(Edited to add: This is a guest post written by Shannon Stacey)

You’ve seen the view from the Executive Editor of Samhain’s side of the desk here, but I thought today I’d give you a glimpse of the view from the other side. What’s it like, as an author, to go through the editing process? I’ve done it eight times, so I’ll give you a quick overview and then I’ll offer up a few specifics that might help if you’re thinking of submitting to Samhain.

(Obligatory caveat: Angie has been my editor throughout all my contracts with Samhain. Other editors may do things differently, plus the working relationship between an editor and each of her authors varies. Therefore your mileage will, as well.)

FOREVER AGAIN was published in January of 2006 (it was one of Samhain’s four launch titles), which means we probably started the editing process in the fall of 2005, therefore Angie has been my editor for almost four years. I’m not really sure how she feels about that…

Anyway. I’m a fairly clean writer, so our process is generally two rounds of edits and a round of final line edits.

Round One: Oh my achin’ ass. These hurt. The comments in the documents (edits are done electronically through track changes) are scary enough, but it’s the general impression in the body of the email that really makes you cry. This is where you hear your hero’s a flaming asshole or your secondary guy (and future hero) is a little creepy. Maybe you didn’t develop the romantic arc clearly enough on the page so the HEA isn’t believable. Or the dreaded I just don’t love it. In the document there are cheerful little speech bubbles pointing out plot holes and awkward sentences and timeline issues and pet words and…just about everything a writer can possibly do wrong in a book.

Round Two: With the heavy lifting out of the way, this usually seems a little easier, but the magnifying glass is out for the fine tuning and a thousand little errors need to be fixed. Okay, not a thousand. (Well, again, your mileage may vary.) If there was a large issue that required substantial rewriting, those sections will be edited and there’s the question of whether it effected other parts of the story.

In both rounds, commas are fought for and typos are fixed. Issues are hashed out. For two books in a row, Angie and I went ’round and ’round about the capitalization of Navy. I lost in both cases. I’ve learned through almost Pavlovian conditioning to trust Angie’s judgement. When I disregard her suggestion, the reviews criticize that element. When I implement a change she suggested, the reviews love that element. Seriously.

Once the book’s edited within an inch of its life, it goes to…Final Line Edits: This is a crucial step in the book’s process and, though I stet a lot of issues dealing with voice and such, I’m always blown away by the number of things the final line editors catch. Usually syntax/grammar/spelling/typos and such, but they’ll also speak up if they think a comment needs to be made. The FLE for NO SURRENDER questioned the clarity of an event from 72 HOURS that’s mentioned, as well as commenting on the timeline of the ending.

Just for fun, here are my five favorite editorial comments from Angie:

5. Is this a word?
4. Something about this sentence just isn’t right.
3. Hello run-on sentence!
2. I don’t think this is a word.
1. This sentence is just kind of…ugly.

If you’re thinking about submitting to Angie, there are a few things you can do to help ensure your manuscript doesn’t make her do something rash. Like running off to Las Vegas, where she’ll stand around on the street sucking down suspiciously disguised beverages, for example.

10 Things You Might Want to Doublecheck in Your Manuscript Before Subbing to Angela James:

1. Make sure none of your adverb adjective combos or whatever they’re called are hyphenated. (“Softly-mounded” for example.) I keep putting them in, she keeps taking them out.

2. Be certain, especially in love scenes, that none of your characters’ body parts are autonomous. Hands and eyes that go a’roaming remind her of Thing from The Addam’s Family. Funny, but not so much with the sexy.

3. Check, doublecheck and triplecheck your timelines. She bags me every single time I convince myself nobody will catch a timeline glitch. They’re one of her “things”.

4. If you’re one of those writers who fires off a draft, figuring you’ll polish it up if she accepts it because that’s what editors are for, you might want to submit to a different editor. At a different publisher.

5. Watch for a lot of thens and and thens. I’m especially guilty of this synopsis-like construction during love scenes and fight scenes—scenes that I’m heavily choreographing in my head and trying to translate onto the page. (Yes, the following comment exchange is for two paragraphs in a love scene and there were more on the page. Ouch.)

6. Pronoun confusion. Make sure every one of your pronouns clearly belongs to the character/item/whatever it’s supposed to. Angie’s very hung up on pronoun clarity. Also— Reflexive pronouns. Umm…I’m still not sure what that even means. Certain usages of himself or herself, for example, will earn an editorial handslap. Since I don’t quite get this rule, I just write and then change it when she points it out. Better for you, though, if you do it right.

