions of readers and reviewers, your window for second-guessing is over. There is no going back and changing things based on the feedback that you get. You have a finished product, it’s out there, and people will think of it what they will.

Some will like it. Some won’t. Some may even have good reasons for not liking it and strong, constructive critique regarding the aspects they don’t like, or may point out the flaws that you knew were there but didn’t know how to fix. Even then, incorporating the advice that resonates with you into your next project and moving forward is all you can do.

What one person particularly liked about a work is probably the same element that another person hated. It has awful worldbuilding; it has great worldbuilding. Someone likes the way the characters are named; someone doesn’t like the way the characters are named. Someone likes the use of magic; someone else thinks there’s too much of it, or too little, or that it ‘doesn’t work that way.’ All you can do with those sorts of reviews are chalk them up to personal taste and let them roll off of you.

Or, someone loves the book but gives it a kiss-of-death single star just because it isn’t available in hardcover, or because the online store they bought it from messed up their order and didn’t deliver it. Yes, your overall rating can be lowered over issues that have nothing to do with your book at all. You have to let that roll off you, too.

Look up opinions of any classic and you’ll see a mix of good and bad reviews. In fact, do that: look up Amazon reviews (since they’re nicely collected) for some of your favorites, and for some classics, and for some books you hate. People will disagree with you, they’ll agree with you, and they’ll be on the fence. Some of them will have gotten something completely different out of the same book or movie; they’ll have missed the point by such a wide margin that they’ll make you laugh. (One review of This Is Spinal Tap complains, “If you’re going to make such an excellent documentary, why make it about about a band that nobody has ever heard of?”)

Here are a few posts to get you started. Click on them, shake your head, roll your eyes, and laugh. You’ve earned a good laugh. It’s okay — I’ll wait.

* One Lonely Star – by Walter Jon Williams
* Lone Star Statements – from The Morning News
* You Can’t Please Everyone – from Get Cynical

Now look at your own reviews, and you’ll be able to take the voices of dissent a lot less seriously. And you have to. Creative taste is subjective and you’ll never be able to produce something that everyone in the world will like.

I know it probably sounds like it’s easy for me to say, since I’m not the one putting my name and my words out there for the masses. Even as an editor and a publisher, though, my ego gets wrapped up a little in the books that I work with — and a little more than that when I’m the one who’s made the decision to offer a contract and champion a manuscript.

So, listen to John Scalzi, because when he talks about his own one-star reviews, he says it, too:

I think it’s useful for all us writers to remember no one work pleases everyone, and you can’t make anyone like it if they don’t, and you can’t keep them from telling other people what they think of it, even if they hate it… and that’s fine. Learn to deal with it. Otherwise it doesn’t matter how much success or praise or satisfaction you earn through your writing, you’ll still obsess over those one-star reviews and it will eat away at your joy. That’s no way to live.

So: own your one star reviews, don’t let them own you. And once you own them, let ‘em go. You’ll feel better, and you’ll worry less about them going forward. Try it for yourself. You’ll see.

* Should I register my manuscript for copyright before I send it out to publishers, to keep them from stealing my ideas?

* I know you only accept digital submissions. However, I can only send this by snail mail because I am concerned over internet privacy.

As creative people, we’re all cautioned to protect our ideas because there are people out there who want to copy them or steal them. But at some point, if you want to get published, you have to get past that fear and send your creation out into the world. If you can’t bring yourself to share your idea with a publisher (or, worse, with the public once it’s published!), you’ll never have a chance.

Publishing is a business and publishers are professionals. If they like your manuscript, they’re not going to steal it. They’re going to sign it.

Publishers want to promote their professionalism and have the best reputation they can, so that authors and agents feel comfortable and encouraged to submit their proposals. A publisher that no one wants to submit work to, doesn’t publish for long.

If you don’t feel that you can trust any publisher or agent anywhere with your query, you’re not at a point where you’re ready to get into a business partnership with one.

Moira Allen over on Writing World breaks the issue down with the dastardly use of logic. This is a must-read. Not only will it put your fears to rest, it’ll make you ashamed of thinking them in the first place.

So, if it’s such a myth, where does it come from?

