That Minotaur Wasn't So Scary

Image from Payton's Dungeon.

Actually, the Beast-in-chief wore a blazer and stylish spectacles. At the MWA NYC monthy chapter meeting this week, I got to converse with writers I know, sit with our own WoM Elaine, and learn some things about St. Martin's Minotaur, part of the Macmillan/St. Martin's mystery fiction behemoth. Their imprint alone puts out about 120 books per year. Andrew Martin (no relation to the saint, but horned god of Minotaur) was there to speak to us, as was executive editor Kelley Ragland, and some other folks who handle editing, administration, publicity (Jessica was sitting next to me), and library sales were scattered around the tables. I didn't hear all the full names often enough to remember with my sieve-like recall. So, forgive me, because I stink as a schmooze hound, and I wasn't avidly collecting cards and networking. I just felt like carousing and soaking up the info with the chicken gravy.

I can accurately report that the Minotaur folks seemed enthusiastic about their work and even more pleasantly, they seem to care a lot about the quality of the manuscripts, cited like a mantra as the sine qua non of getting published. Conveniently, and unlike Providence, it's one part of the process and industry the writer has control over. I also heard the (shocking) advice not to overstretch your marketing efforts online if they're getting in the way of your writing, and that they're willing to see authors build over several books. Immediate blockbusters are not required, though always welcome, of course. All nice to hear, and especially nice for the Minotaur authors present. Given that March 31st has come and gone without a congratulatory phone call, I think I probably did not win the First Crime Novel Contest that Minotaur and MWA co-sponsored this year. So, I'm not in that happy company yet.

Did you get the call? You can tell us. We could seriously rename ourselves the Women of Discretion and also of Mystery, but only after Discretion first. Spill.

The Minotaur guests also didn't much like the talk of "trends" and find it counterproductive to chase them. For what it's worth, if you're an espionage author or foreign author selling U.S. rights, perhaps you're in luck trend-wise. But those categories don't apply to me, so I'd best keep grinding out what I can. It was funny when a writer asked how Minotaur handles touring schedules etc. for their authors with other full-time jobs. The reply was that people have to work out individually what activities will be possible for them, but Minotaur would never decline a good manuscript because an author couldn't tour, and besides, almost all their authors still have day jobs. Welcome to the glamor of crime writing.

They're experimenting with various avenues of online marketing, like many publishers, but it's not clear which strategies are working and the double-investment in traditional approaches as well as the new creates in-house expense and confusion as well as potential. One such new initiative is Moments In Crime, a rotating blog from their huge roster of authors. Andrew Martin said that post-Kindle, e-books did double in sales last year, but that means from tiny number to twice a tiny number. However, audiobooks began like that, too, and have grown to a substantive piece of business today. On the acquisitions side, they deal almost exclusively with agented authors, and it's difficult for a self-published title, even with good sales numbers, to find its way to one of their editors.

If you're an MWA member, in a few days, you'll be able log in and hear the entire Past Meeting as a podcast, but I think those are the high points. If you have other questions about a particular topic of publishing interest I skipped, feel free to ask in the comments. I'll try to remember what was said or make up something that sounds plausible.

Speaking of day jobs: Today, I'm sewing table linens and planning menus and gardening and cleaning for houseguests. Call me Innkeeper. Meanwhile, Elaine is busy, busy with editing deadlines. Laura's manning her trade show booth this weekend. Nan has her own viper's nest of complications to wrestle before Malice Domestic, so I can only hope Terrie and Lois are beaming with pacific contentment somewhere. But I have my doubts. Now that spring is really starting to sproing, it's hauling tail like a lead-footed trucker on white crosses. Hope you're enjoying the breeze in your sails!

Update: In other publishing news, Harper Collins will publish you, but not for money exactly, and retailers can't return surplus. (WSJ article via Roger L. Simon's blog.) But perhaps you'll receive total consciousness on your deathbed, which would be nice.

First Novel's Bite*

First novels are the toughest, most rewritten, most love/hate experience you'll ever have. Until novel 2, at least.

Getting into the structure of mysteries was a blessing for me because it provided some plot expectations that helped my character-centered stories. Sounds like that's true for you, too.

Dropping back story is essential - dribbling some back in here and there works wonders for shredding text where you want rolling story.

Writing book number 2 while allowing book 1 to mellow out is the best next move, IMHO. If it's second in a series or a separate stand-alone, it will add to your perspective and help you realize what themes play out naturally in your story lines, etc.

