In the summer of 2022, I began my first internship at DAS Author Services serving as an editorial assistant to Amanda Edgar, our lead ghostwriter and CEO. Before I began my work here, I didn’t know much about ghostwriting. I vaguely understood what ghostwriters did, but I didn’t know the inner workings of the process or the care that goes into it. This internship has taught me about that and so much more. My experience has enhanced my skills as an editor and my understanding of the industry. I’ve grown more as a writer in these past months than I ever anticipated.
Writing
The best way to develop writing skills is to read—read extensively and with the mind of a writer. Working with DAS, I’ve had to read works that I likely never would have picked up on my own and with a keen eye for details only writers notice. It’s important, as a writer, not to limit the scope of your reading. I’ve done this in the past, but my job here has opened my eyes to working outside of my comfort zone. Our minds are wired to recognize patterns, and we mimic those patterns. To limit your reading is to limit your writing. To find yourself in your writing—your unique style—you have to see what’s out there. Experiment. Combine aspects of everything you’ve read into an intricate pattern unique to you. That’s how you unlock your potential.
Editing
Each week, I am tasked with the first round of edits for a new chapter. By doing this, I’ve learned more about the kind of editing I enjoy. I correct grammatical errors and revise sentence structure, but my real passion lies in developmental editing. This has more to do with the big-picture view of what a book will look like. I am a dealer in ideas. I love to give my thoughts on a particular story and try to reframe how readers will see it—to shape a story in such a way that the audience will see the author’s vision. I’ve discovered a talent for understanding authors and what their vision looks like, which is vital to work as an editor.
Publishing Industry
There are things in life that we know exist, but don’t understand on a fundamental level. For instance, I know that clocks have internal mechanisms that make the hands turn at every second, but I don’t know how. When I started my internship, the publishing industry might as well have been made up of the tiny, invisible cogs in a beautiful timepiece. I knew that in order to get a book published, one must have to send their work to a publisher. It turns out there are more steps to that process. For one, there are multiple options to get published. The most common way I’ve seen is to seek out a literary agent who will help find a publisher willing to turn a manuscript into a book.
“My experience has enhanced my skills as an editor and my understanding of the industry.”
I’ve edited many book proposals and created several query guides and dossiers that outline how to submit to particular agents for consideration. Naturally, I got to see a lot of different agencies and agents, and I learned what an author needs to query someone. It varies from agency to agency, but almost always requires a query letter detailing the idea for the book and why the author wants to work with that particular agent. They ask for genre, target audience, comparable books, and author information. Most agents require some amount of the manuscript for review, and the amount varies for different genres.
As in any industry, the publishing industry has jargon that those outside of this area wouldn’t understand. I still don’t know all of the terms and acronyms associated with this industry, but I have learned quite a few! The most memorable are the BISACs, or Book Industry Standards and Communications, which are codes for specific genres of writing that all publishers use to sell books. Every book fits into at least one of these categories, so they are vital to learn. The book market is reliant on these to connect authors with their target audience. Readers have specific interests—ones that may align perfectly with your book—but they’ll never know about it without this marketing technique.
More to Learn
This is just a glimpse of what I’ve learned from this internship. I know there will always be more to learn, but I feel far more confident in my knowledge of writing, editing, and publishing than I did before. It’s been exciting to get to learn as I go, trying new things as clients cycle in and out. I’ve had the privilege to try out new things without fear, and that has been the most monumental aspect of this experience for me.