7. The dreaded ECHO. I’m not sure how an author can really check for this other than reading very, very thoroughly, but using the same word too often too close together is a common author quirk and a common editorial comment. If you can get rid of this, you’re that much cleaner. She has some kind of magic Repetition Radar.

8. Make sure modifying phrases are modifying the correct subject. This is HUGE with Angie. Another of her “things”.

9. Don’t give a lot of characters names beginning with the same letter. She’ll notice. And right now you might want to avoid naming all of your characters “C” names because…well, just because. (A little inside tidbit from NO SURRENDER: The young woman the DG has to rescue will always be named Claire in my heart. In the book it’s…something else. Isabel? Isabella? Something that doesn’t start with a C.)

10. The standard warning to avoid starting multiple paragraphs with the same word, whether it be a name, the or and. And watch the junk words—just, so, that. She hit FOREVER AGAIN so hard on my “that” usage, I still shudder to remember the edits. I think it took several books for her to break me of that habit. Do a find on “that” and challenge every single one.

As a matter of fact, she was rather traumatized the first time she had to ADD “that” to one of my books. I, of course, gloated.

Okay, if you made it all the way through that overly-long post, comment to enter to win a DIGITAL book from my backlist! Ask a question if you’ve got one or make a comment or just say hi and at 9:00 am est Friday Sunday I’ll randomly draw a winner!

Since I’m no longer with Samhain, I’ve deleted this call. If you want to submit an angel or demon story to me, I’d love to see them, any length, any heat level. It broke my heart to leave this anthology behind. You can send them to me at Quartet Press: submissions@quartetpress.com

Sometimes I put out an anthology call and I’m going to be doing one of those very soon, but in asking for ideas for my next anthology, I realized I would have liked to have gotten some holiday novellas. Historically, I have saved my December release spots for novellas, often erotic romance novellas and generally holiday-themed novellas. In the past, authors from within my “stable” of authors have provided these novellas but only one has indicated any interest this year so I’m putting out an informal call for submissions.

If you have a holiday-themed novella you’ve been working on, something that’s completed (or soon to be completed) I’d love to see it. Visit our submissions page for all submission information, including the email address to send it to. All questions about this should be directed to the submissions email, please don’t use my contact form here for questions related to this. I will also answer questions in the comments, as well.

In the query letter that accompanies your submission, please note that you’re responding to my request for holiday-themed novellas.

I’ll probably be looking to have those books contracted and scheduled no later than the end of July.

Samhain is open to submissions.

In the most recent issue of the RWA’s Pro newsletter (Prospects) it was reported that Samhain is closed to submissions. We’re unsure where the erroneous information came from, but we are not closed to submissions and have no plans to be. We continue to accept submissions in all genres of romance, as well as science fiction/fantasy/urban fantasy all with romantic elements. Submissions guidelines can be found http://samhainpublishing.com/submissions. All questions and submissions can be directed to editor@samhainpublishing.com

We hope you’ll help us out by posting this correction on your local and specialty chapter loops.

Thank you!

Angela James, Executive Editor

**permission to forward granted**

I have a question for all the authors and aspiring authors reading along. When you send in a submission to an editor, is there a period of time that you think an editor responds too quickly? No, don’t laugh, seriously!

I’ve been reading a lot of slush submissions recently, trying to find some shorter length books to fill holes in my schedule. As we’ve discussed before, editors and agents rarely read the whole of a submission they’re going to reject. So if I’m going to reject a book, I can tell quickly (that means if you’re waiting to hear from me and have been waiting, it’s a positive sign because I take longer with acceptances, on the whole, as I have to read the whole manuscript once, maybe twice and then contemplate it). But I’m not sure if it’s better to send a rejection the day or a few days after the book has been received, and put the author out of their figurative misery, or to wait a certain amount of time to give them the warm, fuzzy feeling that their book has received due consideration (the book has received due consideration either way, but I know how perception can play a part in this).

So, what do you think? Rejection letters as soon as I know, regardless of whether it’s the day after submission, or wait a week or so to let the author revel in that nerve wracking feeling of waiting to hear?

Okay, not really. I was actually talking to Sarah and Jane for their third “Smart Authors, Dear Bitches” podcast. We talk about digital publishing and Samhain, tips for aspiring authors, as well as what we’re looking for in submissions. It’s a short podcast, just 15 minutes long, so check it out!

Smart Authors, Dear Bitches podcast with Angela James

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You might be interested in this two part series that Heather from The Galaxy Express is doing on Samhain Publishing and me. Today, Heather has an impressive post up with links to some of my past interviews and quotes from those interviews. She talks about why science fiction/fantasy authors might want to consider a small press publisher.

