Reading Books for Fun and Profit

If someone had told me when I was younger there was such a job as a Book Coach, and that I could be one, I would have been overjoyed.

I mean, I love books. From childhood, I often thought my life would be perfect if I could just spend the day reading. In my early twenties, I was a librarian in various capacities: in academic and public libraries, even a librarian in a chocolate factory (combining chocolate and books, my two favorite things in life). I did lots of other stuff for work over the years, but I always came back to my first loves: reading and writing.

You might think the publishing world would pop into mind, but for some reason the business side of books didn’t appeal to me. I took therefore a circuitous route to being a Book Coach, but that’s okay. Like many of the best things in life, I only discovered it after learning a lot about myself and developing, as Liam Neeson says in the movie Taken, a very particular set of skills (though not, admittedly, the same skills as his).

I read a lot, I wrote a lot, I eventually got my MFA, I began to teach. Of course, I had always dreamed of being a writer, but as I began to do more teaching of writing, I became just as fascinated by the process of helping other writers.

As a certified Creativity Coach, I focused on motivation and mindset issues that prevent writers from writing consistently and easily. But I learned that a writer’s psychology and the development of their craft skills have to go hand in hand. Writers can make huge leaps of progress with such one-on-one holistic coaching. The first hurdle is to convince them to get over the idea that they have to struggle alone, and suffer and bleed for their art.

So I became a Book Coach.

Now I specifically help writers who want to write books (mostly fiction, but I’ve worked with poetry and nonfiction as well). Yes, I do sit around and read books a good part of the day, but I also do a great deal of teaching and writing as part of the process.

You see, a Book Coach is not just an editor. There are several types of editors: A developmental editor will take a finished draft and make suggestions for improvement. A line or copyeditor will go through and tweak sentence by sentence for easier readability. A proofreader will have their eagle eye on the typos and errors of spelling, punctuation, and grammar. A coach may do all that and more.

A Book Coach works with writers all the way through, helping them develop and shape the work as they go. A coach is a cheerleader and accountability partner, helping to keep the writer on track with their goals (the ultimate procrastination-killer). They give high-level feedback on what’s working and what’s not. They might teach specific skills – everything from how to structure a story to how to write a query letter.

I love working with writers at the beginning of their projects, because then I know we’ll be getting the project off on the right foot. If they trust me, I can take years off someone’s process because I have strategies to help develop the project so it starts off strong and people don’t meander through the weeds for years trying to make it work.

I also get writers who are stuck in the middle of a book. They don’t know what comes next, or how to figure it out. Or it’s a project that has been languishing for years and they want to work on it but need support to figure out how to finally finish. Often they have beautiful writing but a terrible writing mindset: no steady writing habits, or they are crippled by past criticism and self-doubt.

Or I get writers who have a finished draft. They usually think it just needs a little polish before it goes off to an agent or publisher. Sometimes it does (although even polish edits can take more time than the writer bargained for!). Sometimes I read the entire manuscript and have a very long breakdown of issues I see that may involve a rewrite from page one. These are difficult conversations to have. Gentle but absolute honesty is necessary; the writer has to trust that you are saying these things from a dispassionate perspective, trying to make the book the best it can possibly be. They are under no obligation to retain me as a coach to make those changes, but if they do they get the same strategies and support I give any other client.

I recently worked with a client on a first-chapter review. A previous writing teacher had told her to do something that I thought, after reading it, was actually detrimental to the story, and to what needs to happen in the first chapter of a novel. As always when telling someone something I think they won’t want to hear, I feared she might be resistant to my feedback, but she immediately said, “I know you are right.” She had felt wrong about the chapter; that’s why she hired me. By the end of our conversation, she had contracted me for several more chapters, and even ruefully admitted she wished she’d had me read her first book, now out on submission, before she’d sent it off.

Let me be clear: A coach doesn’t tell the writer what to write. I don’t take over the story. I ask questions, and make suggestions, and discuss them with the client. It’s the client’s book, and the client’s vision. Ultimately, they have to make their own decisions about what they accept and implement, or not.

I give deadlines, clear feedback, accountability, advice on particular areas of craft, and coach people through the long tough process of writing a book and then the often tougher process of putting it out into the world. I’ve spent years learning about writing and how to teach it effectively (and yes, I believe it can be taught). I understand what you can and can’t learn from writing groups, courses, conferences, and even MFA programs.

As you might see, it takes more than a love of reading to be an effective Book Coach. Below are some of the skills I have had to develop:

Coaching and Psychology – I’ve been through the writing and publishing wringers myself so I have deep empathy for writers. I help them in developing a writer’s mindset and habits; dealing with block, rejection, and indifference; dealing with one’s own inner critic as well as external voices from the present or past, or fears of the future. I am a cheerleader and also a tough-love champion of their work and their ability to do it. I have to be able to work with a variety of personalities, as well as writers who may have been damaged by harsh criticism.

Writing Craft – The day-to-day skills a writer needs to develop to be any good: pacing, structure, grammar, imagery, theme, compelling storytelling. For fiction (or memoir), add character development, dialogue, setting, and description. Narrative design – understanding the logic and structure of story and how to engage a reader – is also crucial, and the least taught by courses, books, and programs that focus primarily on individual pieces of craft. Those are the main ones, but honing your craft never really ends. I have to be able to understand what isn’t working and convey specific strategies to help the writer improve their skills at every step.

Project Management – Working with the writer to create a specific workflow, including time management and setting realistic deadlines, tracking the writer’s progress, goal-setting, and helping to keep the project on track through all the vagaries of life that inevitably come up.

Editing – Big-picture developmental editing, line editing, copyediting and proofreading may all be part of the package, depending on what the writer needs and what is contracted for. I need to see the forest and the trees.

Understanding the marketplace – How a writer brings their work into the world. Figuring out genre, the market and the competition. Helping them figure out the publication process, whether traditional or self-publishing. Who all the players are, what they do, and the steps the writer needs to take in order to publish and market their work. Coaching them through that process, if necessary.

Business development – How to manage and grow my own business. This includes developing my offerings and marketing them, plus managing my time so I can balance the reading, critiquing, and actual coaching calls. I write guest posts, have my own publication on Medium, and teach courses for myself and at other venues. And of course, there are the administrative tasks every business owner deals with, like scheduling clients, updating the website, and paying taxes. After years of doing it part-time, I am now working as a coach full-time, which is a whole other level.

Bottom line, I love it.

No two days ever look the same. I do tons of reading (my client’s work, books in their genre, craft books that might help them, books on business-building, plus my own fiction and nonfiction for fun). The best parts of my day are when I get on a call or Zoom with a client and we discuss how their work is going, my feedback, and the next steps they will take. I share their excitement when they make connections and get fired up to start writing again.

Yes, sometimes there are difficult conversations. But most often what happens is they are relieved to have a partner with them on the journey. They are no longer pounding a keyboard in a room alone, hoping what they’re writing is good, wondering if it even matters or if anyone will ever read it. And I know that I am helping these writers be the best they can be, as they work to fulfill their writing dreams.

Interested in learning more? I was certified through these organizations: Creativity Coaching Association

Author Accelerator

I can be found at Set Your Muse ons Fire!