Editor to Author: A Guest Post from Jessica George, Author of Maame, Our February Discover Pick
Hardcover $27.99
Maame (A Today Show Read with Jenna Book Club Pick)
Maame (A Today Show Read with Jenna Book Club Pick)
In Stock Online
Hardcover $27.99
Like most 20-somethings, Maddie wants to find her place in the world. Between serving as her ailing father’s primary caregiver and living on the whims of her difficult mother and nightmare boss, she’s ready to make some changes. Smart and touching, this brilliant debut explores what it means to live with an open heart. With wonderful narration by Heather Agyepong, this book also makes an excellent listen as an audiobook. Keep reading to find out what it was like for Jessica George to go from the editorial side of publishing to the author side with Maame.
Like most 20-somethings, Maddie wants to find her place in the world. Between serving as her ailing father’s primary caregiver and living on the whims of her difficult mother and nightmare boss, she’s ready to make some changes. Smart and touching, this brilliant debut explores what it means to live with an open heart. With wonderful narration by Heather Agyepong, this book also makes an excellent listen as an audiobook. Keep reading to find out what it was like for Jessica George to go from the editorial side of publishing to the author side with Maame.
My debut novel, Maame, tells the story of Maddie, a young British Ghanaian woman, grappling with unconventional family dynamics, Ghanian culture, first love and first real grief, new physical relationships and the deepening of old platonic ones. It’s a late coming-of-age centred around the caring and then eventual loss of her father whilst she learns to navigate her life predominately via her opinionated subconscious and Google.
Like Maddie, I used to work at a publishing house as an editorial assistant before becoming an assistant editor, and I’ve since been asked many times what it’s like to be on the other side of the editorial process. Maybe it’s a bit uninspiring to say that, for me, when it comes down to the actual writing, being on the other side hasn’t had much of an effect. I used to work for a Children’s Fiction department and writing for children is very different than writing for adults, and I’ve always been in awe of authors capable of doing both. What working in the industry truly helped with was the receiving of editorial feedback.
During my few years in publishing, I worked on books that I absolutely loved and thought were great –– whilst simultaneously thinking they needed a lot of work. I would return manuscripts with numerous suggestions and comments whilst still thinking it was one of the best things I’d read that year. I still think about one particular book series that would make me laugh out loud and wish the characters were real; books I would buy and recommend to anyone, but when the first draft came in, I had feedback. Being in the position of saying to an author, “I truly love this, but I have some thoughts…” has given me an appreciation for editorial comments. It’s not easy to see your work covered in metaphorical red ink with comments like “how about this?” and “I don’t think this is working here” and not have your first thought be, “Oh, it turns out my editor actually hates this and maybe I’m not as good as I think,” but I’ve seen how far from the truth that is! Having been the one to love a book and still have “extensive” feedback has been an invaluable lesson in accepting editorial comments and seeing the truth behind them, which in turn makes the process much more enjoyable. At the end of the day, the end goal is to get the best and most out of what you’ve written.