I turn jobs down. It happens all the time. After five years as a freelance writer, editor, and coach, I can tell when you and your manuscript are going to be a problem — and more importantly, when I can’t help you. If I pass you off to another editor, you’re probably fine. But if…
Every book proposal includes “comps” — competing books. You need to show the potential publisher that you know what other books are out there and how you can differentiate your book from other similar books. Why you need comps There are three reasons to include comps in your proposal. Show you know your market and…
I’m grateful to Chris Taylor, who wrote a piece on Mashable that breaks down everything you learn from self-help books — and why they’re all the same. If you’re an author, you may find it depressing. Especially if your ideas are ordinary. The piece is called “Every self-help book ever, boiled down to 11 simple…
The job of a book proposal is to convince an acquisitions editor at a publishing house to make you an offer. So obviously, you should write it for editors, right? Wrong. Editors don’t want you to tell them what you plan to do. They want you to show them what you can do — for…
You’ve written (or plan to write) 40,000 to 70,000 words of brilliant prose. Publishers — and readers — will bring a set of expectations regarding structure to the work. Publishers expect you to know how books are organized, but they rarely discuss those conventions explicitly. So let’s break down how nonfiction books are organized. Chapters…
Creativity emerges from the interplay of wonder and rigor. That is the central message of The Creativity Leap, a fantastic little book by Natalie Nixon. She taps into a background in cultural anthropology and fashion to create a book that struck me as somehow fundamental, connected to the core of what it means to be…
Have you had an interesting life? Could others benefit from your experiences? Then you might write a memoir. But how should you structure it? Let’s look at two ways to structure a memoir filled with valuable lessons. I’m working with several authors on memoirs right now, and I developed these approaches to help them. One…
A friend and fellow author recently asked me to be his coauthor on a topic close to his heart. I said no. Quickly. It has nothing to do with him. It has to do with the nature of coauthoring. What a coauthor is, and why I won’t be yours I’ve coauthored three books. Here’s the…
I may tell you to work with another professional for a service I don’t offer. Sometimes I get paid a bounty for this. Here’s why I always disclose those payments. When an author comes to me, sometimes I can help them, sometime I can’t. They might need a different kind of editor, an illustrator, a…