January: Ask Your Editor

Your monthly insight into your editor's mind

Photo by Dushawn Jovic on Unsplash

Ask Your Editor is a monthly space where I respond to reader questions about writing, revision, and the creative process. Each month, I select a handful of questions and walk through them, explaining how I’d approach the issue as an editor and reader, based on over 15 years of experience working with manuscripts at different stages.

Behind the Scenes: I purposefully record these in one take with no editing because I want you to hear how I think about the questions and concepts in real-time with no script.

For January, I’m making these audio responses available to all subscribers so you can hear how this works and whether it’s useful for you.

Going forward, Ask Your Editor will be a paid-subscriber feature.

Let’s get to it!

Q: When it comes to world-building, how do you determine how much of that world’s history is important for a story? I personally enjoy fictional worlds that I learn about piecemeal along the way rather than read a synopsis of to set the stage, but I know that some readers can lose the plot without knowing the world context up front.

A:

Q: When you receive beta reader drafts from your other clients, is it usually a rough draft? I think one of the things I struggled with in the past was getting hung up on making everything perfect, but I want to know if it’s completely normal to send you a rough draft.

A:

Q: How do I know if my story idea is strong enough to commit to a whole book? I can’t see the entire vision right now, but it feels like something is there. I just don’t want to waste time.

A:

That’s a wrap for this month! I hope this was insightful and fun. If you have a question to submit for February’s Ask Your Editor, leave a comment or send me a message.

Want to unlock access to future recordings? Upgrade to a paid subscription.

Happy writing!

In ink,

Allison

allisonink.com