Susan Leon
21 Howell Avenue
Larchmont, NY 10538
Phone 914-833-1422
Fax 914-833-1429
sleon@bookdocs.com
Experienced and highly regarded editor, book doctor/ghostwriter and specialist in most fiction and general non-fiction areas. Services include project development, manuscript evaluation and editing, preparation of book proposals, and heavy re-writes (specializing in projects with tight deadlines). I work with publishers, agents, and private clients who seek either mainstream or self-publication. Twenty-five years of industry experience at the William Morris Agency, Viking-Penguin, Atheneum (now Scribner) and William Morrow.
I am a former academic (Columbia University President’s Fellow, doctoral candidate and lecturer) with an expertise in American and European history (social, political, military, legal, woman and family). In addition to history, I have a strong professional interest in memoir and autobiography and story-driven non-fiction. I also love fiction particularly well-crafted historicals, contemporary fiction with bright, compelling, affirmative themes, and intimate literary novels. As an acquisitions editor and now as an editorial consultant, I have edited many regional and national bestsellers, as well as award-winning titles.
Within the industry I am known as a personable, hands-on professional, and I especially enjoy working with new and emerging writers.
Other subject areas of interest to me are: theater, film and television; politics and journalism, education, social policy, travel, parenting, women’s topics; fashion, entertaining and food, psychology, spirituality and fitness.
Authors I have worked with include Lady Antonia Fraser, Joy Fielding, Diane Ackerman, Ursula Hegi, Harvey Fierstein, Dr. Kay Redfield Jamison, Sir Martin Gilbert, Sarah Ban Breathnach, Larry Collins, Andrew Gross, Lucette Lagnado, Steve Coll and Reba McIntyre.
Select recently published titles include: Success: Having the Life You Want (media executive Strauss Zelnick); Heart Broken-Open (a memoir by Kristine Carlson of the Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff series); As I Remember It (philanthropist Daisy M. Soros); and The World is Fat (professor of economics and global nutrition Dr. Barry Popkin). Upcoming titles include Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff for Moms and The China Fallacy, by Washington think tank/Clinton administration Asian affairs expert Donald Gross.
In June 2012, I was a featured panelist at Book Expo America (BEA) in New York City speaking about the editor’s role for authors planning to self-publish.
My list divides evenly between fiction and non-fiction.
I welcome your inquiry.