Digging a little deeper, I’ve found that the frequency of idea theft appears to be higher with short, non-fiction submissions, in venues where authors are asked to pitch an article or a book they haven’t written yet. Certainly, it’s easier to imagine a publication receiving a neat little package with a topic and a list of references, then handing those sources off to someone else and getting an article with quick turnaround.

But even the sites that report on the frequency of pitch theft state that if an article is already written (as your manuscript should always be, before you start querying!) “chances are they’re not going to hire someone else to rewrite it.”

Some tips, to help you sleep at night:

* Do your research and submit only to reputable publishers/agents/editors. There are plenty of resources (like Preditors and Editors) to help you separate the real publishing entities from the scams, and use your own judgment, too. Does the publisher have a name you know? Have you read any of their books? What comes up if you try to search for them online?

* Ensure that what you submit is completed, to make it more recognizably yours. Frank Wilson, Editor-in-Chief at O’Reilly (in an excellent post that applies to fiction as well as non-fiction), says, “There is little copyright protection of ideas, and it is often difficult to prove that you had an idea that we hadn’t already thought of ourselves or heard about from someone else. Copyright law likes to protect written work. If the proposal you send us is complex and detailed and includes an overall description of the concept, an outline, and some indication of your qualifications, however, your ability (and a court’s) to recognize your idea in any finished work increases.”

* Recognize the difference between theft and inspiration. Ideas aren’t unique. It’s what’s done with the idea that makes it something special. Other writers are likely inspired by the same sources and events which inspire you. If “two people fall madly in love but circumstances keep them from being together” were a copyrightable idea, our current field of literature would probably be a heck of a lot narrower than it is! That doesn’t mean that all those stories copied or stole from each other. Similarly, another story may be similar to yours, or yours may be similar to it, just because it’s grown, completely independently, from the same kind of seed. Asimov himself said, (here quoted in an article on io9 about science fiction’s greatest stolen ideas,) “It’d be different if I used the details of his plot and worked up a story that was so like his that nobody could fail to see it – that’s plagiarism. But just to use the idea and build your own plot or story about it – why, we do that all the time.”

…and more!

Kimi Alexandre of the urban fantasy Tale Chasing podcast put up a great interview with Laurie McLean, an agent with Larsen-Pomada Literary Agents.

Kimi asks some great questions, and Laurie shares a wealth of knowledge on a range of topics, including the definitions of urban fantasy and its sub-genres, how the bestseller lists really work, how and why podcasting affects your chances with traditional publishers, and what she does and doesn’t like to see in a submission from a prospective client.

Go here to give it a listen!

We all have a deep-seated need for closure in our lives. We like to know why people have made the choices that they’ve made, whether we’ve done something wrong to bring about that choice or whether acting differently could have somehow changed the outcome.

In the absence of answers, we tend to analyze situations and come up with answers of our own. We rationalize events around us all the time, to the point that we don’t even notice ourselves doing it. If traffic is slow, we tell ourselves that there’s road construction up ahead, or maybe there’s been an accident. If someone’s late for an appointment, or doesn’t answer the phone, we come to an internally satisfying conclusion about what might be occupying them.

In the absence of an explanation, we also tend to try to read too closely between the lines of a form rejection letter. No reason is given, but there must have been a reason, so we rationalize and analyze and come up with our own.

I acknowledge that, I empathize with it, and I send out form rejections anyway. I stand by it.

1. It’s kinder to dump someone outright than to lead them on.
Do form letters deprive writers of the constructive criticism that might make their work better? Maybe. But if I’ve already decided I don’t want it and that nothing you can change will make me want it, I’m not the one you’ve got to make it better for. If it’s close enough that I’d accept it if a couple things were different, I will tell you. But I won’t suggest changes that might make it less suitable for publication somewhere else, when I don’t plan to take it on no matter what you do with it.

2. Form letters discourage further conversation.
It’s a simple one-shot business transaction. You send me one query, I send you one response. If that response is no, that’s all you get, and I don’t want to give out any signals that suggest my decision might be open to negotiation. It isn’t. I don’t want to invite discussion, I won’t be coerced into giving a free critique, and I don’t have time to listen to a rebuttal against my decision. It won’t change my mind, it’ll just make you look unprofessional. You need to move on, and you need to let me move on, too. You’ll earn more respect by respecting my decision. And it’s not just me: Colleen Lindsay’s post What Not to Do When You Get a Rejection speaks in more depth about the kinds of follow-up correspondence agents and editors don’t like to see.

