Alaya Johnson – Editor

Who I am:

I am an award-winning speculative fiction writer and teacher with over 15 years of publishing experience with major New York houses. I have years of experience working with beginning and mid-level writers as a professor in an MFA program as well as an instructor for professional workshops and writer's organizations including Tin House, Mendocino Coast Writers Workshop, Aspen Words, and Clarion.

Who you are:

A writer of speculative fiction who has worked hard to master the basics. You have read extensively in the genre, you have solicited feedback from others, and you have revised your novel beyond the first draft. You get positive comments in your rejections from agents and editors, but a 'yes' still feels elusive. If you want to figure out how to get your writing from "decent" to "publishable," and are willing to put in the work, then I would be delighted to work with you.

Editorial philosophy:

I am a puzzle-solver who loves to figure out *how* and *why* stories work the way they do. I want to work with writers to clarify their creative vision in order to help untangle the thorny problems preventing it from being fully realized on the page.

My services:

I am primarily open to writing coaching-mentoring arrangements (especially with younger or less experienced writers). In this arrangement, I will critique up to 15k words of prose with an eye to your broad strengths as a writer and the areas that you need to focus on. After I send you my comments (a global letter as well as some targeted in-line editing), we'll have an hour video conference. When you have 15k of *new or revised* material, we can begin the process again.

For more advanced clients, I can offer developmental editing of a single project, either a novel or collection of short stories.

My developmental edits include in-line comments, including sentence shaping (as-needed in order to give you an idea of the prose-level issues that you can then address globally), an in-depth editorial letter analyzing the both the strengths and weaknesses of the plot, characters, and general flow of the manuscript, and an hour long conversation where we can go over any remaining questions before you tackle your revision.

I'm here to answer any questions you might have, so please don't hesitate to get in touch. I look forward to hearing from you!

Testimonials from clients:

Abby P.

"I have been stuck in an editorial roadblock for months but I just got Alaya’s editorial thoughts back and they were detailed and brilliant and inspiring. I actually feel like diving back into my draft instead of hiding from it. Hire her!!"

Amanda H.

"Alaya's editorial notes helped me identify key points in my novel draft for revision that have shifted it from a first draft to a more honed draft that I can query with. Her feedback was indispensable."