Book 2 helps firm up your subgenre orientation, if you need any. The agent who didn't like the pacing of your story might be a gal who likes chippier chics - she might say she wants a dead body earlier on, but Janet Evanovich, for one, often begins with subplot and doesn't hit solid plot drive until well past the first chapter. Inotherwords, agents and editors might say one thing and mean another.

What's your hook? Is it your protag's devotion to winning bake-offs which leads her into a world of intrigue circling around a gas stove and a dead baker? That's a cozy. That would drive a thriller-agent to instant rejection. But, if a traditional cozy's what you want to write, then you get some time to set up your protag's world and her place within it before having to have the dead appear.

Read. Read. Read. Read works by fellow Sisters In Crime to see how they work their craft and get to be published. Observe what works and what doesn't - get a sense of your place in the marketplace.

From some ear-to-the-ground observations, modern audiences do like action up front, even in a cozy, but it doesn't have to be a murderous action. Humor is a great sidekick to keep the reader on track. Lots of folks layer in such enhancements as humor once the story line is in decent shape. What works best for you and your protag?

There's lots of time for you to figure this all out. Let your inner writer have some space to explore before expecting a salable novel. Get to know yourself by writing more stories. Try your hand at short stories (it worked for me! Suddenly I'm a finalist in Malice Domestic's Agatha for Best Short Story!!!) It will be much easier seeing what needs tweaking once you've had some distance from it.

Spend more time writing than rewriting for a while. See how it goes.
Write On!
Nan

*(This comes by way of the Guppy Internet Chapter of Sisters In Crime. One gal struggling with the polishing of her first novel asked for advice. This is my reply. Beware: I give mine freely, and it's worth every penny, as my pal Clare2e would say.)

Do Editors Still Edit?

Later this month, the guest speaker at my local Sisters in Crime chapter meeting will be an editor from Simon and Schuster. Among the things he’ll discuss will be, “Do editors edit anymore?” How do I know? Because that’s what the announcement postcard says in boldfaced, italicized, and slightly larger type.

The Sisters in Crime general discussion list recently inaugurated an offering called Mentor Monday. A wonderful idea, it features a different publishing professional (published author, editor, agent, librarian) answering list members’ questions every Monday. This week's guest, an author, was asked, “We keep hearing that editors don’t edit anymore. What has been your experience?”

Whether or not editors still edit has become a hot question the past several years. The problem is, the people posed the question usually aren’t the best ones to answer it. Writers generally go by their personal experience, which is usually with the same editor for a number of years, and editors tend to go by what they themselves do. The best person to ask would be someone who deals with a variety of editors from a variety of publishing houses.

As a freelance copyeditor, I can tell you, in no uncertain terms, that the answer to whether or not editors still edit is an unequivocal, um, yes and no. The fact is, some editors edit and some don’t. Some publishers require their editors to edit and others don’t. And among the editors who edit and the houses that encourage it, the amount of editing that’s done varies.

First let’s clarify the type of editing we’re discussing. Editors such as the guest speaker at my upcoming chapter meeting do developmental editing. Here, the editor helps the writer produce the final draft of a manuscript. The editor will point out problems with the plot and pacing and characters. He or she will recommend where material should be added to fill out descriptions or improve explanations, where text could be deleted to tighten things up, how paragraphs or sections could be shifted to increase tension or flow. These editors almost always work in-house.

Copyeditors do everything else, including copy (mechanical) editing and line (stylistic) editing. Some also do substantive (structural) editing. (For descriptions, click here.) These editors generally work on a freelance or contract basis.

Over the years, I’ve worked for every type of publisher in terms of the amount of editing expected. One full-time employer felt that once it acquired a manuscript, it had the right to totally rework it, no matter what the author wanted or how much the author objected. Another felt the writer’s words were sacred and didn’t even allow commas to be inserted without the author’s approval. Most fell in between these two extremes.

As a freelance copyeditor, I do work for a number of different publishers, a few on a regular basis. Some of these clients want me to plow in and fix everything necessary, while others want me to merely point out the problems and recommend the corrections. Again, most fall in between, but they still vary in how heavily they want me to edit and in the amount of leeway they give me.

I’ve also noticed that the quality of the manuscripts from one publisher can vary depending on who the in-house editor is. At one company, some of the editors can be superb, obviously working closely with their authors to craft near-to-perfect final drafts, while other editors there seem to barely look at their manuscripts. Needless to say, I lunge for manuscripts edited by the first kind of editor and sometimes find my schedule suddenly packed when offered a project handled by the second kind. I’ve had some manuscripts from editors like the latter that I pretty much ended up having to rewrite.

