Recently I received these questions from reader Traci Rhoades: “What happens when a writer’s agent sends a book proposal to a publisher? What is the process? What do the various titles of editors mean? It seems to take a long time to review a proposal. Is that due to high volume, or do various people/committees consider it?”

Great questions! In this post I’m going to take you inside a publishing house and show you how things work. Of course, no two publishers are identical, so the process can vary a bit, but what I share will be typical for a large trade publisher.

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The Book Proposal Arrives

Many larger publishers have a “no unsolicited book proposals” policy. This means the only way a writer can get a hearing is if she has a direct connection with an acquisitions editor or is represented by a literary agent who has such a connection.

This, incidentally, may be one of the most valuable reasons to attend writer’s conferences—for the opportunity to meet with editors and agents. (I wrote a guest post a while back that will help you prepare for a meeting like this. Click here to read it.) An even more effective way to make these connections is by referral—when an already published author friend puts in a good word for you.

So let’s assume you have an agent who submits your book proposal. In most cases your agent would be sending it to an acquisitions editor.

The first job of an acquisitions editor is to bring books under contract for the publisher. Oftentimes acquisitions editors also do or at least supervise the developmental edit of the manuscripts they acquire. More about various editors and their roles in a bit.

The Book Proposal Is Reviewed

The acquisitions editor will review your proposal and decide what to do next. For some of my more popular blog posts on book proposals, click here, here, and here.

The acquisitions editor certainly has the authority to decline proposals without taking them any further. But let’s say the editor thinks your proposal has some potential and wants to take it the next step.

In some houses the editor may prepare the proposal for their publishing committee (“pub comm” or “pub board,” for short), but in many cases the proposal goes first to an editorial board (“ed board”). Ed boards are usually composed only of editorial staff—often the publisher or editorial director and acquisitions editors.

The purpose of the ed board is to decide or help each acquisitions editor decide which proposals to take to pub board. Pub board is usually made up of sales, marketing, and editorial personnel. The role of pub board is to decide what to publish.

Back to our fictional proposal. Let’s assume a pub board wants to publish your book. Typically what happens is the pub board, or the key stakeholders of a pub board, agree to a sales projection, often how many copies of your book they expect to sell in the first 12 months. This number becomes the foundation for the rest of the financials, represented in a profit-and-loss statement, sometimes called a pro forma.

Click here to read my article “How Much Money You Can Expect to Make from Your First Book Contract.”

Why Does It Take So Long?

Traci asked, “It seems to take a long time to review a book proposal. Is that due to high volume, or do various people/committees consider it?”

I suspect turnaround time on book proposal reviews varies quite a bit from house to house. When I was in acquisitions, we tried to get back to writers with an indication of our disposition within four weeks. This was not always possible, though, because, well, editors are human. They have vacations and get sick and often do quite a bit of travel. Sometimes it simply takes a while for an editor to review all that’s in her inbox.

And yes, an actual publishing decision often requires the involvement of multiple people from multiple departments. It requires, in other words, a meeting of pub board, and if your proposal happens to arrive just after a pub board, it could be a while before the next one is scheduled.

My recommendation here is to wait two weeks and then follow up—just to make sure your proposal is still on the editor’s radar. Then, if you haven’t heard anything, follow up again two weeks after this. Hopefully by this point you’ll have a good idea of when your proposal will be reviewed.

When I was an editor, I didn’t mind agents following up with me, especially if I never confirmed receipt. I appreciated a little nudge here and there.

Various Types of Editors

Traci asked about what the various editorial titles mean. Here’s a rundown:

Acquisitions editors acquire books (bring them under contract) and often do some conceptual work with the author. AEs also regularly handle the developmental edit, also referred to as the content, substantive, or macro edit, though sometimes a separate developmental editor will be brought in to do this.

I sometimes refer to developmental editing as “big picture” editing. When I do a developmental edit, I’m looking for:

• gaps in logic
• apparent self-contradiction
• flow or sequencing problems
• boring prose
• unnecessary repetition
• fuzzy thinking
• ways to add content to boost the value of the book
• ways the author can make the content more practical
• places where a story or metaphor would be useful
• permissions issues
• places where the author takes something for granted that shouldn’t be necessarily

Ideally, copyeditors focus on grammar, punctuation, consistency, spelling, style, and sentence structure—the more technical aspects of writing. I say “ideally” because in reality copyeditors do end up doing some developmental work as well.

Proofreaders go a step further into the technical review of the text. They’re looking for typographical errors and mistakes. They do not make major or developmental changes. The etymology of “proofreader” has to do with reading proofs, sometimes called proof pages or designed pages.

Proof pages are facsimiles of the actual book pages, so theoretically proofreaders don’t come into play until the manuscript has gone through design and composition. In practice, though, a publishing house may also choose to use proofreaders to review a manuscript after copyediting but before composition.

Question: Do you have a writing- or publishing-related question? You can leave a comment by clicking here.