A Writer's Editor - RIP Monica Harris

It's strange how people affect us, impact upon our lives and leave some kind of indelible impression. And, I'm not referring to the people we've known the longest or the most intimately. Sometimes, more than we might realise at the time, these individuals are people we've met only a few times or, in some cases, only once.

I was reminded about this just a week ago when I checked my email and found one from Twitter. I get these often, as I'm sure many of you who have a Twitter account do. It's an email suggesting people for me to follow; the suggestions generated by some program that analyses trends, hashtags, followers, those who follow you, etc. Well, one of the suggestions was MHM Editorial Services (@mhmedits). It'd been a while - probably a year or so - since I'd last thought about MHM but I recognised the name immediately and my initial thought was "Don't I already follow this account?" So, I logged into my Twitter account and checked it out and, just as I suspected, I already follow @mhmedits. I further learnt, however, that MHM's account is no longer active due to the death of its account holder. Likewise, MHM Editorial Services is no longer operating.

Upon discovering this, I felt like I'd been kicked in the gut and slapped in the face. MHM Editorial was an editing business run by Monica Harris. I met her at the 2009 Book Expo America and a few months later we met at the lobby of a New York hotel where my sister-in-law and her husband were staying. My wife came into New York with me. She had breakfast with my in-laws and I had a meeting with Monica. 

A few weeks before our meeting, I'd emailed Monica the first ten pages of my novel, Back Kicks And Broken Promises. She was more of a content editor versus a line editor but she did offer suggestions in syntax and caught some typos as she made useful comments on the various red flags she found in the book's plot, character motivation and dialogue. As most editors do in this kind of situation, Monica went through these pages for free. To edit more would've required a proper business arrangement which, after considering my self-publishing budget, I could not pursue. In spite of this, Monica more than welcomed my emails that were full of general questions on publishing. She also, even months after our meeting, willingly accepted and promptly answered my questions asking for further clarification of the comments she'd made on the pages she'd read. To me, this showed a true dedication on her part of being a writer's editor; being more concerned about the writer creating the best work he or she can produce and understanding what he or she needs to do than performing quality editorial services and writer support just for a buck. 

As insightful as Monica was with my manuscript, she was also ahead of the curve when it came to self-publishing. In the last ten years or so, independently publishing one's own work has grown and become less taboo. Anticipating the growth of indie published books, Monica specialised in serving the independent author, leaving her editing posts at traditional publishing houses and forming MHM Editorial.

I didn't know Monica very well, at all. I only met her once. But, the integrity in her approach to my work and the dignity she offered me as a green first-time author, has left a lasting impression on me; so much so that, when I found out she'd died, tears pooled at the bottom of my eyes. I felt like a friend had died, albeit one with whom I'd lost touch.

I'm an indie author hoping to break into the mainstream with an agent and a traditional publishing house. Thanks to Monica, I'm less ignorant about the entire process and I feel more secure about my work and vision being my work and vision. For that, I thank her. And, whether you're an indie or a traditionally published author, I hope your editors possess the character and love of her craft the way Monica did. 

RIP Monica Harris. The publishing world, especially that of the indie author, misses you deeply. 

New Adult Fiction

New adult fiction.

I came across this term a couple of hours ago, when I was reading the latest issue of Publishers Weekly (PW) on my flight from New York to Hong Kong. There was a short piece in it that introduces the term - the genre - and explains it as fiction for books that are, basically, older than YA (young adult) and younger than adult/contemporary/mainstream/literary fiction. The contents of NA (somehow I don't see the abbreviation NA catching on, like the abbreviation YA, because of the other kind of NA, N/A. I don't fancy any author wanting his or her work to be mistaken for being N/A when it is NA.) are usually centered around characters who are older teens and younger twenties who are navigating what it means to be a (new) adult. It's coming-of-age, another genre that instantly makes me think of Catcher in the Rye and the movie Stand By Me, for an older set. Coming-of-age, typically, as far as I've always known it to be, was about the preteen referred to as 'tween' in the current century) through adolescent years and center around how the protagonist navigates the mental, emotional and social changes that adolescence brings.

The term 'new adult fiction' came about in the early 2000s when a contest was held within the walls of a publisher on how to describe a particular book it's staff was working on. It hasn't really come into vogue (yet) but with its unveiling in this week's PW I'm sure it's only a matter of time before it stakes its claim in literary lexicon. NA fiction is also geared towards those YA readers who are getting and have gotten older. With this approach, I suspect some authors may expand on the types of stories they tell to keep their audience. I don't know if this necessarily good or particularly bad but it could lead to stories just being produced no maintain a fan base and not written because the author HAS to tell the story.

Personally, I like this new genre. Well, the genre, as far as the kind of books that would fall into it, isn't new. NA books have been written for decades. The identification though for books being referred to as such is new. Really, readers will like stories that entertain and move them so it doesn't really matter what you call them. I love Legend by Marie Lu, The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint Exupery, and the Narnia books by C. S. Lewis, to name a few, and these are regarded as YA/children's books. I loved them today, at 43, as I did when I originally read them when I was a tween. (Legend, of course, I only read as a 43 year old because it only came out last year but I love it, all the same.)

I like the term, though, from a marketing and publicity viewpoint. When asked about my book, Back Kicks And Broken, I describe it as 'older YA;' something that's appropriate for 17+. I feel it's NA because of the intimate scenes and not because of the martial arts action or the adult material that pertains to issues surrounding the protagonist and his parents. The martial arts scenes are action but they're not violent and, from personal experience, I know of eleven year olds and younger who have been faced to deal with - and handle very maturely - their parents' divorce, extended families with parents' new boyfriends/girlfriends/spouses. Good or bad, it's the world we live in in 2012.

Another reason I like about the term 'new adult fiction' is that those are the kinds of stories I'm writing. I've described my work-in-progress, Sage of Heaven, as YA but when I finished the first draft I felt that what I'd written is 'older YA' yet again. I can, and might, change it to more conventional YA yet but the story naturally lends itself to older YA, aka new adult fiction. This new genre gives writers like me a firmer place to belong as I slowly make my way into the world of writing and publishing. And that, in and of itself, makes me hopeful that I might actually make it. Good writing and storytelling will always win readers regardless of what category a book falls under and who the writer is but it never hurts having to place to call home.