What do I do, anyway?

The universal response to “I’m an English major” is, “So what are you going to do with that—teach?” As a student I tried to sidestep this inevitable reply with more elaborate explanations like, “I’m majoring in English and minoring in editing and plan to work as an editor for a living.” But then when people still said, “So . . . English major . . . what are you going to do with that—teach?” I gave up.

Now when I tell people I work for a publishing house as an editor of children’s books the response I get it, “Oh? Do children’s books need to be edited?”

So . . . if I’m an English major who doesn’t teach and who edits things that don’t need it, what on earth do I do all day?

Most of my time at the internship is devoted to reading new manuscripts. Candlewick doesn’t accept unsolicited submissions, so these are books recommended by agents or sent in by authors who have previously met with our editors. I read the entire manuscript and write a critique (about two a day), which I pass on to the editors. Most of the books I’ve read have been just fine—neither amazing nor terrible. I’ve only gone through two truly dreadful manuscript, both written by authors who had previously self published.

I’ve also gotten to write a little jacket copy (the blurbs on the covers of books), transcribe the notes of other editors, sort through old drafts of now-published books, and fact check an anatomy picture book. My most baffling experiences involve sitting through the weekly coordination meetings, where we check on the progress of about 130 books scheduled for release up through the fall of 2012. It takes more than 40 major steps involving half a dozen departments and parties to get the book from manuscript to bookstore, and this is all after editing.

So is there work to be done, even by English majors? Plenty!