3. Don’t assume it’s you.
Some people respond to rejection in a very internal way. They think they must have done something wrong, and they analyze every minute nuance of their actions trying to figure out how they could have done better or changed the outcome. If you’re a writer, you need to develop a thicker skin than that. If your work is polished and well-written and interesting and engaging, it could just be that it’s not a fit for a particular publisher, that it’s not directed toward their market, or that it’s directed too well toward their market and they already have too many similar submissions in their list. Don’t beat yourself up over your query letter, either. If it’s well-written and professional and portrays you as sane and serious about getting published, it was probably fine. Get a critique group to look at your manuscript and your query, get opinions from other writers and from editors. If general consensus is that your manuscript is at a publishable stage and appropriate for submission, just accept that it wasn’t that publisher’s “type,” and move on.

4. Don’t assume it’s NOT you.
On the opposite end of the continuum, we find people who refuse to take responsibility for anything. The world is out to get them, and it’s everyone’s fault but theirs. Don’t go too far in this direction and assume your manuscript is perfect. Yes, it may have just been that your golden triangle didn’t fit in a publisher’s square hole, but it may also be that you’ve submitted a lump of unpolished tin. I see a lot of manuscripts that just aren’t fit to be published, with horrible grammar and spelling, or with premises and protagonists that make me weep. A certain amount of confidence is a good thing, but don’t ever become so overconfident that you refuse to consider that your manuscript might not be ready for the big leagues. Not all manuscripts are perfect; in fact, few of them are. If they were, I wouldn’t have a job.

5. Whether it’s about you or not, it’s not personal either way.
You’ve probably worked on your manuscript for a very long time. It’s your baby. It’s part of who you are. It’s your inner daydreams and emotions and hopes and fears written down for the whole world to see. You’ve never felt so free, or so exposed, as when you hand that little piece of your soul over for someone else’s approval or enjoyment. But to them, it’s just a book. It’s one of many books. Millions of books. No one who declines your manuscript is passing judgment on you or your worth as a person. They’re simply saying that this particular offering isn’t appropriate for them at this time. You’ve probably heard a thousand times about all the rejection letters any writer gets. I understand that “Don’t take it personally” is easier said than done. But really, I mean it. I make no value judgment on you as a person if I reject your manuscript. I don’t even make a value judgment on your writing. I just don’t want to publish it. It really is as impersonal as that. And that’s part of the value of a form rejection, believe it or not. As Rachelle Gardner points out, “the more detailed I get about the rejection, the more personal that rejection becomes.”

6. It’s who you know… but only to a point.
Nothing fills me with more anxiety than sending my own submissions out to face rejection. But, second to that, nothing fills me with more anxiety than reading a submission from a friend or colleague if I’m unfamiliar with their writing. Knowing someone in the industry might get you in the door, but what happens when you’re inside is all up to you. Your manuscript still has to stand on its own merits. It’s under more pressure, even, because it’s going to reflect on the person who referred you, too. I don’t give pity dates; if I accepted something that didn’t meet my standards, it would reflect on my reputation, as well. If it turns out that I can’t take it, I’ll have to reject it all the same no matter who you are. If I do take it, you can be assured that it’s because the manuscript has earned it. I may be more likely to offer feedback and critique to a friend’s manuscript, but I’m not going to be any more likely to accept it.

7. It’s not random.
I think this is the hardest one to accept. There are reasons, even if you don’t know them, and you may never know what they are. This is where the whole mythos of the crapshoot comes from: the folklore that acceptance and rejection are based solely on the editor or agent’s mood, a toss of a coin, what they had for breakfast and the state of their morning commute. It’s easy and convenient to think that way when you’re not presented with evidence to the contrary. I understand that it gives you the closure that you need. But please give us a little credit, too. Most of us treat our submissions seriously and make careful, considered decisions. Ultimately, we want to like the submissions we get. We wish every manuscript we get could be The One. And we want to see you succeed, too, even if your manuscript isn’t right for us.

