It sounds simple. You give your editor a copy of your manuscript; they return the copy with specific edits, questions, and several pages of general comments. The editor’s job is to make suggestions that improve a nonfiction book in every possible way — including clarity of ideas, structure, tone, paragraphs, sentences, and words. As your…
Newsletter 170. The America.gov chatbot persists in telling the truth — but how long will that last? Plus, is teaching writing necessary, Sony ditches CES, three people to follow, three books to read, and a chance to tell us what you really think. Is America.gov a traitor or a patriot? The US Federal government announced…
If you have the financial resources not to need extra money during your retirement, then you have a set of decisions to make. You can stop working and spend time on hobbies, travel, and grandchildren. Or you can keep working. But if you keep working, you should do what makes you happy. My rules for…
“Writing coaching” sounds like an open-ended commitment, similar to, say, sports coaching or executive coaching. I reject that model. I want to help authors complete books, not charge them for counseling every week. But I like the idea of helping an author to get progressively better as they make progress on their book. I’ve just…
In the Classic Star Trek episode “The Ultimate Computer,” most of the crew of the Starship Enterprise are removed and replaced with the ultimate in automated starship operations, the M-5 Multitronic unit. It operates efficiently — faster and better than the crew — until of course it goes rogue and disables and kills crew of…
I’ve now worked on 80 nonfiction book projects. Writing books doesn’t work the way people expect. Publishing certainly doesn’t. And book promotion is equally confounding. As a result, I have to repeat the same surprising truths over and over to each new author. I’ve compiled 47 of these sobering truths here. I’m sure it’s futile…
Newsletter 169. Now that AI can write, we must change how we inspire students. Plus, the disaster of corporate slop grenades, editorial cheat sheets, three people to follow and three books to read. Teach writing as thinking In school, we’ve been teaching writing as a series of rules. Here is how to spell; here is…
Here’s how I behave as a freelance service provider: A lot of service providers work like this. We give away a lot of advice for free. We lead with service, not with paid services. Your attitude makes a difference There’s a right and wrong way to approach a service provider like me. Approach us the…
When I get hired to edit a manuscript these days, the first thing I do is check whether it was created in whole or in part with AI. Around 90% of the book projects I work on now are at least partially AI-assisted. My clients are smart, busy, and tech-savvy, and most of them appear…