Overview

I'm an experienced managing editor with a decade of history in both fiction and nonfiction works. I hold an MFA in Creative Writing and run my own editing and writing business. More importantly, I long ago learned the distinction between editing by the book and editing for the book. It's good to follow the rules—it's better to know them well enough to understand when it's OK to break them.

My heart is in fiction. I'm an excellent proofreader and a proven copyeditor, but my true desire is to work in deep collaboration with writers early in the process. I experience great joy when I can help writers understand their characters, narrative, tone, style, audience, etc. in ways they may not be able to on their own. And then I do everything in my power to show them how to bring out the best of all those elements that they control.

Over the years, I've cultivated a set of editorial ethics that govern everything I do. Chief among those is a commandment always to be in the service of the work, the author, and the audience, and to put aside personal opinions and preferences unless they are in the best interest of those three masters. I don't edit for me.

Services

Fiction

Non-Fiction

Managed all aspects of publication for manuscripts from acquisition through all editorial and
design stages for 9 to 12 books per year. Managed regional literary journal. Designed and oversaw
book covers and interior layouts. Created content for all marketing efforts, book jackets, and
website. Presented and contributed to panels at conferences and events.

Since 2006, have consulted, edited, copyedited, written, and proofread a variety of materials, including novels, legal texts, nonfiction books, research essays, marketing copy, and creative works for individuals
and organizations. Taught classes at conferences, writing groups, state facilities, and other venues.
Served in managing editorial roles for several literary journals.

All You Can Eat

Richard Harlan Miller

Darius is at peace. He drinks expensive wine, reads, and wanders the Spokane skywalk system connected to his condo. He meets Seattle women through a dating website, and when he really needs to, kills them. Life is fine. Until the arrival of Luke, an old friend who can't stay out of trouble. He brings an invitation to a counterculture festival in Montana, where old, powerful Dimitri and his twi... read more

Darius is at peace. He drinks expensive wine, reads, and wanders the Spokane skywalk system connected to his condo. He meets Seattle women through a dating website, and when he really needs to, kills them. Life is fine. Until the arrival of Luke, an old friend who can't stay out of trouble. He brings an invitation to a counterculture festival in Montana, where old, powerful Dimitri and his twi... read more

And Every Man Has to Die: Book Four in the River City Crime Series

Frank Zafiro

Every city has organized crime. But only River City has a Russian gangster like Valeriy. He's meticulous, cunning, and willing to sacrifice anything--and anyone--to see his conquest through. In Val's way are the men and women of the River City Police Department, including rookie B.J. Carson. She's trying to fill the shoes of a legend while the pressures of patrol and her own past catch up to h... read more

Every city has organized crime. But only River City has a Russian gangster like Valeriy. He's meticulous, cunning, and willing to sacrifice anything--and anyone--to see his conquest through. In Val's way are the men and women of the River City Police Department, including rookie B.J. Carson. She's trying to fill the shoes of a legend while the pressures of patrol and her own past catch up to h... read more

Dead Even (River City Short Stories Book 1)

Frank Zafiro

Detectives and mobsters, missing mummies and a shootout with Gypsies – here are fifteen stories featuring major and minor characters from the novels of Frank Zafiro, now given their own chance to shine. The good, the bad, and the in-between of River City come together in this fast-paced collection of theft, mystery, murder and detection, where the heroes of River City will keep fighting until ... read more

Detectives and mobsters, missing mummies and a shootout with Gypsies – here are fifteen stories featuring major and minor characters from the novels of Frank Zafiro, now given their own chance to shine. The good, the bad, and the in-between of River City come together in this fast-paced collection of theft, mystery, murder and detection, where the heroes of River City will keep fighting until ... read more

The Hat Pin Murders

Joyce Caudel

The world’s largest social organization for women, the Red Hat Society, has over 50,000 registered members; and in Joyce Caudel’s new novel, The Hat Pin Murders, one of them ends up dead. So begins a novel that is part mystery, part thriller, and part celebration of the Society. When a Hattie is stabbed at a gathering, it is up to her close friends to uncover the truth and discover what the po... read more

The world’s largest social organization for women, the Red Hat Society, has over 50,000 registered members; and in Joyce Caudel’s new novel, The Hat Pin Murders, one of them ends up dead. So begins a novel that is part mystery, part thriller, and part celebration of the Society. When a Hattie is stabbed at a gathering, it is up to her close friends to uncover the truth and discover what the po... read more

The Young Woman's Breast Health Book: Breast changes that are not cancer, for women in their 20s, 30s, & 40s

Kerry Anne McGinn

Every young woman is inundated with messages about her breasts: they’re the wrong size or the wrong shape, too much this or not enough that. Most frightening of all: they’re going to give her cancer. But most changes in the breast are not cancerous. Many are perfectly normal and easily managed with a little knowledge and a good healthcare provider. Kerry Anne McGinn helps women sift through th... read more