Further reading:

• Dealing with Silence and Rejection by Earl Newton
• Investment – a post about rejection by JA Konrath
• The Art of Reading Rejection Letters by Nathan Bransford
• Why it’s Hard to Tell the Whole Truth by Rachelle Gardner (with links to further posts about rejections)
• What Not to Do When You Get a Rejection by Colleen Lindsay
• What Editors Mean, in which Kit Whitfield takes the dating analogy to a whole new level

I’ll leave you with this, from author JA Konrath: “Remember, there’s a word for a writer who never gives up: Published.”

If you’ve got a link to another good post on the subject, please leave it in a comment!

This may sound a bit obvious, but when you send a query, please send it to the correct address as specified by a publisher’s submissions guidelines.

If a submissions address is listed for a publisher, whether it’s a physical address or an e-mail address, that’s the best address to which you can direct a submission. It’s what it’s there for.

I’m noticing a surprisingly common perception that goes something like, “If I send this to the editor at home, or send it to their personal e-mail address, I’ll cut corners and get in the back door and get my query noticed. That’ll get me off the slush pile and in ahead of everyone who sends to the ‘submissions’ address; it’s like cutting to the front of the line.” This is absolutely false, in this editor’s experience, and I strongly discourage it. Please, don’t even consider it.

Proper channels exist for a reason: to be followed. Every editor, agent, or publisher has a process in place, and it’s not a random thing — it’s the process or system that works best for them. Stepping outside those lines just makes their job harder, and in some cases can severely limit your chances.

If someone has work mail and home mail separate, it’s because they don’t want to see work mail while they’re at home. Sending it there isn’t going to get it answered any faster, it’ll just be an imposition on their personal time.

Speaking for my own experience: I work at home, so I don’t have office mail and home mail separate. My personal and professional e-mail all filters into the same mailbox. Searching out my “personal” email and directing a query to it, or sending me a Dragon Moon Press query through this blog, will not get your mail seen any faster than sending it to the proper address. I see mail directed to all my addresses with equal frequency and reliability.

So why does it matter?

Sending professional mail to a stranger’s personal, home address is an inappropriate intrusion on their personal space. If the professional address is posted and the personal address isn’t, that extra effort you took to track them down will show, and will make you look a little desperate and stalkery. That’s not the first impression you want to give. Even if I communicate with someone on a personal, friendly level first, if I then invite them to submit a query, I still ask them to submit to the submissions address so that the mail can be tagged and processed correctly.

Sending professional mail to a stranger’s personal, home address will reduce your message’s chances of being read. I expect my personal mail to be from people I know personally; everything else is usually spam, and is usually treated as such.

Incoming mail is tagged differently, based on where it’s incoming from. Submissions that get to me in the correct manner are tagged with a little green label in my inbox. It makes them stand out from the rest of the mail and I instantly know, before even reading the subject line, what they probably are. That label helps me to handle submissions more efficiently and alerts me to do all the things that I need to do to process them. Without it, I might still see them, but even if I do, they’ll be harder to find again. They’re more likely to fall through the cracks.

Ultimately, it’s important to remember that publishing, while it can feel informal and blur the lines at times, is a business. Publishers, editors, and agents are professionals. Correspond with the same professionalism you would display to any other business contact, and you’ll be more likely to receive prompt, professional attention in return.

If publishers want me to have my manuscript completed before I start shopping it around, why do they only want to see my first few chapters? In this electronic age, do you see publishers skipping the “sample chapters” step in the future? If I’m just sending a file, it doesn’t take up that much more room to send the whole thing.

The query letter and the synopsis show a publisher what you write. The partial—a partial manuscript, usually two or three chapters—shows a publisher how you write.

As a publisher, I want you to have your manuscript written and finished because it takes discipline and dedication to finish a novel. Especially if you’re a first-time author, I want to see that you have the ability and attention span to knock out all 80-100k of those words. I want to know that you’ve gotten to the end of the story, edited the heck out of it on your own, and already smoothed out any plot problems and conquered any writer’s block that might have happened along the way. I want to be able to slot you into my print schedule when I ask my boss to sign you, instead of being strung along waiting for you to finish writing the book. That doesn’t, however, mean that I need to see the whole book. I just need to know that it’s done.

You need to grab a reader with the first line. Usually, I know by the end of the first paragraph whether I’m interested in seeing more. If at the end of the first paragraph it’s still iffy, I’ll probably know by the end of the first page.

