Buying an editor or agent

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I was perusing this auction put on by Brenda Novak which benefits research for Diabetes. It's the fourth annual, and they have some interesting items being offered for sale. Of course, my first stop was in the "For Writers" section.

As I scanned the listings I couldn't help but smile. Check out the editor section here. Folks are paying big bucks for these things, and I think I can see why! Editors are offering to look at proposals and even complete manuscripts and get back within 24 hours in some cases. What do you think? Is that worth a couple hundred bucks? How much would you pay to have an editor or agent guarantee they'd respond to you within a week?

Sometimes editors and agents get a bad rap. We don't realize just how busy and under appreciated their jobs are. Check out this photo of agent Rachelle Gardner's mail:

How would you like to go through all that and know that almost every one was expecting you to get back to them the second you received their submission? Puts things in perspective, huh? :)

An editor's life ...

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Ever wondered what it's like being an editor? This interview clip with the editor of Bleak House Books will give you a little glimpse. Watch the whole thing because at the end you'll see the editor going through her submission stacks. I've always wondered what those looked like:

Straight Talk From the Editor

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For those of you writers out there, may I recommend a great little Amazon Short by W. Terry Whalin? Terry is a successful author and editor, and you can learn a ton from his insights.

For more information on writing, check out Terry's instructional blog The Writing Life.