Write right: 'Everybody Needs an Editor' transforms everyday communication

Wedding toasts, website copy, social media posts, even holiday cards--you'll become a sharper everyday writer with this witty and comprehensive guide to clearer, better communication. You'll never write an email the same way after reading Everybody Needs an Editor, a game-changing guide to sharp, attention-getting writing.

The authors (Melissa Harris and Jenn Bane, with editing by Mark Jacob) use their decades of real-life journalism and marketing expertise to demonstrate the WTFF technique: Writing, Topping, Formatting, and Fixing. You'll learn how to eviscerate your own writing--and enjoy doing so. You'll learn to create must-click subject lines, cut jargon, and write emails that people will actually read and remember. If you've ever felt nervous to hit a submit button, this book is for you.

In this new guide from Simon Element, you’ll also learn how to use ChatGPT without sacrificing your humanity, how to write emails that will actually get opened, and how to make a presentation that will keep your colleagues off their phones.

This book will also guilt you into taking tired cliches out of your vocabulary. No more shopworn phrases like “now more than ever,” “the future is now,” and “it remains to be seen.”

Co-author Harris was a star reporter at major newspapers, and co-author Bane is an expert communicator who was the first hire for the adult party game Cards Against Humanity. Their advice is relentlessly practical but also very funny. Because the mistakes we make in communication can be hilarious. And we all make them. That’s why EVERYBODY NEEDS AN EDITOR. 

The book’s section on Artificial Intelligence is especially relevant, because AI does not relieve us of the responsibility of writing well. AI loves cliches and hates fact checking. And when it produces a first draft, it turns us into editors. And it’s up to us to infuse life into the finished product. This book tells you how to do that.

Harris and Bane’s book is an essential guide to writing well, whether it’s in our professional or personal lives. One section is titled “How to Write Work Emails That Won’t Make Your Coworkers Hate You.” Another offers 10 steps to help you avoid embarrassing yourself while giving a wedding toast. Whether you get stumped when writing website copy or while composing holiday messages, this book can help.

(Coming Sept. 10, order here)

About the Authors:

Melissa Harris is the founder and CEO of M. Harris & Co., a Chicago-based marketing agency. She spent fifteen years as a journalist at the Orlando Sentinel, The Baltimore Sun, and Chicago Tribune. She serves as an entrepreneur in residence at the Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation at the University of Chicago and on the governing board of The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

Jenn Bane is an author, producer, and the creative director of M. Harris & Co. Her first book, Friendshipping, is a feel-good guide to making friends as a busy and anxious adult. Previously Jenn was the first-ever hire at Cards Against Humanity, where she earned a Clio Award for Excellence in Advertising, a fact she intended to omit from this bio but added it because coauthor Melissa Harris ordered her to.