Amelia Beamer – Editor

“Amelia is a brilliant editor. She can pinpoint the strengths and weaknesses of a story as well as any editor I’ve dealt with, and suggest smoothly compatible improvements.”

– Tim Powers, World Fantasy Award winning author of Declare and Last Call

I'm a developmental editor of 100+ fantasy, horror, and other novels, working mostly with first-time authors. Books I've edited have gone on to be published by Big Four publishers and other traditional and hybrid publishers, as well as earning glorious reader feedback after being self published. I've earned my stripes working as an editor and book packager for Shueisha English Edition, a major publisher in Japan, and Locus, the trade magazine for the science fiction, fantasy, and horror publishing industry. I welcome writers whose first language is something other than English, as I understand how to address the cross-cultural and linguistic translation issues these books often have.

Here's the kind of stuff we'll tackle, with example problems we can fix:

● Character and plot development (example issue: characters mired in conflicts that bog down the plot)

● Worldbuilding (example issue: explaining unnecessary information)

● Competitive pacing (example issue: the character got up in the morning and spent hours waiting for the story to start)

● Clear, compelling writing (example issue: sentence constructions that used to be common but now feel dated)

I also am (weirdly?) grateful to have felt the sting of lots of red pens, as an author of a critically acclaimed novel and a number of professionally published short stories. I take a long view of writing careers (you'll be a new writer for at least ten years), and I expect you can and will be writing at a professional level.

“Amelia’s comments addressed all the worries I had about the story she beta-read for me—and she brought up several new and useful points for me to consider. After her input I feel well and truly un-stuck with this story.”

– Margo Lanagan, World Fantasy Award winning and Michael L. Printz Honor author of Black Juice and Tender Morsels

“Amelia did an incredible job. Her developmental edit was detailed and offered very insightful comments. Thanks to her developmental edit, I managed to fix major issues in the novel including plot holes, continuity issues, character motivations, pacing, etc."

– Hashem Al-Ghaili, author, Simulation: The Great Escape