ACADEMY of CHRISTIAN EDITORS
ABOUT THE ACADEMY
The academy is an industry association of Christian editors who serve in the Christian and General markets.
MISSION
To enhance the professional competence of Christian editors and promote a collegial forum for the study and discussion of issues of mutual interest and concern.
MEMBER BENEFITS
- Access to a growing network of highly qualified and widely respected Christian book editors.
- An annual retreat for professional and personal development.
- Regional gatherings and Zoom webinars for continued learning.
- Discounts for a growing list of industry events and professional resources.
- Subscription to a quarterly e-newsletter geared to editorial issues and interests.
- Access to a growing archive of resources for professional and personal development.
FAQ
How Do I Join?
Membership in the Academy of Christian Editors is by invitation. Each spring and fall, current members are invited to nominate freelance or in-house book editors for membership. Once approved by the ACE board, invitations are extended to nominees.
Who Can Join?
Freelance or in-house book editors and collaborators who affirm the Nicene Creed.
Do I Have to Work at a Christian Publishing House or Belong to a Specific Denomination?
No. Members of the Academy of Christian Editors affirm the Nicene Creed, but we are an ecumenical organization, and many of our members work as freelance editors or for publishers who do not publish specifically Christian literature.
How Do I Get the Most out of ACE Membership?
Our annual retreat (held each September in Chicago, Colorado Springs, or Nashville) is our main event each year, where editors gather to hear presentations from authors and industry leaders on timely and pressing concerns, participate in roundtable discussions on issues pertinent to book editing, and experience opportunities for collegiality, networking, and mutual support. The quarterly newsletter also keeps our membership informed of what’s happening in one another’s lives, and regional, online, and conference gatherings provide additional touchpoints between retreats.
What Is the Cost to Join?
ACE members pay annual dues of $75.
Recommended Books By ACE Members
Write Better: A Lifelong Editor on Craft, Art, and Spirituality
In this primer on nonfiction writing, Andrew Le Peau offers insights he has learned as a published author and an editor for over forty years, training, guiding, and cheering on hundreds of writers. Here are skills that writers can master―from finding strong openings and closings, to focusing on an audience, to creating a clear structure, to crafting a persuasive message. With wide-ranging examples from fiction and nonfiction, Le Peau also demystifies aspects of art in writing such as creativity, tone, and metaphor.
Igniting Your Influence
From this one book, you’ll gain the wisdom and insight of hundreds of books published and millions sold. Your guides include executive coaches, business leaders, career authors, various industry experts, an undercover federal agent, military officers, and an NFL hall-of-famer. But more than their credentials is the credibility that comes from their expertise and their success. And every one of them has a book to prove it!
Recommended Books
the Christian Writer’s Manual of Style
The standard style guide of the Christian publishing industry, The Christian Writer’s Manual of Style, 4th Edition, compiled by veteran Zondervan editor Robert Hudson, contains clear guidance on style questions related to religious writing, including many topics not addressed in other references or online.
The Elements of Style
The concise handbook remains one of the most important and influential English writing style guides ever published. The original edition of the guide is organized into eight elementary rules of usage (such as using the active voice rather than the passive), ten elementary rules of composition (including the rule of omitting needless words), several matters of form, 49 commonly misused words and expressions, and 57 words often misspelled.
The Writing Life
Featuring a gathering of more than fifty of contemporary literature’s finest voices, this volume will enchant, move, and inspire readers with its tales of The Writing Life. In it, authors divulge professional secrets: how they first discovered they were writers, how they work, how they deal with the myriad frustrations and delights a writer’s life affords.
The Writing Life
In these short essays, Annie Dillard—the author of Pilgrim at Tinker Creek and An American Childhood—illuminates the dedication, absurdity, and daring that characterize the existence of a writer. A moving account of Dillard’s own experiences while writing her works, The Writing Life offers deep insight into one of the most mysterious professions.
“Writers arent people exactly. Or if they’re any good, they’re a whole lot of people trying hard to be one person.
– f. Scott Fitzgerald
“Another thing your teachers didn’t tell you is that one day, arguments over whether or not to capitalize the word internet would constitute half your workday and lead to severed ties with many people you once considered close friends and family.”
– Emmy J. Favilla
“So the writer who breeds more words than he needs, is making a chore for the reader who reads.”