COMMENTS
BY PUBLISHED/PRODUCED WRITERS
Robert
Lambolle's sharp eye and perceptive sense of readability have been
invaluable components in making my books the finessed finished products
that they are. His ability to hone in on detail and suggest additional
references while giving attention to the overall ‘feel’
of the read are rare, treasured qualities in literary consultation.
I cannot reward him sufficiently, in word or deed, for his services.
Prof. BRENDA
DIXON GOTTSCHILD (USA), author of DIGGING THE AFRICANIST PRESENCE
IN AMERICAN PERFORMANCE (Greenwood Press), WALTZING IN THE DARK (St.
Martin's Press, New York), and THE BLACK DANCING BODY (Palgrave Macmillan),
winner of the de la Torre Bueno Prize for Dance History Scholarship
Your advice and comments, reflecting your special interest in cinema
and theatre, have been extremely useful to me. Many thanks for all
the help and inspiration you've provided over the years.
JOEL W. FINLER,
author of several books on cinema, including
THE HOLLYWOOD STORY (BFI Cinema Book of the Year Award)
a shrewd and discriminating reader
ROBERT IRWIN,
author of THE ARABIAN NIGHTMARE,
EXQUISITE CORPSE and THE ARABIAN NIGHTS: A COMPANION
Your comments are always valuable and your proof reading is immaculate!
... Thanks for taking the time to go through it and for such a detailed
response.
KATHLEEN JONES,
author of
CATHERINE COOKSON: A BIOGRAPHY (Constable, Little Brown, Warner)
I have benefited
so much from the many hours of editorial input you have supplied.
You have done an excellent job on my first book, Sorrows of the
Moon and it gives me great pleasure to ask you to edit my second
book, Empire of the Mind.
IQBAL AHMED,
author of SORROWS OF THE MOON (Coldstream Publishers),
London Review Bookshop's Book
of the Week. Cited as a
Book of the Year by Iain Sinclair in The Guardian and by Lilian Pizzichini
in The Independent on Sunday
A careful and gentle
reader, and an excellent critic. Robert Lambolle’s editorial
skills are second to none - he is precise, patient and perceptive.
In a word: worth every penny.
ANDY MARINO,
author of HERSCHEL - THE BOY WHO STARTED WORLD WAR II
(Big Time Press) and AMERICAN PIMPERNEL (Hutchinson)
What a relief to discover you're still around, and doing what you
do - especially for people like me. I'm sure you won't remember, but
back in 1992 you critiqued my first ever novel … Your helpful
advice, insight, and comments definitely led the way for this enthusiastic
amateur to become a published writer. Up to now I've had short stories
published in My Weekly, The Lady, People's Friend, and World Wide
Writers.
LISA AMMERMAN
You may be interested to know that I re-worked HOLY into a two-act
stage play in Maltese under the title EVERY HONOUR AND GLORY which
I entered for a drama competition organised by the Department of Culture.
It was awarded first prize and was performed at the Manoel Theatre,
Malta's national theatre, with great success ... It goes without saying
that your comments were extremely useful in reshaping the plot.
JOSEPH VELLA
BONDIN (Malta)
Once again, thank you for your very helpful comments, and your convincingly
detailed and discerning report ... your analysis crystallized a great
many things for me and has been extremely helpful … I enclose
a copy of An Unmarried Man - with many thanks for being my 'sounding
board'.
PATRICK SMITH
(Paris), author of AN UNMARRIED MAN (Jonathan Cape)
It was a pleasure to receive such precise criticism coupled with your
inspired suggestions to overcome the fundamental difficulty of 'meshing
intestinally' the two strands of the book ... your criticism of the
biography is amazingly perceptive for someone who has never read a
book on Columbus ... I am heartened that you think this is salvageable
and I shall have your suggestions very much in mind while I rewrite
what must be rewritten.
RICHARD CROSFIELD
(Madrid), author of
COLUMBUS: A DISCOVERER AND HIS CONSCIENCE (Frontier Publishing)
You are, without
doubt, the best-read man I've ever met.
DR. KEVIN
McCARRON, author of WILLIAM GOLDING
(Northcote House), Lecturer in English, Roehampton Institute, London
Your letter arrived... so did those interesting (and very sensible)
book proposal notes by Robert Lambolle.
