by Carly Silver
I’m so excited to be a featured guest blogger on Manuscript Wish List! Since the goal of the website is to connect authors, editors, and agents and help everyone get to know one another, I thought I’d provide a bit of insight into what makes me tick.
My desk has quite a few personal effects: posters of champion Thoroughbred racehorses; a calendar featuring Fuzzberta, the world’s cutest guinea pig; and family photos. I’m an animal aficionado, so my computer background photo is (of corg-se!) a corgi.
While I don’t require manuscripts to have animals in them, it’s always a big draw for me! Add in a stumpy canine companion, a retired Thoroughbred, or a sassy, know-it-all rabbit (feel free to ask this longtime lagomorph owner for inspiration), and you’ve got me wrapped around your literary little finger. For example, in her July 2016 Harlequin Special Edition, the adorably romantic Puppy Love for the Veterinarian, author Amy Woods had me from the moment the downtrodden heroine rescued two puppies in a snowstorm!
My shelves include all of the books I’ve edited, like Carolyn Hector’s The Bachelor and the Beauty Queen and Katie Meyer’s A Valentine for the Veterinarian. And, yes, I may have a thing for veterinarians. Taking a look at these volumes boosts my confidence if I’m having a particularly tough day. A reminder of all the wonderful writers that I work with and many, many hours they’ve put in to create compelling stories, these books never fail to make me smile. In particular, The Bachelor and the Beauty Queen was one of those rare reads that’s just as funny and smart as it was sexy and romantic; editing that book was a dream for me.
That’s why I love my job at Harlequin: I get to work with incredible authors. They’re creative, funny, original, and true romantics that make every day brighter for me. I love the editor-author relationship, the give and take that allows me to help authors deliver the best books they can. Just today I spoke to a writer on the phone to clarify some questions I had about a proposal; listening to her describe her characters’ motivations and passions made me that much more excited about her writing and gave me better insight into the story she’s bringing to life. What’s always most exciting to me is seeing what they’ll come up with, what ideas they’ll generate, what fascinating characters they’ll bring to life.
Right now, I’m looking for smart, sexy submissions from diverse authors for Harlequin Romantic Suspense. Tweet-pitch me @carlyasilver on Twitter, view my full Manuscript Wish List profile, or submit to me at Submittable.com with “ATTN: Carly Silver” in the headline.
