What Is a Book Coach? (And Why You Need One)
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Security hands you a visitor's pass and sends you to the elevator bank with instructions to go to the 27th floor.
When you reach your stop, the doors open to blindless windows beaming light off of every bit of white space. Carefully curated coifs bounce around with the appearance of effortlessness. Steaming cups of coffee rest on spotless desks with Instagram-worthy stationary setups.
Reception quickly escorts you to a conference room that seems more fitting for Architecture Digest than an office. You would take some time to breathe it all in, but the glowing welcome of the publishing team takes over.
We’re so excited to finally meet you.
Your book — is the voice of a new generation. How have you not been discovered yet?
Even though your manuscript is still raw, there’s a gem just waiting under the surface. We can’t wait to spend months and years working with you to get there.
Ahhh, yes. That’s how we like to think that our publishing journey will unfold, right?
We’ll pound away by ourselves, able to see the whole or non-working pieces of our manuscript and be able to submit a blind query to a publishing house and be the next great American writer.
But there’s a lot that happens before you submit your manuscript, and what most writers don’t like to admit, is that at some point, you have to let someone else into your work. And this goes beyond a writer’s group or casually asking a friend to read your first 100 pages.
You need a true partner who will support you through the ebbs and flows of the writing process and who not only guides you to a finished product, but a finished product people will want to read.
You need a book coach. Here’s everything you need to know about what they do, how to choose one and how to make the most out of your coaching experience.
What Does a Book Coach Do?
In short, a book coach guides you through the book writing process. Depending on your goals, you could work with a coach for a few months or even years. You’ll focus on one project at a time with your coach giving you assignment deadlines, editorial feedback and a set number of coaching sessions.
The specifics of how each coach works may vary, but there are three things that every book coach should provide.
Story Development
From Emily Dickinson and Thomas Wentworth Higginson to F. Scott Fitzgerald and Maxwell Perkins, it used to be that good writers worked with a trusted editor for years and years. Beyond simple grammar or formatting edits, these pairs were collaborative partners — chipping away at work until its best form was able to take shape.
However as the publishing industry has evolved, there are fewer resources to nurture such relationships.
It’s not that time isn’t being spent editing books, but publishing houses and editors have more moving parts to consider, especially when it comes to marketing and social media.
Those writer/ editor relationships of a seemingly bygone era may not be entirely lost though — they just have a new title: writer and book coach.
Before your manuscript ever hits an editor or agent’s desk, it needs to be complete or nearly complete. Those months spent developing your protagonist or rewriting chapter 3 — that happens with a book coach guiding you.
They’ll be that critical eye to guide you to the deep layers of character and story development. This is beyond what your writers group may give you — often surface-level critiques from other writers who are more concerned with what you have to say about their work than giving you useful notes. Or on the other end of the spectrum, the group rips your work apart leaving you too scared to make changes because suddenly everything is wrong.
A book coach has no other agenda than to help you find the best story you can tell.
Emotional Support
It starts out great — an initial spark, a moment of genius so poignant that you can’t get to a computer or notebook fast enough.
And then, a few pages or even chapters in, you lose steam. You reread your work and question everything. Or doubt starts to creep in when you see other writers you know being published, and you feel so far behind. Worse yet, you might have given your pages to someone and received a harsh critique you don’t know what to do with.
So, rather than working through fear and insecurity, you convince yourself you’re not a writer.
Until you hire a book coach, that is.
Your book coach knows the sweat and tears you’ve poured into your manuscript, and they can help you filter through the frustration and disappointment, so you can keep writing.
Writing in any form is an act of bravery, but writing a book? That's Mt. Everest.
You can’t anticipate specific setbacks — getting sick, an increase of hours at your day job, writing 25,000 words that have to be thrown out — but you can anticipate that they will happen. And when they do, you need someone who’s invested in your manuscript and can continue to be a champion of your work when you feel like you can’t.
Project Management
Woah. Project management sounds so serious.
Well, it is.
And believe it or not, but writing a book is a project. It’s a massive undertaking, and one that most writers can’t manage themselves.
If you’re not given deadlines with someone waiting on the other end, you’re more likely to drag out the process. It’s easier to tinker with scenes or chapters and dream that your finished work will be perfect, but much harder to hand over the pages when you feel like they’re not quite there.
But if your ultimate dream is to make this book something people will want to read, you have to hand over the reins at sometime. Hiring a book coach alleviates the stress of creating and maintaining your own deadlines.
It allows you to stay in your zone of genius, which is exactly where you should be.
How to Choose a Book Coach
Now that you know what a book coach does, it’s time to choose your dream one. But where do you even begin? Your current network is a good place to start. Tell people about the type of project you’re working on and ask if they know anyone who works with writers like you.
If your network comes up short there, you can search for book coaches or editors via Google. There are sites like Reedsy and New York Book Editors, where you can hire specific people or a general team for your project. Take some time searching for potential matches. You’re going to spend a lot of time with this person or team, so don’t throw money at someone unless you’re ready to commit.
So, here’s the three things to look for when choosing a book coach.
