Editor information

I has a question about editors, not about how to get one or something like that...

My brother has written a poetry book and claims to have got an editor interested in it... But he keeps coming to me with helping him correct his line formatting, problems with adding photos to the document, and now...

He called me up and asked me to make a query for him... and I have to say wtf? I can't think of any reason why an editor would need a query database...nor can think of any reason why they'd ask a writer to provide them with one.

I haven't ever dealt with a professional editor for a book before so I might be wrong about my reaction, but I don't see how this makes any sense? So, I'm asking you guys for your opinions and if there are anyone that has dealt with a pro editor... is this in any way normal for them to have asked someone to come up with a query database?

Are they paying him or is he paying them?

If he's paying them, it's a scam. The stuff he's asking for sounds like that. If he's going the self-publishing route (a la Lulu) then he's BSing you.

From what he told me is that he just showed someone who said they were an editor and they want to publish it or something.

I don't know much about the situation and I don't think any money has even been talked about. Like I said I can't think of any reason why they'd ask for a query database ever. He called me up asking about a query database thingy and I asked for what and he said "everyone has this" and I was going to go and learn how to make a query database for him...but i was trying to figure out what on earth would a book need a database for which I'd need to know to make it... After trying to explain this to him, he started **** so i told him to **** off and hung up.

But I still want to know whether I'm just not informed or am I right in thinking this is odd.

and lulu books are easy... all you need is a pdf.

An out of the blue "I will publish this!!" sounds fishy. Poetry as a publishing genre is a really hard sell. Even for established auhors.

And what in heavens does he want a query database for?

yeah see that's the thing, I haven't got a clue what he could possibly need one for... That's why I'm asking. I've never run across something like that, but like i said I've never tried to get a book published.

I've been trying to get published for a few years now. I've never heard the word 'database' used in regard to queries or anything else.

The traditional path is you query an agent, who then talks to a publisher. You can also query a publisher directly. In general the author doesn't interact with an editor unless 1.) A publisher has already given you a contract, and wants you to work with one of their editors, or 2.) You're paying for a freelance editor to look at your book before the query stage. (That latter scenario is almost always a scam.)

It sounds to me as if your friend met a freelance editor who isn't going to do any actual work for him, but who is pointing out the steps he must take. A freelance editor -- if paid -- would correct the manuscript for the author, and they never to my knowledge involve themselves with queries. Maybe one would critique and edit a query, if paid to do so.

Check to make sure he's not paying this 'editor'. If not, your brother may have just found a mentor who is trying to teach him the ropes...but if you do everything for him it's not going to help anybody.

Never heard the term, query, used in reference to publishing. And he said something to do with a database. And he should only be coming to me for computer help in this case. So he probably didn't understand what he was talking about and he thinks I should auto-know everything that has anything to do with anything v.v

After reading what a query is for publishing I'm not sure I should help him either way... He's a bad reader/writer and I don't know anything really about his book or any of the information that would be involved with what would be written in one so the only thing I could do is edit the letter...and isn't that what the other person that he has should be doing?

Everything RemusShepherd and Ironik said is correct. Follow up on the issues they raised. And, personally, the whole situation sounds fishy to me, too.

Also, as Remus already implied, Editors aren't really the people to get stuff published. Editors in publishing are handlers and points of contact at the best of times, and taskmasters and guard dogs at the worst of times. While knowing an Editor who likes your stuff would be a major help in getting published, the publishing houses I'm aware of have relatively rigid submission guidelines. Mostly to prevent accusations of idea theft and the like. None of which involve databases.

In fact, I'm quite unsure how a database would help with poetry unless you were setting it up as some piece of interactive artwork to correspond with your poetry book.

I hate him v.v He knew what it was the entire time, but doesn't want his gf to know and decided to call me while she was there...

If I got this right, apparently he's not paying his contact, whoever it is, but this person that his contact put him in contact with is another type of editor of some sort that can write queries and such... and she was going to charge him a couple grand but a his contact got her to lower her price due to some favor >.>

Sounds weird to me...I can see how this could be a scam, but again don't know standard practices and prices to say and my brother is a dipshit so >.>

I had a terrible idea...

Maybe your brother found a PDF Editor he can use to self-publish, but to get it to work he needs a database to work from. Wouldn't that be a terrible misunderstanding?


Edit: And serious people in publishing don't charge for that kind of thing. Unless it's like a doctorate thesis which you need to get published.

Professionals in any business pay the artist, not the other way around. Movies, modeling, publishing, whatever, the artist gets paid. Sometimes the payment is junk, like two free copies of whatever it is, but it's still a payment.

If he is being asked to pay anything other than return postage for a submitted manuscript then it is a scam.

I repeat. If he is being asked to pay ANYTHING then it is A SCAM.

Well, that's the thing, from what I understand, this person, whoever it is, is not asking for any money. They are saying that his book is good and they want to help him get it published, like what you said, some kind of mentor. The money part comes in from writing a query up for him and possibly actually editing the book, which might be an actual freelance editor.

This makes sense to me as something that would happen in this situation. And further the fact that the guy himself isn't asking for money and such seems to imply that this isn't a scam by way of the idea that if it were, why take on a partner when you could simply lie?

So from what you guys have said an hat I know of the situation I don't think it's a scam, but then again, we're all working from incomplete partial info and I can see how it could be a scam.

Somehow, I get the feeling this is a case of one half of the conversation talking about one thing while the other half is thinking something completely different all the while both think the other knows what they mean.

Still waiting for his Official BackAlleyBrawler No-Prize

I could, maybe, see hiring a free-lance editor to apply his/her professional skills to a new writer's novice effort in order to make said effort look less like a novice manuscript.
(ie making it look more polished before trying to get it submitted for possible publishing)

In that case, though, I'd seriously want to see this so called editor's resume before doing anything (heck, I could run a manuscript through a spelling and grammer checker and call myself an "editor").

However, this really REALLY sounds like a scam: "Hey, I'll help you get published...all you have to do is hire my friend over here to edit your book for you"

In regards to a database....this really makes no sense at all.
A database of WHAT? What DATA is actually in this database?

There really seems to be both a (potential) scam AND a serious disconnect in terminology here.