I just handed in the final round of edits on Capitol, and, as always, I am delighted–and so lucky–to be working with an outstanding editor. I actually have a physical reaction–an escalation in pulse rate and general excitement–when I read through the pages she’s edited because she’s just so dang good at what she does.
I’m fairly easy on an editor when it comes to the line editing side of things–my copy is pretty clean, and I’m good about taking care of all the non-fiction-mechanics like endnotes–so her edits are more like a conversation about the manuscript via comments in the margins. She’ll ask questions, urge me to make something clearer, or even just write Ha ha this is great!, which is exactly the kind of thing writers like to hear. If there’s an MST3K version of editing, she’s got the Joel seat smack in the middle.
Who is she? Her name is Jill Schwartzman, and she’s the VP and Executive Editor at Dutton Books, as well as the Editorial Director at Plume. She’s edited lots of stuff you’ve probably read–including books by Nick Offerman, Drew Barrymore, and Jeff Tweedy–and now I’m lucky that one of those books gets to be mine.
While this is the first project we’ve worked on together, we’ve actually known each other for more than a decade. Back in 2010 or so, when my agent was out pitching the proposal for Jim Henson, there were a number of publishers interested in acquiring it–which meant I got to have phone conversations with several editors to decide which publishing house and which editor I thought might be the best fit for me and for the project. One of those editors I spoke with was Jill, who was then at Ballantine Books inside Random House–and the moment we started talking, I knew Ballantine was where I wanted to be. Jill was smart and funny and interesting and pop culture savvy. We talked for a long time, and I immediately called my agent back.
“That’s the one,” I told him.
A deal was made, paperwork was signed, and the book was officially nestled in its home at Ballantine.
Alas, just as I was starting my hardcore research for Jim Henson, another really smart publisher wisely hired Jill away, fully appreciating just how brilliant and funny she was–and immediately put her in the cleanup position in their editorial batting lineup. Jill and I promised to stay in touch–which we did and we have, even as we both changed publishing houses over the last decade–and vowed that we’d try to find an opportunity to work together in the future. (Oh, and the editing duties on Jim Henson went to another editor at Ballantine who I also enjoyed working with so . . . everything came out okay.)
Flash forward nearly 15 years to 2024. After Jim Henson, I’d written two more books, one at Little, Brown, and one with Dutton–but both with the same editor, an incredibly talented fellow named John Parsley, who’s now Dutton’s editor-in-chief. But apart from being a brilliant editor, John is one of the nicest guys you’ll ever meet–and if there’s anyone who truly deserves to have bestowed on them one of Jim Henson’s favorite compliments–lovely–it’s John. Just a lovely guy. But also a really smart and busy one.
At one point, then, I got a call from my agent who said, “John needs to talk. He’s gonna call you.”
Now, 99 percent of the time, an editor and author deal with each other directly–there’s usually no reason to bring in your agent as a third party. No reason, that is, unless there’s something major going on, in which case they’ll usually call your agent first. In my head, then, I played out all the worst case scenarios, from Oh my god John is leaving to Oh my god they don’t like me any more and I’m going to die alone and unloved. You know–very rational stuff. But my agent could probably hear the catch in my voice as I stammered out, “What–?” because he immediately laughed and said, “No no no, it’s nothing to worry about. In fact, I think you’re gonna be really happy.”
John called me moments later to have a chat–I always love just chit-chatting with him, especially as I know he’s super busy, so I appreciate the time he spends to just flap, as they say–and after a few minutes he got to the point of the call: he’d been promoted to a new role that was going to demand a lot of his time and attention across several imprints, which was gonna make his day-to-day work as an editor tougher. “Now, I’m still your editor, dammit,” he said, laughing–but he added that he also wanted to make sure he put me and my book in the hands of another great editor who could oversee the day-to-day work of editing and steering the book through publication. And he told me he thought I’d be very happy with the editor he’d had a conversation with–a vice president and executive editor, who had agreed to add me and my project to her current roster of writers and projects.
Come on, I already gave away who it is: it’s Jill Schwartzman, who I’d wanted to work with all those years ago–and now, through a circuitous serendipity that put us back under the same editorial roof at the same time, we’ve managed to come full circle, albeit with a different project. To say I’m delighted would be an understatement; working with her has been just as fun and meaningful and educational as I thought it would be. Better, even. Plus, she’ll let me chat-chat on the phone, even when I know she’s super busy.
We’ve had some really good conversations about the book, and while I’m not sure if the last round of edits made the book any shorter (if you’ve read my stuff, you know my books tend to be on the longish side), I know they definitely made the book better. We’re now moving on to discussing photos while we put the manuscript in the hands of a copyeditor.
Oh, and did I tell you we’ve got a publication date? And a cover?
More tomorrow.
