Your publishing house has just signed an exciting new manuscript, and it promises to be a best-seller. That book might be fiction or non-fiction, modern or historical, a thriller or science fiction, written for adults or young readers. It might be meant as social commentary or pure entertainment. But if a book is to make its most powerful mark, it must always read as authentic.  A History Studio review ensures just that.

History Studio’s award-winning experts offer invaluable assistance to editors and authors alike by being an additional and informed set of eyes on manuscripts in process, under consideration, or on their way to press. We offer close reads of manuscripts and, on every page, we consider the myriad elements that impact how well a book is received by reviewers and readers that too often are overlooked.  Books are at their richest when they move or inform readers in ways they have never imagined—when a book takes them to places they have never been, introduces them to people they would otherwise never know, and when it allows them to empathize with groups whom they might otherwise never have offered consideration.  By working closely with authors, History Studio ensures that the magic that happens when they put pen to page will also be informed and feel culturally authentic.

Bringing History Studio on board means having someone on your editorial team trained to ask vital questions such as:

• Might the author’s descriptions of a character or figure, or the dialogue they give them, unwittingly strike readers as stereotypical, insensitive, or simply uninformed?
• When seeking to develop characters or figures that herald from communities other than their own, has an author sufficiently immersed themselves in the writings and scholarly works of those same communities to ensure their manuscript will ring true with readers?
• Does an author know enough about the history of the period to render it most believably? Is the dialogue true to period, or does it seem anachronistic?
• Will the scenarios upon which an author’s main themes are premised feel plausible to a reader scientifically or logical culturally?

Beyond offering close and careful manuscript reads for cultural sensitivity, authenticity, and accuracy, we also offer the tools that authors actually need if they wish to rewrite a certain paragraph or reconsider a certain premise or storyline. Our experts, for example, can give them the needed historical context of the story they wish to tell, or offer them essential cultural, political, or linguistic background on the dialects they seek to reproduce, or point them to the cultural iconography they need to be aware of, or alert them to any key books or articles on the subject they wish to capture that they should know about.

We also work closely with marketing teams to make sure that the materials they produce not only capture what an author’s book is about but do so in way that is careful to avoid inadvertently alienating potential book buyers or missing the mark with potential reviewers.

Finally, we also assist editors and authors when they begin thinking about the possibility of a book becoming a film or a television series.

Our goal in doing all of this?  To help authors write the most gripping and powerful books they can, to make sure their books are marketed to the widest readership and most diverse group of reviewers possible, and finally to work directly with authors interested in having their work rendered on film or television.  Our team has extensive experience working with entertainment agents, as well as working directly with studios and networks on projects currently in development or production.