Q&A with Steven Pressfield discussion

Mr. Pressfield, they tell young writers today that books are not published, but printed.

(1) When we read Killing Rommel, how much of the text is 100% pure Pressfield, and how much has been filtered by an editor?

(2) Since you’re a Big Brand, do you get better editing and proofreading than less established authors?

(3) To get a truly good editor do you have to contract, yourself, a Gun-For-Hire?

(4) Do you feel an editor can even make a book significantly better for the average reader, or might they not even notice?

(5) How do you feel about the current state of the publishing business, and the way young authors are, for the most part, no longer mentored by veterans?

Thank you for you time, sir!

Excellent questions, JHHK! Let me answer them all together if I can.

When I was working on "Tides of War," back in '99 I think, my wonderful editor Shawn Coyne had some problems with the mansucript. He flew out to California and stayed with me for three days, going over everything. He sent me back to the drawing board for the next four months (and I probably should have done a month or two more.)

That would never happen today. Publishing has changed dramatically. Shawn himself has since left Doubleday, started his own publishing house which succeeded very well for a time; now's he a lit agent at Endeavor. Take as much as you want out of that!

Basically a writer today has to be an excellent self-editor. I'm very much opposed to paying money to freelance editors. Maybe it works out sometimes but I've never seen it happen. Editors today are so under the gun, they just don't have time to help shape manuscripts. In a way, that job has fallen to agents, at the pre-submission stage. For example, Shawn now does a lot of that for his clients at Endeavor -- working on the manuscript before it's submitted.

A good editor, yes, can make a tremendous difference. Sometimes the writer himself is just too close to his material. In practice these days, such a task usually falls to the writer's peers, colleagues and friends on an informal basis (and a lot of friendships are ruined thereby). Most of us need help. We need a fresh pair of eyes -- or more than one. That said, I'm still very much a believer in doing it yourself. It's your book. Listen, take things to heart, but in the end it's yours and you have to do it.

So, with Killing Rommel...

1. You wrote your near final draft.
2. Got feedback from friends.
3. Polished it up.
4. Sent it to your agent.
5. Got a few more notes.
6. Put it into final form.
7. Then your agent negotiated money.
** (Or did that happen in advance?)
8. Then your publisher just printed it, your exact final draft, so when I read it I'm consuming 100% Pressfield, every word selected and arranged by you?

How much say do you get into Cover Art, Maps, Font, etc...?

(I love the Killing Rommel hardcover cover art.)

Do you have your own independent marketing team, or do you always use your publisher's in-house crew?

I'm asking all these Big New York Publisher questions because I work in Small Press Land and don't know if I will ever want to "trade up."

You got it just about right, except the money was negotiated in advance, when the publisher first approved the idea for the book. The final draft went through a lot of editing but not from my actual editor. Mostly it was for technical content -- military stuff, British vocabularly and slang, etc. Lots of people went over the draft. I had mimimal input in the maps and cover, just a little "consultation." It seems to just work that way.

As for marketing, for "Killing Rommel," I did a whole big marketing thing myself. If you're interested, look on my website and click "The Videos." It tells everything. But basically I had two independent internet marketing people, my own website people, plus a video crew and all kinds of stuff -- in addition to getting a lot of help from my publisher, including them springing for a little TV advertising on the Military Channel. Without all that, the book would have sunk without a trace.