Every young woman is inundated with messages about her breasts: they’re the wrong size or the wrong shape, too much this or not enough that. Most frightening of all: they’re going to give her cancer. But most changes in the breast are not cancerous. Many are perfectly normal and easily managed with a little knowledge and a good healthcare provider. Kerry Anne McGinn helps women sift through th... read more

The Rancher

Dawn Nelson

When Laura Dawson’s husband left her for a wealthier woman, she took full custody of their two children and swore off love for good. She’s a tough and resourceful rancher who could go it alone, but the money her ex offered to stay out of his new life was too much to turn down. She’s putting that payoff to use on a new stallion from South Dakota, where self-proclaimed bachelor Kyle Wilson owns ... read more

When Laura Dawson’s husband left her for a wealthier woman, she took full custody of their two children and swore off love for good. She’s a tough and resourceful rancher who could go it alone, but the money her ex offered to stay out of his new life was too much to turn down. She’s putting that payoff to use on a new stallion from South Dakota, where self-proclaimed bachelor Kyle Wilson owns ... read more

Closing Circles:Trapped in the Everlasting Mormon Moment

Ronald B. Scott

Closing Circles is a rollicking, brutally candid novel of a young Mormon journalist's attempt to liberate himself from a failed marriage and the confounding influences of his religious culture and family. New York journalist Jedediah Pratt Russell is the victim of an inexplicable divorce. A loving father, a dutiful bread-winner, a sensitive lover--he'd given Sarah everything. Except himself. W... read more

Closing Circles is a rollicking, brutally candid novel of a young Mormon journalist's attempt to liberate himself from a failed marriage and the confounding influences of his religious culture and family. New York journalist Jedediah Pratt Russell is the victim of an inexplicable divorce. A loving father, a dutiful bread-winner, a sensitive lover--he'd given Sarah everything. Except himself. W... read more

No Time for Dancing (Acme Poem Company Chapbook)

Adam Hammer

Poetry. "Adam Hammer was an American original: a sweet, disturbing, happy, driven, comic surreal and tragic baseball fan whose poems graze madly among a Rube Goldbergish circus of our tonalities, foibles, commodities, and dreams. He was also brilliant beyond belief, to which this little book of gems, excerpted from the unfinished manuscript he left behind, will give ample testament. Reading it... read more

Poetry. "Adam Hammer was an American original: a sweet, disturbing, happy, driven, comic surreal and tragic baseball fan whose poems graze madly among a Rube Goldbergish circus of our tonalities, foibles, commodities, and dreams. He was also brilliant beyond belief, to which this little book of gems, excerpted from the unfinished manuscript he left behind, will give ample testament. Reading it... read more

You Are Not Alone & Other Stories

Sherril Jaffe

Fiction. A homeless woman takes up residence in a man's closet; a detective solves cases by feeling the emotions of the perpetrators; a woman happens upon a swingers' club in the back of a tire shop; a couple struggling with their pets' protracted endgame puts out a hit on them; and a man's mother, newly dead and buried, calls him to ask if she can visit. Each of these fifteen tales set in San... read more

Fiction. A homeless woman takes up residence in a man's closet; a detective solves cases by feeling the emotions of the perpetrators; a woman happens upon a swingers' club in the back of a tire shop; a couple struggling with their pets' protracted endgame puts out a hit on them; and a man's mother, newly dead and buried, calls him to ask if she can visit. Each of these fifteen tales set in San... read more

Strange Weather

Becky Hagenston

Becky Hagenston's second collection of short stories, is the 2009 winner of the Spokane Prize for Short Fiction that Antonya Nelson, author of Nothing Right and Some Fun, calls "curious, clever, quick, hilarious, and heartbreaking"; Brock Clark, author of An Arsonist's Guide to Writers' Homes in New England, says, "Just when you think you've got these characters and their messed-up lives pegge... read more

Becky Hagenston's second collection of short stories, is the 2009 winner of the Spokane Prize for Short Fiction that Antonya Nelson, author of Nothing Right and Some Fun, calls "curious, clever, quick, hilarious, and heartbreaking"; Brock Clark, author of An Arsonist's Guide to Writers' Homes in New England, says, "Just when you think you've got these characters and their messed-up lives pegge... read more

Burning Paradise

Terry Hughes

"Five Murdered." That's the latest headline in beautiful Santa Marta, California, where an arsonist called Smoke has the oceanside city by the throat. Smoke is both smart and vicious, and the pyro's fires have already burned thousands of acres and hundreds of homes. Santa Marta's fire department can't stop Smoke, and the city council, led by the licentious Mayor Innis, is hiring outside help i... read more

"Five Murdered." That's the latest headline in beautiful Santa Marta, California, where an arsonist called Smoke has the oceanside city by the throat. Smoke is both smart and vicious, and the pyro's fires have already burned thousands of acres and hundreds of homes. Santa Marta's fire department can't stop Smoke, and the city council, led by the licentious Mayor Innis, is hiring outside help i... read more