But if my experience doesn’t convince you, bring up the subject at the next gathering of published authors you attend. Guaranteed, some will complain of too much editor intrusion, others will lament the lack of editing they've received, and others will say their experiences have been just fine.

Super Linky Tuesday

No doubt about it. Those Martians have a sense of humor. c. Barcroft Media. Don't sue, please.


You may be celebrating the NY Football Giants victory (some of us are in mourning), or following the bucks and throws of the political rodeo, or indulging in some Fat Tuesday gluttony, and here we have the perfect accompaniment of smokin' hot links:

1) Great, more competition. Striking screenwriters go back to their novels.

2) Not NaNoWriMo. Work-for-sale. Jeff Vandermeer explains how he wrote a publishable MS in two months.

3) Rachel Donadio muses in the NYT Sunday Book Review about why, despite technological improvements, publishing still takes so darn long.

4) For debut mystery author Rosemary Harris of the blog Jungle Red, Super Tuesday can only mean her book launch party at Partners & Crime tonight. As per above, it took Ro 22 months to see Pushing Up Daisies in print. Congrats!

5) Wacky kicker courtesy of the "blog" of "unnecessary" quotation marks.
"Chicken", anyone?

Plagiarism and Responsibility

Do you ever worry that you might have committed plagiarism in your work? It can happen innocently enough. In researching something for your WIP, perhaps you quickly copied word-for-word from some source material. But when it came time to utilize your notes, you forgot you did this and just dropped chunks, unchanged, into your manuscript.

Perhaps you’re reading another book and notice a similar passage. Or you're watching a show on TV and hear familiar words come out of the characters’ mouths. Will your neighbors begin snickering as you pass through the aisles of the supermarket?

Accidentally using research notes unaltered isn’t a sin. It’s a mistake, and it’s one that more than a few writers make. And writing something similar to what’s in another book or in a movie or TV show is unavoidable. After all, there are only so many believable ways to present certain situations or conversations.

But if you do plagiarize, or skate dangerously close to it, whose responsibility is it to catch it before your material is published? Whose responsibility is it to correct it?

Ann M. Marble, an editor by day and romance reviewer and writer at night, discusses plagiarism and writers’ and editors’ responsibilities in an excellent column posted Monday at All About Romance. The website is for romance writers and readers, but the article applies to all types of writing—fiction, nonfiction, long, short, romance, mystery, what-have-you. You can find the article here.

Worst Short Story Evah?

Author J.A. Konrath is judging a short story contest, and he's written a sample entry collecting the most common errors he's seeing. I found it a scream, if only because the funniest things are also true. I know lots of the Great Unwashed and Unpublished class of writers like me who are working hard at becoming better craftspeople and storytellers. I've also met plenty in our class who swear their work is flawless and that it's the industry conspiring to stifle their greatness. Most of the latter artistry reads like this, and they all want introductions to my agent:

It was a very sunny day in the spring of 2004 in fact it was so sunny, that even the sun had to wear sunglasses! It was on this very sunny day that I first met my wife. Her name was Rhoda, and she loved life. She lived in a house at 8786 Cranberry road, with her mother and three dogs named Sharpie, Bull, and Doxie, who are a Sharpei, a bulldog, and a doxhund. Boy were those dogs trouble! Yes they were! Trouble spelled T-R-O-U-B-L-E with a capitol T! But Rhonda loved those dogs, so much, that I never would have guessed, how it all ended up. And, boy, did it end up, bad! On a very cloudy day in the fall of 2006, Rhonda took the dogs out for a walk, but you can actually say that they walked her. Those were some frisky dogs! As they all walk to my house, Sharpie sniffe d out a skunk and got squirted, which smelled even worse. Sharpe thought it was a cat, but he sure was surprised! When Rhonda brought the dogs into my house, boy was I ever really very upset.

Read the rest of the brief jewel-like tale here at Joe's blog. The more you read, the more trouble you'll find. And if you have any of these occasional uh-ohs lurking in your own work, well, be very ashamed and get to editing. That's what I'm doing.

There's Still Time

Over at the Crime Time Café Steven Torres is giving away copies of his noir stand alone novel The Concrete Maze. Steven’s latest post is entitled There’s Still Time Steven tells us there is still time to get a free copy by contacting him through his website.

Since I’ve already ordered Steven’s book from Amazon, I’ll just steal his blog post title. There’s Still Time.