Specialty
Every coach has a niche, and good ones will be able to pair down their specialty as much as possible. Story is universal, but you want to make sure that your coach gets what you’re doing and truly understands the genre you’re writing in. You’re not just looking for someone who loves books, but someone who can elevate your work within their specialty.
For example, you’re writing a food cozy (murder mystery light), so you look for a food book coach. You find someone who has worked in food writing and editing for years. You love their blog and newsletter, so you set up an introductory call and submit a chapter to them. There’s some immediate energy, and you’re both excited to work together.
But they don’t know anything about cozy novels. In fact, they don’t even know they’ve ever read one. They couldn’t even tell you the common tropes or formulas for them. You end up having to coach your coach on the genre and spend so much time explaining the structure that you’re exhausted by the thought of another coaching call.
This is the last thing you want.
In this case, you’d want to start with a book coach who specializes in cozy novels, and then possibly bring in a food book coach for any specific culinary pieces.
Coaches will often list their specialties on their about, work with me or FAQ pages of their website. You can also find examples of the folks they work with on a testimonial page and see if there’s any alignment there.
Availability
This should go without saying, but you and your book coach should have the right availability before diving into a working relationship. First, you want someone who is available to work with you when you’re ready.
Some coaches only take clients at specific times of the year, while others have rolling schedules. If you have your heart set on a book coach who can’t take you on for a few months, see if they have suggestions for anything you can work on in the meantime.
You’ll also want to look for deadline schedules, coaching call availability and how long typical packages are. If a book coach has a rule of all calls being scheduled 72 hours in advance, but your schedule is in constant flux, you may need to find another coach who can accommodate those needs.
Keep in mind that coaches are working within their own time zone, so if you’re halfway around the world, you may not want to wake up at 2am for a coaching call. Or maybe you do. That’s your call to make.
Process and Workflow
Along with scheduling, you want a book coach who has a process you’ll work well within.
If a book coach has an expectation of weekly deadlines at 5pm on Fridays, but you need at least two weeks in between submissions, that’s something to consider. You also want to know how your potential book coach will handle the logistics of your project. Some questions to ask are:
How easy will it be to submit your work?
What does the developmental editing process look like?
How will missed deadlines or coaching calls be handled?
What kind of communication can you expect from your book coach?
If you have to put your project on hold, do they have options for that?
Most of these answers can be found on a coach’s FAQ, work with me, or blog pages. If you’re not sure, ask them on your introductory call or shoot the book coach an email. Even though creative processes are messy, you want the sense that your book coach has a general framework for working with clients and handling project details.
How to Make the Most of Your Book Coaching Experience
Now that you know what a book coach does and how to choose them, you need to know how to make the most of your coaching experience. This is your chance to dig deep into the book project you’ve been dreaming about, so use your time well. Here are a few ways to make your book coaching experience the best it possibly can be.
Protect Your Deadlines
This may seem like a no-brainer, but you would be surprised at how quickly you let life push your writing to the side. Don’t assume the time will appear to sit down and work. You have to carve consistent time out.
Is writing every day the ideal? For many writers, yes. But even if you have three days blocked off for a two hour writing session, you’ll have more productive pages than winging it between deadlines.
A lot of writers try to wait for the perfect circumstances to be inspired. They’re going on a trip or will be alone for the weekend, so they’ll write then. You know what happens though? The internet goes out at your scenic cabin in the woods right when you’re supposed to submit your pages. A pipe bursts in your bathroom, and you spend the whole weekend with your plumber instead of rewriting the chapter that’s due first thing Monday morning.
Most likely, you’re not working on a 24-hour turnaround, so protect your deadlines. Add them to your calendar. Block time off in your schedule to write. Turn your phone on silent. You’re paying good money for book coaching. Why would you want to waste it by missing deadlines and not getting the results you’re hoping for?
Over Communicate
Building off of the above, if you know you’re going to miss your deadline, let your book coach know at least one business day in advance. Rarely does something come up where you have absolutely no time to meet the deadline you’ve known about.
If you’re emailing your coach at 7pm on a Thursday that you’re going to miss your 9am deadline on Friday, you probably already knew that on Tuesday or Wednesday. Tell your coach as soon as you see an issue, so they can possibly adjust the assignment.
Over-communicating is the best way to walk away with work you’re proud of. Your book coach can’t help you if they don’t know what you’re struggling with. If there’s a chapter you can’t seem to figure out, tell your coach. If you’re not excited about your story anymore and not sure what to do, schedule a coaching call with them. The more open you are about what’s really happening in your writing practice, the more effective your coach can be in addressing your exact needs.
Read
When a writer’s pages show up dull and uninspired, chances are they’re not reading. Use the library. Listen to audio books. Buy books outside of your professional genre. If you want someone else to pick up the book you’re writing, pick up other people’s work too. You need to know what’s out there, how people are telling stories and ways you can improve your own craft.
As Stephen King said: If you don't have time to read, you don't have the time (or the tools) to write. Simple as that.
Taking the Leap
If you’re tired of unhelpful editorial advice or being frustrated with the book writing process because you don’t know what ends up, it may be time to hire help.
Your book coach isn’t writing your book for you or deciding what the final product should be. They’re simply a guide to bring forth a complete version of the story you believe in.