LEN DEIGHTON
(reply to Reading and Righting client,
commenting on RL’s ‘Non-Fiction Book Proposal Guidelines’
(For comment by JOANNE HARRIS, see ‘Home
Page’)
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COMMENTS
BY LITERARY AGENTS
Robert Lambolle is our first port of call for committed
in-depth MS assessment and precision editing. A creative person himself,
he understands the creative process from the inside. Unusually, he's
equally at home with fiction, non-fiction, plays and screenplays.
And he always delivers on time.
RICHARD GOLLNER,
Radala & Associates Literary Agency
Hang on to your reader, Richard. His reports are outstandingly perceptive
and well-written.
AL ZUCKERMAN,
Writer's House Agency, NY, author of HOW TO WRITE THE BEST-SELLER,
commenting
on report accompanying MS submission by Radala agency
How can I thank you enough for the wonderful editing job that you've
carried out on our Fiction Guidelines? I am so very grateful and I
found some of your suggestions quite inspirational and I wish I'd
thought of them myself... Thank you so much for doing such a thorough
and helpful edit.
CAROLINE DAVIDSON,
Literary Agent
Thank you very much for the two reports which, as ever, were fascinating
and enlightening to read... Both Caroline and I read them avidly and
totally agreed with all your comments… I look forward to being
in touch again soon, and to reading another of your riveting reports...
I am at the moment busy compiling a 'Novel Checklist' designed to
be full of handy tips and points to remember for first-time novelists
and I am finding your reports invaluable.
ALICE HUNT,
Caroline Davidson Literary Agency
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MISCELLANEOUS
CLIENT RESPONSES
I thank you for your careful reading of my stories, and for the comments,
which I found encouraging and nourishing ... Just thinking about this
again gives me the urge to work on fiction.
T.M. (Paris)
Thank you so much for your comments on our TV script. As usual they
were very perceptive; I agree with just about every word you said.
It was our first try at a TV script; I think we can do much better.
S.P. (London)
On doing the revision, according to your helpful suggestions, I was
increasingly struck by how much work you had put into editing the
manuscript, how much time it must have taken and how careful you had
been. I am extremely grateful for that.
D.D. (Cheshire)
Thank you ... for your prompt and positive analysis of my book. Your
suggestions have given me much to think about, and the report has
given me the confidence and enthusiasm for the project which I very
much needed. I now no longer doubt that it will be carried to a successful
conclusion.
Ms. J.E. (U.S.A).
I will never be able to thank you enough for winding me up and pointing
me in the right direction. How you dug up such pertinent information
sheets I will forever wonder! So one small thank you will have to
do.
Ms. M.M. (Cardiff)
I am thrilled to find such a sensitive response to my work in the
UK (land of my roots)... Once again, thank you for your interest in
me and my work… Your report served to get me into this darned
manuscript for another re-working despite much initial resistance
on my part after many stages of production. Now I am loving it and
actually revelling in the improvements I see taking shape.
P.D. (Hawaii)
Thank you for your excellent report... I must also tell you that I
have learned more about writing from you than from two years in a
writer's circle. I'm afraid that in general writers are too nice to
criticise, they would rather not give offence. Possibly they fear
bringing wrath on themselves, I don't know... With many thanks.
D.B.R. (Northumberland)
Thank you for your swift and no holds barred analysis of my book...
I'd say that I agree with about 95% of your comments... I did find
your criticism helpful though I have to confess an initial reaction
of wishing to re-arrange your face or perhaps break your thumbs! ...
Thank you again for your help.
A.W. (Cumbria)
After taking on board many of your suggestions the first agent I resubmitted
it to accepted it.
D.F. (Wales)
What a wonderful Christmas present! Many thanks for managing to complete
the final edit before the holiday [and] for giving me a re-education…
Of course I take note of your caution - I too am mindful of the obstacle
race of present-day publishing - but it is most gratifying to have
got this far. I could not have reached this situation without your
help. You have been a marvellous editor.
T.A. (Essex)
Your advice has helped me enormously, beyond any other that I have
ever received ... I should like to thank you for all you have done
for me; in fact, I wish there were a better way than this to express
my gratitude.