When it comes to writing, I feel as though I came very late to the dance. I am rushing into the ballroom to catch the last waltz. Got to do this. Got to learn that. This week I got a silly little cold that knocked me for a loop and I didn’t keep to my self imposed schedule.

This morning my good friend, CiCi, with whom I’ve share a message board for many years, told us all to start the day with deep breaths. Inhale to a count of six. Hold for three. Exhale for a count of six. I followed her directions and did the deep breathing routine three times. I cleared my head and saw time stretched out before me.

Time to write. Time to read. Time to revise. Time to learn more about the craft of writing. Time to walk and ponder. Time to explore great writing blogs. Time to learn more about the business of writing. Time for family and friends. Time to breathe.

Today I’m going to stop rushing and start using my time. Thanks CiCi.

Terrie

Potter's Magic Rewriting

Just back from a month-long absence from the internet and I take the time to go to the movies !?! Where are my priorities?

Well, I'm stuck on the Harry Potter juggernaut. A willing passenger. After all, J K Rowling is a writer, and the movies do work off her books. I considered it reasonable research.

In preparation for the movie I reread the book. Needed to refresh my memory and prepare to identify characters and translate Hogwarts-speak into Muggle-speak for my hubby. The book is complexly written - and, yes, somewhat poorly written by comparison to the literary standard bearers. But it has complex characters and deals with the stressful realities and emotional confusion involved in a coming-of-age novel. The characters are practically members of our family - the good characters, of course. AND, I love the on-going story.

While feeling like I'm Mrs. Weasley, I'm watching the movie leave out events and sub plots. Conversations are swallowed up and bits of them are spit out by other characters in another scene. Losing those bits and pieces of the book feels like losing family treasures.

Yet, the movie would have gone on way beyond all reason if the book had been followed exactly. (Bladders need consideration!) The director/screen writers clearly had to condense and consolidate. And that's exactly what I must do to my own manuscripts; get them to zip along and keep my readers involved. Hey, I'm no J K Rowling! I can't afford to present an over-stuffed manuscript to an agent or an editor. This movie helped me see the value of tightening as you rewrite.

And, the climax in the movie blew me away - far better than the already action-packed book. Wow. The rewriting streamlined the story and ended it with a stronger bang. "Rewriting" is no longer a dirty word.

Are you a Potter fan? Does this strike you as an accurate assessment of the on-screen revisions? What do you think?

Write On!
Nan

Enough is Enough

The pundits say make your manuscript the best it can be before you start sending it out. I wouldn’t think of doing anything else. But my dilemma is, how do you know when it’s the best it can be?

At Sleuthfest in April, I had a pitch session with an agent I greatly admire and I was thrilled when she asked to see the full manuscript. In the months before the conference, I had completed two major edits/rewrites on the book, one to include some changes that I thought were necessary and the second, in response to the critique of a writer friend, to tighten and clarify. So I left the pitch session confident that the manuscript was ready to go in the mail as soon as I got home.

But on the plane flying back from Florida the nasty little voice in my head convinced me that I couldn’t send the book out without checking one more time for spelling errors and stray commas. It has to be the best you can make it, the voice said, you’d better ask Sherry, an excellent copyeditor, to read the book again and do another edit at the same time as you.

Sherry did her part quickly and she found surprisingly few problems. I, on the other hand, could not limit myself to copyediting. In fact, I found myself in the midst of another extensive rewrite that included slashing, tightening, rearranging, searching again for the perfect word, and … well, you get the picture. Three weeks later, it was ready to go. But then I asked Sherry how she liked what I had to done to the book since she last read it, several versions ago. “It’s great, much stronger, the writing gets better and better, I like it a lot,” she said. But, I pressed, tell me, did it drag or not hold your attention anywhere? “A little slow before we get to the murder,” she said, “but you can't change those scenes, they’re so well-written and, in and of themselves, interesting and exciting.” I knew what she meant. I loved those scenes too.

But how could I expect an agent to read the entire manuscript if a friendly reader thought it dragged a bit in the beginning? Was it really the best I could make it? I went off to think and gnash my teeth. It wasn’t the first time I had considered these scenes. In fact, each time I did a draft (many, many) I struggled with this section, trying to figure out how to speed it up, but I couldn’t see a way. Then, suddenly, as often happens with writing, it was clear that those wonderful scenes, my darlings, didn’t move the story forward and they needed to go. Not only that, I knew exactly what to keep from those scenes and where to put it. So I got rid of my darlings and rewrote other scenes to include the important points. At the end, I had deleted 5,000 words from my 100,000 word book. I think it is a better book now. Is it the best I can make it? Right now it is. At least I hope so, because I sent it to the agent last week.