If the first page doesn’t catch my attention, I won’t keep reading. I might stick it out a little longer if I feel the query and synopsis are worth it, but I probably won’t. If the first page is full of spelling and grammatical errors, I’ve seen enough. If you’re not serious enough about your submission to take the time to make sure it’s edited and polished, you’re not serious enough to be writing professionally.

If I make it to the end of the first page and I want to keep going, I’m hooked, or at least curious and willing to give the benefit of the doubt and see where things go. Your characters are intriguing, they’re in some sort of conflict that’s created questions I want to learn the answers to, your world is interesting…usually at least one of the above. I like your writing style, and I want to see more. I’m looking for vocabulary, a sense of your world and your characters, and engaging prose. I want to be drawn in. At the same time, I’m paying attention to how much line editing the manuscript might need later.

The second chapter often starts in a completely new place, and I like to see if the momentum that started in the first chapter was a fluke, or if it will carry through. Two or three chapters are often more than enough to know whether I want to see more. Even when I’m not sure on the first page, I’m pretty confident within ten or fifteen.

The difference between receiving a partial vs a full manuscript isn’t a matter of file storage space, or even a matter of how much I plan to read. It’s a matter of degrees, and it revolves around publishers’ universal dislike of simultaneous submission. It’s okay to send queries and synopses to multiple publishers, but when it comes to sending out actual bits of your manuscript, policy may vary.

Some houses treat partials as manuscripts and won’t allow simultaneous submission of partials. Other houses treat partials as samples; they’re fine with you having a few partials out, as long as you’re open about it. It might even motivate them to work faster, because they know that there are other interested parties. It’s polite to let other publishers know if you have partials out at various places, so that they can respond to you in line with their own policies.

A full manuscript is different. It’s something special. A request for a full manuscript says “We think we might be interested.” And while it might be a nice ego-boost to get publishers into a bidding war over your manuscript, keep in mind that publishers get SWAMPED with submissions, and they don’t like chasing down a lead and getting close to making you an offer, only to learn that you’ve just sold your manuscript somewhere else. Even Dragon Moon, which is officially closed to unsolicited submissions, still gets swamped with submissions.

Simultaneous submissions are great for the author, since they beat the frustration of having to wait while someone makes up his mind before you can send your manuscript somewhere else. But they’re lousy for the publisher for the same reason. The debate on the matter is a long and angry one, and you need only type “simultaneous submissions” into the search engine of your choice to get a good sampling of both sides of the argument and see a lot of good points raised.

I’m not going to go into it too deeply here, since whether it’s a good thing or not is tangental to the point. To answer the question, requesting a partial has very little to do with file size or storage space. It’s about level of interest and level of commitment, and editors/publishers/agents not wanting to tie up a manuscript that they might not be interested in.

With that in mind, I don’t see partial submissions going away.

A lot of steps are involved in taking a book from a document file to a printed and bound collection of paper.

This eleven-minute video demonstrates the bookbinding process. Edwards Brothers, Inc., located in Lillington N.C., binds the C-SPAN book ABRAHAM LINCOLN, with a guided tour to lead the viewer through the process.

Then, step back in time with this bookbinding video from 1947.

I’m especially fascinated by the contrast between how much the process has changed… and how much it hasn’t.

There’s a lot going on in the podcasting world lately!

First, in general news, Parsec Award Nominations are now open. The Parsec Awards recognize excellence in speculative fiction podcasting. Please go and nominate your favorite podcasts.

Closer to home (or, depending on how you’re counting, farther away!), podcaster and author Philippa Ballantine has received a two book deal from Ace Books (an imprint of Berkeley Books, and part of Penguin) for her book GEIST and its sequel! I had the privilege of working with Pip on GEIST, so this is huge news for me as well. I was waiting to post about it until a print date was announced, but your first book to get signed with a major publishing house isn’t news that’s easy to keep to yourself.

You can listen to podcast author P.G. Holyfield interview Pip about podcasting, the publishing process and her twelve-year overnight sucess at The Dead Robot Society.

