On today’s podcast, Jane welcomes Laura Portwood-Stacer to the podcast to discuss her new book, Make Your Manuscript Work: A Guide to Developmental Editing for Scholarly Writers. Laura is the founder of Manuscript Works, a writing consultancy with a mission to help scholars achieve clarity and confidence in their published work. She offers straightforward, empathetic feedback that takes the guesswork out of scholarly book publishing and makes her clients feel that they can get their books out into the world and feel proud of the results.

During the episode, Jane and Laura discuss why Laura decided to write this book, how the book can help scholarly writers with the hard work of revision, and what the book can do to help scholarly writers feel less anxiety about the writing process. 

Highlights of their conversation include: 

➡️ How romanticizing the book writing process can make writers eschew developing systems.

➡️ Why thinking of manuscript development as a cycle can limit discouragement about writing multiple drafts. 

➡️ What you should be thinking about before you worry about accessibility. 

From the three-stage manuscript developmental cycle, to the four pillars of scholarly writing, and finally the ten most common opportunities for development, Make Your Manuscript Work prevents a clear, actionable system for turning your rough draft into a publishable book. 

You can learn more about Make Your Manuscript Work: A Guide to Developmental Editing for Scholarly Writers by visiting manuscriptworks.com/book

To learn more about Laura, visit manuscriptworks.com 

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