Catherine

He's Late, He's Late, for a Very Important Date

I’m starting work on a rush copyediting project today. I don’t mind rush projects. I work best when I have a deadline pressing—I guess because I don’t have time to worry about doing it right or wrong—and the fees are often higher. But that’s just me.

The author was supposed to deliver this manuscript to his publisher several weeks ago. The delivery date was either in his contract or, if this is “option material,” firmly and clearly stated in some other official way. The author just blew it. Luckily, this is his fourth book with this publisher and the first three did well. If this was his first book or the first three didn’t do so well, this might very likely also be his last book with this publisher.

Why? Why are manuscript delivery dates so important? When a project is acquired, among the many things negotiated and agreed upon by the author, agent, and acquisitions editor is the delivery date. Before the contract is even signed and returned to the publisher, the project is “scheduled” based on this date. Whether the publisher is big or small doesn’t matter; all publishers work to their capacity as far as the number of books they publish is concerned. And each of those books has to go through the various steps of the publishing process in a certain order and by a certain date. One book being late can knock all the other books off schedule.

More important, the publishers begin presenting their books to booksellers six months to a year before the book even comes off the printing press, and the booksellers order them two months to a year in advance. Publisher sales reps don’t haul around copies of finished books in their cars, and booksellers don't buy two copies of this and three copies of that, sliding them immediately onto their shelves. Instead, the sales reps verbally describe the books, basing their descriptions on sell sheets and leaving catalogs for the buyers to review and order from when they're ready. The publishers, therefore, need to have their catalogs, sell sheets, and other sales materials prepared a year or more in advance. And this, of course, means that they need to schedule their titles a year or more in advance, with the schedule remaining unchanged after the catalog is finalized.

Booksellers, meanwhile, are also hurt if a book is late. Most have tight budgets, with an allowance for a certain dollar amount of books each month. If a book is released late, many usually cannot fit it into their budget for the rescheduled month. The money allotted for book purchases in that new month has already been committed to other books. Furthermore, the income they expected from the book in the original month is lost. Income is lost all down the line—by the booksellers, publisher, author, and agent.

A late manuscript also isn’t great for the content of the book. The acquisitions editor of this particular book is the best content editor I know, but he didn’t have the opportunity to perform his magic this time. And magic it is, since his editorial recommendations usually not only significantly improve his books but have put several on the New York Times Bestseller List. I won’t have the time to be as careful as I usually am, and I may also not have the time to make a second pass, which is when I read for flow and catch anything I missed on the first pass. The proofreader will be similarly rushed.

Personally, I’m going to have to skip my Sisters in Crime meeting tonight, postpone a doctor’s appointment next week, and put in much longer workdays than usual. I’ll also have to put my own book on the side for now. For the next month, the acquisitions editor will be even more stressed than he normally is, and the production editor will be on pins and needles hoping the proofreader, book designer, compositor, and I all finish on time.

In the end, this book will still be good, because everyone involved will continue to give it the best they can under the circumstances. However, it could have been a better book. It’s a shame.

Critique Buddy Search

Laura’s posting on April 30th got me thinking about critique groups, and how to go about setting yourself up with the right critique group so you can advance your mystery writing career.

I've had some experience with setting up critique groups and keeping them alive. I spent years coaching a writing group at our local library. We primarily focused on critiquing each others’ works in progress. It was fun, and some writers went on to become novelists, but we had a large drop-out rate, too. Sometimes good writers dropped out, and that bothered me. Until I read Laura’s posting and realized the strengths and the flaws inherent in our writer’s group.

What was wrong with our writing group at the library? We were a varied group, writers from all genres. What was right? We were a varied group, writers from all genres. We enhanced each others’ pieces by bringing varied perspectives to the table – varied expectations of writings and varied approaches to crafting a good story. Our shortcomings applied to the genre-specific plot expectations of editors and agents. All good stories have conflict and resolution, valiant warriors winning against all odds, but the plot devices expected by the publishers vary from genre to genre. Sci-fi mysteries face a different set of expectations than romantic mysteries. Our library group was great at helping first drafts head in the right direction, but not so great when it came to searching for the missing elements that would make the manuscript hit the mark dead on.

