An editor in the corner of every screen, who has read your book

Ask anything: is this too slow, does the ending land, should this chapter go earlier, who is this for. It reads the manuscript in front of it and answers about that book — not about books in general, and not from your outline. If there isn't enough text to answer honestly, it says so rather than filling the gap.

It also never edits your book behind your back. Ask it to merge two chapters and it will offer the action and wait; the change goes through the normal versioned edit flow where you can see and undo it. An answer is never replaced by a button.

memoir. The memoir questions people most need answered are not craft questions in the abstract — they are is this chapter self-indulgent, have I explained too much, does the reader know why I am telling them this. Asked about your actual pages, at the moment you are worrying about them.

business. The recurring business-book question is whether a chapter earns its place, and it is exactly the question an author cannot answer about their own expertise. Ask it chapter by chapter as you draft, rather than discovering the answer from a developmental report six months later.

childrens. Children's writing raises quick, specific questions — is this vocabulary right for six-year-olds, is this too frightening, is the page turn in the right place — that are cheap to answer at the moment they arise and expensive to discover in a developmental report on a 900-word text.

fiction. The novelist's question is nearly always about a specific passage — does this opening work, is this reveal too early, have I set this up. Answered against your actual manuscript rather than against general advice about openings, which is what makes the answer usable.

graphic novel. Script questions in comics are specific and consequential, because an artist will draw whatever you write. Is this panel description drawable?

non fiction. Non-fiction questions are usually about evidence and order: is this enough to support the claim, does this belong here, am I assuming knowledge the reader does not have. Answered against your pages, which is the difference between advice and an answer.

poetry. Questions about a collection are usually about arrangement rather than individual poems: does this sequence work, is this the right opening, is the section doing anything. Asked with your poems in front of you and — importantly — with the line breaks left exactly as you set them.

script. Script questions are about scene function and time: is this scene doing anything, is the exposition invisible, is this act too long. Asked against your actual pages, with element types and margins preserved so nothing gets reflowed while you are asking.

textbook. Textbook questions are pedagogical: is this explanation clear to someone meeting it for the first time, is this sequence right, does this exercise test the objective. Asked chapter by chapter, which is how a textbook is written anyway.

travel. Travel writing raises a specific recurring question: is this description doing work or is it postcard prose? Along with the harder one — is the narrator someone the reader wants to travel with.

Ask about any book in your account, however it got there. An uploaded draft you wrote years ago is often the best use of it — you have lost your objectivity about that book entirely, and this has none to lose.

Authors batch their questions. You hit something uncertain in chapter four, make a note to ask someone eventually, and carry on writing around the uncertainty. By the time the editorial report arrives you have written nine more chapters on top of a decision you never actually made.

Almost all of the value in editorial advice is in when it arrives. A structural doubt answered at chapter four costs an afternoon. The same doubt answered at chapter thirteen costs a rewrite, and by then you are also emotionally committed to the version that is wrong. The reason a consultation is expensive is that it is scarce — and scarcity is the thing that makes it arrive too late.

An editor who has actually sold books in your genre carries market judgement no rubric holds — what a particular imprint is buying this year, which agent to approach. That is worth paying for and this does not substitute for it.