4 EDITOR SHOUT-OUTS

While editors may wear many extra hats nowadays than in publishing days of yore, it’s a myth that editors don’t edit. If you need proof, here are a few editor shout-outs from our author spotlight series on WritersDigest.com:

• “Settling into writing was not something I could do at the beginning of COVID. I had to push back writing deadlines, which felt unprofessional and embarrassing. But Lake Union and my editor Jodi Warshaw were so generous and compassionate. I’m deeply grateful.” —Laila Ibrahim, author of Scarlet Carnation

• “This is the third book that my editor James Melia and I have worked on together, and I never fail to be surprised by how his edits make me a better writer. It sounds a little cheesy, but it’s the absolute truth—James has an almost otherworldly talent for hearing the stories his writers want to tell before they hear them.” —Grant Ginder, author of Let’s Not Do That Again

• “The final third of the book did change a lot during the editing process with Rachel Kahan at William Morrow. Rachel did what a great editor is supposed to do: turn my point of view around so I could see the growth through Joan’s eyes, not my own. That perspective really made the book better.” —Lian Dolan, author of Lost and Found in Paris

• “My incredible editor, Carina, having bought the book for [Simon & Schuster], gave me the best piece of advice I’ve ever received. She told me that the draft she read (about three drafts away from the final!) felt like I wanted to write a book about religion and faith, but that I was holding myself back. In a sense, she gave me permission to bring out the themes already implicit in the novel—to make them explicit and develop them—and the book was so much better for it.” —Tara Isabella Burton, author of The World Cannot Give