So, if you are a mystery writer, you need to find mystery groups, right? Kinda. You need to consider your subgenre, if you want the fine details of your story to line up in your favor. What subgenres are there in mysteries? A wicked lot of them! Here’s a few to consider:

• Cozy Mystery – contains cozy elements and no violence on stage
• Hard-Boiled Mystery – noir – tough guys, tough gals and blood
• Romance Mystery
• Private Eye Mystery
• Police Procedural Mystery
• Ethnic/Cultural Based Mystery
• Psychological Suspense Mystery
• Paranormal Mystery
• Historical Mystery
• Chick Lit Mystery
• Medical Mystery
• Erotic Mystery
• Caper/Sting
• Legal Mystery
• Forensic Mystery
• Female in Jeopardy Mystery
• Hen Lit Mystery, to name a few!

Often you can find subgenres that mesh together rather well – just don’t expect a slasher novelist to be a good critic for your cozy mystery. That’s why you might want to search the internet for writing groups which address a broad spectrum of mystery – groups like the Sisters In Crime and Mystery Writers of America - where various “Chapter” groups exist based upon either geographical location or subgenre interests. Once that’s done, you’ll be interacting with similarly oriented writers, and potential critique buddies will appear on the horizon.

That’s when you realize that there are nuances to be considered between a stand-alone book and one in a series. Ah, the fine tuning that comes with finding someone strong where you’re weak, and someone who is weak where you are strong. That’s another factor, too!

Finding the right critiquing buddies is a challenge right up there with finding the right agent and the right editor. But, once that’s done, you’re golden!

Do You Really Need a Freelance Editor?

Are you off to a conference this weekend? Next weekend? They’re coming boom-boom-boom now. Big ones, small ones, all over the country. Are you going for pleasure—to schmooze, attend panels, get autographs? Or are you a writer on a mission, synopsis perfected, elevator pitch memorized? But what if an agent or editor actually likes your pitch? Is your manuscript truly ready? If someone asks you for the first three chapters, should you quickly hire a freelance editor to give them a final once-over?

Um, no. Did I say that? I’m a professional freelance editor, after all. Yes, I did say that. A professional freelance edit of a book-length fiction manuscript can cost a thousand dollars or more. Usually much more. While most freelance editors no longer charge by the hour, instead preferring to charge by the word or the page or the project, they continue to prepare their estimates based on what they’d like to earn per hour, and that’s usually in the $35-to-$50 range. At this point, that would be wasted money.

Freelance editors do several different types of editing. Copyediting is the most basic—correcting spelling, grammar, punctuation, syntax, and word usage. Line editing goes a little further and includes clarifying meaning; rewording jargon and awkward phrasing; eliminating wordiness; changing passive voice to active voice; flagging inappropriate, ambiguous, or incorrect statements; ensuring parallel structure; rearranging sentences within paragraphs; correcting inconsistencies in writing style and tone; and flagging discrepancies in plot, setting, and character traits. Substantive editing, also called heavy editing, focuses on the structure of the story.

Agents and acquiring editors don’t reject manuscripts because they have a dangling modifier here and there. What they look for is a first sentence that grabs, a first paragraph that mesmerizes, a first page that forces them to turn to the second. If the mechanical aspects of the writing are so awful that they hamper reading, that’s one thing; by all means, get yourself some recommendations and estimates. But if what you want is just a second and maybe third pair of eyes to review your first five pages, your character development, your pacing, your dialogue, and so on, find a critique group or writing workshop. There are also a number of writers and English teachers who edit fiction manuscripts as a sideline and for much lower fees than professional editors.

As Laura mentioned in her April 24 post, “What is selling is not only house-dependent, but even editor-dependent within a house.” Every editor, as well as every agent, has his or her specific preferences. Don’t spend several months revising your manuscript to add a murder to page 100 because you paid a small fortune to a freelance editor who told you that you have to do that. Not all editors and agents insist on a murder on page 100. Your dream editor might not even like it! If an editor likes your basic story and buys your manuscript, he or she will guide you in reworking whatever needs to be reworked to satisfy him or her and the specific publishing house. Getting even a basic copyedit might be a waste, since the overwhelming majority of trade publishers send all manuscripts out for that—and pay for it--as part of their SOP.

If you really have a few extra thousand dollars taking up precious space in your bank account, take a marketing class for writers. Obtain a domain name and hire a web designer. Or, go to Nordstrom and buy a designer suit to wear to all the awards ceremonies you’ll be attending as a winner at next year’s conferences.