Editing
| Editing, Writing
The Editorial Letter
We’ve discussed editing before, and it can be confusing that the word “edit” can mean so many different things. In publishing, there are three basic types of edit that a book might go through (although the lines can be blurry): The copyedit: Detailed editing including the nitty gritty of grammar, punctuation, typos, word choice, even fact-checking.…
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What the Fiction Editor Looks For – Part 2
Yesterday we focused on the characters in your novel. Here are a few more things editors look for when reading your novel, this time, about the story itself. The premise needs to be strong enough (as well as interesting enough) to support the entire book. Every book needs suspense…the page-turning factor…a burning story question that the…
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What the Fiction Editor Looks For
Part 1 For the next couple of days I’m going to point out some of the things an editor looks for when reading a manuscript. When you get a content edit (or “developmental edit”) on your novel, you may find these kinds of things pointed out for improvement. Today I’m going to focus on your novel’s characters.…
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More on Revision Letters
A few weeks ago, guest blogger Camille Eide wrote about getting a revision letter for her novel, and how much time she spent reworking the manuscript as a result. Many of you have asked variations of the following question, which came from Mike Dennis: I have to ask, if the agent had 10 pages of…
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The Revision Letter
Last week, guest blogger Camille Eide wrote about her first experience with a Revision Letter. Some of you may wonder, what exactly does that letter address? Simply put, it addresses whatever your particular book needs to make it the best it can be. But to be a little more specific, here is a rundown of…
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Dealing with Contradictory Feedback
I frequently receive questions about all the “mixed messages” writers get in the course of writing and publishing their books. So we’re going to spend this whole week talking about it. One of the kinds of mixed messages we have to deal with is getting contradictory responses to our work. You may hear one thing…
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Tighten Up Your Manuscript!
There comes a time in every writer’s life when an editor requires them to reduce their word count. Ack! Not my precious words! Even if an editor hasn’t asked you to do this, most writers would benefit from tightening up their manuscripts before submission. (I, for one, would appreciate it. ) But how do you…
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How Much Editing Can An Agent Do?
Before I became an agent, I’d been editing and writing books for years, so I naturally approached agenting from an editorial perspective. Meaning: I look for excellence in the craft of writing, and I also use my editorial skills to help polish a proposal or a manuscript before we send it out to publishers. Because…
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Which Comes First – Agent or Editor?
A lot of people think it’s a chicken-or-egg question: Do I pitch to agents or editors first? But it’s really not that hard. The truth is, if you want to sell your book to a commercial royalty-paying publisher, you’re going to need either an agent, or some kind of personal contact with editors. Since it’s…
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Freelance Editor Recommendations
Updated 1/21/25. Sometimes it’s necessary to work with a freelance editor to improve your writing skills or help make your manuscript more marketable. You can find editors by searching Fiverr or Reedsy, though you need to vet them carefully and ask a lot of questions. I’ve compiled a list of editors I know who are…
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How to Become a Freelance Editor
Before I was an agent, I was a freelance editor. A lot of people ask me how to get into freelance editing, but I never quite know how to answer. My freelance career grew from my contacts and experience working in the publishing industry for a dozen years. It grew organically out of what I…
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Handling the Editorial Process
Many of you are working on your first contracted book. (Yeah!) Prior to your publishing deal, you may have been through countless edits and revisions of your book (or books). But you’ve never had to do it under deadline, and you’ve never done it with the input of your own publishing house editor. So this…
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The Editorial Process
Several of you have been curious about the editorial process inside a publishing house. Rosslyn asked:What is the role of freelance editors in the publishing process these days? I’ve noticed cases recently in which published authors had in-house editors AND freelance editors working on their novels. Do publishing houses hire these freelancers, or do the…
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Agenting & Editing – Part Deux
Last week I explained that it’s not considered ethical for literary agents to benefit financially from the editing of their clients’ books. (Agents should not profit from their clients in any way except for selling the rights to their books.) As part of my mission to clear up some misconceptions about how WordServe operates, I…
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Rachelle Gardner
President & Literary Agent,
Gardner Literary Agency
President & Literary Agent,
Gardner Literary Agency