Meanwhile, podiobook novel NINA KIMBERLY THE MERCILESS by Christiana Ellis is all set for its print debut on May 15th. Proofs have been reviewed and the book looks fantastic. While you’re listening to great interviews, listen to Christiana talk about the writing and publishing process with Michell Plested over on his blog, Irreverent Muse.

My current projects include the print edition of the podiobook CRESCENT by Phil Rossi. If you like science fiction and haunted houses, this creepy tale will keep you turning pages. CRESCENT is scheduled for a July 9th print release from Dragon Moon Press.

And next on deck for me is P.G. Holyfield’s podiobook novel MURDER AT AVEDON HILL, also forthcoming from Dragon Moon Press.

And, finally, Scott Sigler is taking preorders for a limited edition hardcover run of his cult podiobook hit, THE ROOKIE. Grab a discount code to snag $3 off the cover price and support your favorite podcast, and order your copy before they’re all gone.

Money should flow toward the writer.

You might have heard this phrase before. It’s one of those standard bits of advice you hear a lot in the publishing industry. And, it has a lot of merit.

You shouldn’t have to pay someone to represent your book. Reputable literary agents operate like real estate agents, making their money from the deals they secure for you, not from your pocket. Likewise, you shouldn’t have to pay someone to publish your book. A publisher should buy your book. They should pay you, whether in advances, royalties, flat figures, ice cream, or whatever combination you negotiate of the above.

And a publisher will, almost certainly, have an editor on staff. So why should you pay money up front for a service that you’ll be getting for free later? Doesn’t that go against money flowing toward the writer? What makes editors the exception?

The difference is that a good, professional edit is an investment you’re making in your work, and it’s one that will more than pay for itself when that work gets signed. It’s an investment, just like getting yourself business cards, or buying a computer or notepads and good pens. It’s an investment, just like buying advanced outlining and writing software or a set of reference books. Yes, you could write and sell a novel without all of those things, but you’d be putting yourself at a disadvantage if you did.

A beginning writer is looking to cut corners and save money wherever possible. It’s true that a professional edit costs money, and it’s true that there are a lot of other ways to find pairs of eyes to read your story for you.

The difference is that an editor is a professional. Your friends, your family members, even other writers—who may have great perspective on where your story sags and what it needs—are not editors, and there’s a big difference between editors and writers in how they approach a manuscript and what they see in it.

There are different levels of editing. A good copyedit will polish up what you have and make sure it’s technically correct and stylistically consistent. (Don’t underestimate industry-standard style, and don’t underestimate consistency. If you’ve got the same word handled three different ways throughout your manuscript, it’s exactly the sort of amateur mark that’s distracting enough to be noticed.)

A good substantive edit—and this is where there’s an added benefit to having an editor with experience in your genre—will identify the weaknesses in your plot, characters, pacing and/or style, and help to make your overall manuscript stronger.

As an editor who works for publishers as well as working independently for writers, I have the copyediting skills and the substantive editing skills, and I also have the exposure to manuscripts that have already been signed and accepted for publication. That exposure is invaluable, because when it comes to being able to tell someone else if I think their manuscript is up to publishing standards—or advise them regarding what it needs to get it there—I have the perspective to be able to give an informed answer. The facilitators of a major writing workshop probably have that perspective, but a local writing group (depending on its members) may or may not.

A manuscript doesn’t “need” to go to an editor in order to be good enough to get published, but I do think that when you’re sending your work out to publishers and agents, it’s in your best interest to send out the best product you possibly can.

The larger the publisher, the more they’re going to hesitate over a manuscript that has a good core but needs a lot of work, and the less likely they are to take a risk. They get enough submissions that they can easily have their pick of manuscripts that are already clean, and polished, and strong, and they want to churn them out as efficiently as possible. They may assign you an editor, yes, but probably only for a quick round of copyediting. If you need something more in-depth, chances are they’ll keep going until they find a manuscript that doesn’t.

With smaller presses it’s a little different. They’re more willing to take chances, and they might be more willing to work with a book and pull it into shape. But the quality of editing you might find at a small press may vary widely, and keep in mind that smaller presses are flooded with submissions, too. Quality and polish still matter a great deal.

A good editor will be able to give you an honest assessment of your manuscript and its readiness, and help you with whatever it might need. It’s not a requirement to getting published, but it’s a worthwhile investment that will more than pay for itself in the end.