Tomorrow, in part two, she’ll have a new interview with me up (where I get to talk about my love of Firefly).

You can check out part one here.

I’m too sexy for my shape!

Bad boys and wild girls. Cats, wolves, dragons and hamsters (just kidding about the hamsters…really). We’re looking for the best of your shifters, no holds barred. Show us your sexy, your untamed and all the growls, purrs and squeaking hamster wheels (still kidding about this part) you think we can handle.

Samhain Publishing is seeking submissions for their as-yet-untitled Summer 2009 shapeshifter anthology. Stories can be of any genre or heat level—make them fun, make them sexy, make them burn right off the pages but whatever you do, they must feature a shifter theme as integral to the story. M/m or same-sex submissions welcome and anticipated.

Submissions should be 20,000 to 30,000 words in length. This anthology is open to all authors previously published with Samhain and authors aspiring to publish with Samhain. Submissions must be new material; previously published material will not be considered.

Chosen manuscripts will be published as separate ebooks under their individual titles in Summer 2009 but will be combined in print titles for Spring 2010 print release.

To submit a manuscript for consideration, please include:

The full manuscript (of 20,000 to 30,000 words) with a comprehensive 2-5 page synopsis. Please include a letter of introduction/query letter. Full manuscripts are required for this as it’s a special project.

Important! When sending your manuscript/synopsis please name them: SS_Title_full/synopsis. For instance, if you’re writing a book called Hot Hamster Love (which we sincerely hope you’re not because that title is ours, darn it!), you’d name your manuscript SS_HotHamsterLove_full and your synopsis SS_HotHamsterLove_synopsis.

Following this naming convention insures that your manuscript/synopsis don’t get lost in the mess of files and submissions we save to our computers, and helps us keep them separate from normal submissions. And keeps them neat and tidy on the ebook reader! It’s harder when you have 50 files called “Synopsis” to know which to look at.

Submissions are open until March 1st, 2009 and final decision will be made by March 23rd,2009.

Send your submission to editor@samhainpublishing.com

Please put Sexy Shifters Anthology Submission in the subject line. Query letters can be addressed to Angela James.

We’ve hired a new content editor and are catching up on submissions, so if you’re thinking to submit, now is a great time.

People have been asking about particular genres we’re looking for. One thing I know, we’ve gotten inundated with romantic suspense. If you write romantic suspense, it will need to be pretty great for us to consider it at this point, and something different than the cop catching a serial killer storyline unless you’ve got a unique twist on it. We’re kind of feeling played out there.

Paranormal is still hot, and we’ll still consider vampires, shifters (personally, I’m a fan of shifters), demons and otherwise. We like different, but we also know there are readers out there who still love vampires.

We like contemporary but it’s the genre we see most of (along with romantic suspense) so it needs to be special for us to want to sign it. That doesn’t mean don’t submit it, it just means make sure your writing is tight, the pacing is good and your manuscript clean (actually, that really can be said of every submission!)

Erotic romance of any genre is still something most of our editors love. But the kicker here is that there must be story and plot to your erotic romance, not just some sex scenes strung together. And the sex scenes should be hot, not clinical. There’s a difference!

We have several editors who love a great historical romance, so if you’re writing historicals: western, regency, ancient Egypt, whatever, they’d love to see it!

Some genres that we want to publish more of but get few excellent submissions in include: inspirational, interracial romance, GBLT (especially m/m but we do sign a great f/f when it comes along), urban fantasy and fantasy romance.

Remember, we’re no longer accepting non-romance submissions (except in the fantasy/science fiction categories, and they have to have romantic elements). That means no YA, no horror, women’s fiction, non-fiction, etc.

A couple key things to remember when you’re submitting: Please make sure you include a thorough synopsis–at least two pages but however many it takes to tell the story, including the end! Proofread and spell check. I know spell check seems useless, but it really does catch spelling errors. Having a book that’s fairly clean is going to work in your favor at all times, but even more so if it’s a genre we see a lot of. There’s no reason for us to take on a book that needs a lot of work when there are other submissions that come through in great shape. And last, please read our submissions guidelines before you send your submission. http://samhainpublishing.com/submissions

*permission to forward granted*

As of today I’ve re-opened submissions at Samhain. Please keep in mind that we have refocused our efforts and the accepted genres have changed.

Additionally, we’ve clarified and/or changed some of our submissions guidelines.

http://samhainpublishing.com/submissions

Questions can be sent to editor@samhainpublishing.com