Meet the Editors

Heba Elsherief

Heba Elsherief

Heba Elsherief holds an MA in English Literature and a PhD in Language and Literacies from the University of Toronto. A former Islamic high school English teacher, she now teaches university classes in cultural studies and language education.

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Prefers
Anything!
Avoids
None!
Tova Seltzer

Tova Seltzer

Tova Seltzer is an editor, fiction writer, and poet. She holds a B.A. in creative writing from American University in Washington, D.C., and is a 2020 graduate of the Columbia Publishing Course. The great love of her life is working with stories in development and figuring out what they want and need to be the greatest they can be. Read More

Prefers
Romcom  Middle Grade  Young Adult  Low Fantasy 
Avoids
Horror  Detailed medical stories 
Helen Gould

Helen Gould

Helen Gould is from the UK and specializes in reading manuscripts for POC, gender, sexuality, mental health, and other topics. She has worked as a freelancer writer, blogger, consultant, and writer. She speaks regularly about the socio-political impact of media (especially navigating race in films and games). Read More

Prefers
Sci-fi  Fantasy  Horror 
Avoids
None!
Rochelle Burnside

Rochelle Burnside

Rochelle is an editor who enjoys stories in any medium, from novels to video games to fine art. She’s worked on the editorial teams of several magazines, compiling sci-fi/fantasy short stories with Leading Edge and nonfiction travel articles with Stowaway.

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Prefers
Fantasy  Science Fiction  Young Adult  Nonfiction 
Avoids
 
Rebecca Blevins

Rebecca Blevins

Rebecca Blevins has been a freelance editor for ten years, working with indie authors and multiple publishers including Penguin, Tor, and Little, Brown. She is the author of five published books—two for children and three for adults, so she understands how it feels to have your work edited. Read More

Prefers
Children's  Middle Grade  Contemporary Romance  Romcom  Science Fiction  Nonfiction  Contemporary Fantasy 
Avoids
Rebecca would love to read anything except dark erotica that contains excessive violence toward women or dark adult horror involving children. (She couldn’t sleep for days after reading Stephen King’s Cujo.)
Thais Carreira Afonso

Thais Carreira Afonso

Thais is an Associate Agent with Azantian Literary Agency. She has eight years of experience in publishing between Brazil, China, and the United States. More recently, she interned at Writers House, where she honed her skills while supporting the desks of Amy Berkower and Johanna Castillo, and she was mentored by Jennifer Azantian before stepping up to the Associate Agent role at ALA. Read More

Prefers
Erotica  Literary Fiction  Queer Romance  Romance  fantasy  women's fiction  upmarket  contemporary 
Avoids
Horror 
April Jones

April Jones

April Jones has read, written, or edited her way through dozens of fictional worlds. When she’s not working as a teacher or freelance editor, she spends her time pretending to practice Korean by binge watching Korean dramas. She received her bachelors in English and her M.F.A. in creative writing.

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Prefers
Fantasy  YA fantasy  regency romance  mythology-based stories  magical realism  paranormal romance  travel-based stories 
Avoids
Erotica 
Jordan Merica

Jordan Merica

Jordan Merica (she/they) is a former university-level writing tutor who bounced around strange jobs for a few years post-college before deciding to branch out into freelance sensitivity reading, editing, and hosting writing workshops. It was there Jordan fell in love with the timelines and stories of her own peoples, who always seemed to be extracurricular options.

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Prefers
Scifi  Fantasy  Graphic novels  Memoirs  Historical Fiction  Sci-Fi  Fantasy  Short Stories  Poetry  Afro-Futurism  Indigenous-Futurism  Plays 
Avoids
None!
Carrie Jacks

Carrie Jacks

Carrie loves the entire process of publishing a novel—from developing that brand new, exciting idea to formatting the words to look perfect on the page.She is sometimes intimidated by editing her own words, but she loves to read other writers’ works in progress to help make them the best they can be. Read More

Prefers
Young Adult  Fantasy  Dystopian  Romcom 
Avoids
Dark Horror  Heavy Sci-Fi  Erotica 
Veronica Vega

Veronica Vega

Veronica Vega is a sensitivity reader and copyeditor who has worked with bestselling authors and novice writers. Her experience as a freelancer has led her to work with major publishing houses like Penguin Random House, Tor, and Bloomsbury Press in various genres, including Young Adult, Romance, Literary Fiction, and YA. Read More

Prefers
Literary Fiction  Women’s Fiction  Young Adult  Mystery  Paranormal  Science Fiction 
Avoids
None!
Leila Halimo

Leila Halimo

A wild child of the chaotic arts, Leila is a creative soul with a proclivity for colorful, vivid imagery in her artwork and writing. She enjoys bold, brilliant splashes of color in everything and anything. When not nose-deep in a book, she can be found playing video games and writing critical analyses on the pop culture/media she consumes. Read More

Prefers
Anything queer (especially with interracial or black-focused gay stories)  Comics  Manga  Anime  Fandom  Geek  Horror  Mystery  Noir  Whodunnits  Erotica  Sci-fi  Fantasy  Urban fantasy  LGBTQ  comics  video games  YA 
Avoids
None!
Lydia Suen

Lydia Suen

Lydia (she/her) studied novel writing and editing at Stanford University. She specializes in helping authors create character-driven stories, increase emotional impact in scenes, sharpen plot points, nail their themes, and heighten tension for books readers won’t be able to put down. Lydia believes working with an editor should be fun and as low-stress as possible. Read More

Prefers
Young adult  Adult  Urban fantasy 
Avoids
None!
Karen A. Parker, MFA

Karen A. Parker, MFA

Karen A. Parker is a Black, queer, nonbinary, and neurodivergent Secular Buddhist. They are an author and editor of speculative fiction, and they’re determined to help you take your writing to the next level. After graduating cum laude from UC Irvine with a BA in English, a Creative Writing Emphasis in Fiction, and a minor in Japanese Language and Literature, they taught English in Gifu, Japan, for three years as an Assistant Language Teacher. Read More

Prefers
Fantasy  science fiction  horror 
Avoids
Non-consensual sex scenes  Christian fiction 
Lune Dube

Lune Dube

Lune was raised in two storytelling cultures. Whether it was the indigenous stories their father told them at bedtime, or ones from the Torah that they heard in school or synagogue, Lune has always been enchanted by the power of stories. By age 19, they were performing on stage as an improvisational actor and traditional Native storyteller.