T.W. (Berlin)
What your report did was help me break down this last wall... I can
never thank you enough.
Ms. H.F. (Bournemouth)
I was so surprised to receive such a constructive, critical review.
You must have spent a good deal of your time on the MS. (I can't say
as much for my American editor). You have correctly pinpointed the
difficulties I've been trying to come to terms with the past two years.
I honestly felt I'd reached an impasse.
Ms. J.A. (Paris)
Just a few lines to thank you for the professional job you did on
the manuscript ... Your comments and criticisms were all very constructive
and not so hard to take when one considers how accurate they were.
There is very obviously a need for me to look carefully at both my
style and technique. Your assessment will go a long way to helping
me find where to start ... Thank you again for all your hard work.
M.M. (Japan)
I found your comments intelligent, pertinent, comprehensive and thoughtful.
There were moments reading them ... when I had the uncomfortable feeling
that you had thought more about what I'd written than I had ... So
my gratitude for your efforts. I can't conceive that I could have
got a better editing job elsewhere. And it was something I needed.
I had very much written myself into a corner.
F.M. (Wolverhampton)
Your assessment... is probably the most helpful advice I have ever
had on anything that I have written, and my only regret is that I
didn't discover you much earlier.
D.D-R. (London)
Many thanks for all your work ... Can I also take this opportunity
to say that it has been rewarding working with you. Not simply to
get this damned [novel] closer towards publication, but also that
I feel this process, where your contribution has been essential, has
improved the few writing skills I happen to have. Never mind publication:
that alone has made it worthwhile.
D.F. (Sheffield)
You have done a masterful job, and earned your fee many times over.
When I think of some of the modern novels I've read recently, I wonder
what the outcome would have been if the authors had gone to you first.
A.B. (Denmark)
Thank you very much for another unsparing report on my latest attempt
at screenwriting. I very much appreciate, as always, your candour
... As to your comments I agree with them wholeheartedly ... I intend
to go back and re-think the whole creative process I am applying to
screenplay writing, and, as you mentioned, my own motivation for writing
them in the first place.
R.N. (London)
I found your comments extremely helpful. I am confident the changes
I make in the next few weeks will tighten and improve the work.
N.F. (Barcelona,
Spain)
Thank you for your help and for the effort you are taking to make
these stories publishable ... I also am delighted with your ideas
for change to the story ... Your talent and encouragement is immensely
appreciated ... I do appreciate your work so much, and your professional
help and advice makes such a difference to the stories.
Ms. H.H. (N.Ireland)
Your evaluation just received and much appreciated. Many thanks indeed.
I am persuaded by 99% of what you say and will make good use of it.
M.N. (Perth,
Australia)
I'd like to thank you once again for your very constructive criticism
of my novel, which inspired me to make considerable improvements (I
hope!), even though I realise it might still not be quite there yet.
Ms. W.M. (Cracow,
Poland)
With regards your recent assessment of my two sit-com pilots I must
say I am extremely disappointed, upset and angry - that I didn't contact
you sooner. All your comments were perceptive, constructive, wholly
justified and more helpful than any insular writers group ever could
be. With the benefit of your comments and hindsight everything you
said is actually rather obvious and I could kick myself for not seeing
it. Still, I suppose it's a case of the wood for the trees.
R.N. (London)
Many thanks for your letter and report. The dust settled very quickly
because I realized that your report was a valuable one - it did, in
fact, confirm many of my own doubts ... Your report was surprisingly
detailed for the time you had my manuscript and was certainly money
well spent.
C.S. (Oxfordshire)
Many thanks for your response to and suggestions about my TV screenplay
... I must say I'm very heartened and reassured by the suggestions
you make, because a number of them refer to things I had vaguely wondered
about but hadn't fully articulated to myself, so you have helped clarify
them ... and other things you mention which I hadn't thought of ...
make me nod in agreement and go ah yes! good point! That seems to
me to indicate that I can trust my own judgement a bit more than I
thought... My intention is to write another draft, taking into account
your points ... but even if this effort doesn't make it, I am at least
encouraged to try my hand at another one - which could well mean more
work coming your way in due course.
R.K. (Devon)
... the most refreshingly honest and helpful feedback I've ever had.
D.D. (Merseyside)
