Betsy Lerner

© Copyright 2002, Betsy Lerner. All Rights Reserved

The Forest for the Trees by Betsy Lerner

Reviewed by: Kimberlee Roth (Author Showcase)

With deadlines continually looming for freelancers. "pleasure reading" seems like a cruel reminder of that pile of unread books by the nightstand. Betsy Lerner's Forest for the Trees is one to move to the top of the stack posthaste. It will make you chuckle, explore, conquer, and wonder, "How did she know that?" Lerner, a former editor at Simon & Schuster, Ballantine, Houghton Mifflin and Doubleday and now agent with The Gernert Company, shares insights into writers personalities (she covers the good, the bad and the ugly) and the publishing process. Forest for the Trees is not a "how-to" book. At the outset Lerner promises not to "Strunk you over the head," and keeps her word.

Lerner devotes the first half of the book to Writing. There, she delves into the characteristics of the Ambivalent Writer, the Natural, the Wicked Child and the Self-Promoter, among others. Through anecdotes about literary figures and her own clients, she touches on the neuroses, ambitions and insecurities that distort our perspective, preventing us from seeing the big picture (hence the title).

In the second half of the book, Publishing, Lerner covers working with agents and editors, rejection, revision and life A.P. (After Publication) through stories of her own and others foibles and achievements. There's plenty of advice for the taking, and with Lerner's wit and flair, plenty of humorous surprises too. The traits she's identified and the publishing process aren't always pretty, but Lerner offers her keen insight as does a good friend with respect and understanding and an outstretched hand.


Copyright 2001 Kimberlee Roth. All Rights Reserved.