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Prefers
Fantasy  Horror  Post-Apocalyptic  Sci-Fi  Speculative Fiction  Urban Fantasy  Young Adult  TTRPG’s  Video Games  Historical fiction 
Avoids
None!
Akelah Adams

Akelah Adams

From a young age, Akelah has always had a passion for reading. She loves the different characters and worlds that she could discover when she read and she knew she wanted to work with authors and writers to put their work out there. <!–more–> She graduated with a B. Read More

Prefers
Young adult fiction/fantasy  contemporary romance  middle grade  humor  fantasy  children’s books   
Avoids
None!
Cameron Van Sant

Cameron Van Sant

Cameron Van Sant is an editor who wants to see every writer succeed. He has experience editing creative works, professional reports, and academic writing.

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Prefers
Science fiction  fantasy  young adult  romance  drama  comics 
Avoids
None!
Erin Olds

Erin Olds

Erin (she/her) is an experienced developmental and line editor with two secret skills: decreasing word count while retaining voice, and figuring out the one thing that needs to shift in order to make a story truly excellent. She loves working with beginner writers on craft and with experienced authors on in-depth skills like objective correlatives, theme, misbeliefs, and character arcs. Read More

Prefers
Fantasy  Historical  Middle Grade  YA  Magical Realism  Cozy  Paranormal  Mystery 
Avoids
Slasher Horror 
Nicole Hawken

Nicole Hawken

Nicole is a passionate storyteller and consumer of stories in every form. As a neuro-spicy writer and editor, she vehemently believes audiobooks count as reading and is willing to arm-wrestle anyone who disagrees. Nicole particularly loves helping authors build complex worlds and develop compelling, authentic characters. Read More

Prefers
Anything!
Avoids
None!
Taye Timko

Taye Timko

Taye Timko is a Jack and Jill of all Trades and the Master of Some—primarily an educator of color at an African centered high school on the East Coast, teaching (sometimes) reluctant young writers by day and is a writer and freelance editor by night.

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Prefers
Urban Fiction  SciFi  Fantasy 
Avoids
None!
Mandy Ballard

Mandy Ballard

Mandy (she/her) is a skilled developmental, line editor, and book coach who has worked with both traditional and indie bestsellers, taught at multiple writing conferences, and has a soft spot for beginning writers. Her cozy approach comes through in every edit; if you’re looking for an editor who is 100% on your team, Mandy is the editor for you! Read More

Prefers
YA contemporary  YA Speculative  YA Fantasy  YA Sci-Fi  Dystopian  Magical Realism  Alternate History  Post-Apocalyptic  Steampunk  Contemporary Romance  Paranormal Romance  Romcom  Middle Grade  Adult  Literary  Women's Fiction  Inspirational Non-Fiction  Personal Development 
Avoids
Slasher horror  Erotica  Regency Romance 
Sachiko Suzuki

Sachiko Suzuki

Sachiko is a Japanese-American with an insatiable appetite for good story. She understands character motivation on a deep level and can help you dig deeper into your character than you thought possible. Best of all, she’ll do it with her trademark enthusiasm and deep-heart kindness. Plus, if you need someone to spread punfetti through your manuscript, Sachiko has a party cannon for that. Read More

Prefers
Fantasy  Sci-Fi  Romcom 
Avoids
None!
Victoria

Victoria

Victoria (she/her) is a second-generation Korean American writer who was born in Virginia. She currently supports college students with their academic and creative writing and leads creative writing workshops for teens. Victoria has published fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. She is a Kundiman Fellow, a VONA/Voices alumna, and was Co-Fiction Editor of Apogee Journal. She also received support from Vermont Studio Center and led creative writing workshops for New York Writers Coalition. She lives in New York City.

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Prefers
Contemporary adult fiction  Personal essays  Magical realism  Science fiction  Apocalyptic  Dystopian stories  literary fiction  creative nonfiction  history  mental health  psychology 
Avoids
Erotica 
Al Ross

Al Ross

Al Ross is a writer and story editor from beautiful Vancouver, British Columbia who jumped into story-telling early as a teenage Dungeon Master and never looked back. When not editing, writing, pitching or producing you can find Al at home weaving, listening to podcasts or watching reality TV with their fluffy grey cat Duchess and hamster Frisbee.

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Prefers
Anything!
Avoids
Any kind of romance/erotica with dubious or lack of consent
Justin Ho

Justin Ho

Justin Ho (he/him) is a writer who grew up in Hawaii but spent most of his time in online worlds. Now a bit more grounded, he’s currently pursuing traditional publishing, keeping up with YA releases, and learning Korean (code for watching too much TOMORROW X TOGETHER and BTS content).

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Prefers
Contemporary  Sci-Fi  Fantasy 
Avoids
Horror  Gore  Erotica 
Fatin Marini

Fatin Marini

Fatin Marini (she/her) is a developmental and sensitivity editor. Her attention to detail and the overall narrative allow her to help authors

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Prefers
Young Adult  Contemporary  Historical Romance  Romance  Fantasy  Middle Grade  Memoir  Picture books 
Avoids
Erotica  Sci-Fi 


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