Book Manuscripts · Book Proposals · Hostwriting
Editorial services for expert-authored nonfiction.
Thirty years of experience publishing serious nonfiction devoted to your next book.
At five presses,* Thomas LeBien acquired, edited, and published trade books to textbooks, first-time authors and repeat bestsellers, and works across the sciences, social sciences, and humanities. LeBien Ink turns an author's expertise into books readers remember, recommend, and enjoy.
*Harvard University Press, Simon & Schuster, Farrar, Straus & Giroux, Princeton University Press, and Oxford University Press
Thomas LeBien
Founder · Editor & Publisher
30+
Years
Publishing expertise
100+
Award-Winning
Titles
30+
Best Sellers
National & NYT*
*Across multiple nonfiction subjects, including science, history, sports, and more.
- 01 Waking Up Sam Harris
- 02 Harvard University Press Executive Editor
- 03 Katrina: A History, 1915–2015 Andy Horowitz
- 04 The Gales of November John U. Bacon
- 05 Farrar, Straus & Giroux Publisher · Hill & Wang
- 06 Mirror to America John Hope Franklin
- 07 Fahrenheit 451 Ray Bradbury
- 08 Oxford University Press Editor
- 09 Health Care Reform Jonathan Gruber
- 01 Slouching Towards Utopia J. Bradford DeLong
- 02 Traveling Black Mia Bay
- 03 Simon & Schuster VP & Senior Editor
- 04 What Works Iris Bohnet
- 05 Their Life's Work Gary M. Pomerantz
- 06 Princeton University Press Editor
- 07 Impeachment: A Citizen's Guide Cass R. Sunstein
- 08 Extraterrestrial Avi Loeb
- 09 Scientific American / FSG Publisher
Thomas LeBien
A thirty-year veteran of publishing.
Thomas LeBien has worked at top-tier university and commercial presses: Executive Editor at Harvard University Press; Vice President and Senior Editor at Simon & Schuster; Publisher of Hill & Wang and Scientific American / Farrar, Straus and Giroux; Editor at Princeton University Press; and Editor at Oxford University Press.
He has returned imprints to profitability, invented and launched a line of bestselling, genre-defining graphic novels, published Hill & Wang's first Oprah-pick book, and edited or published multiple New York Times bestsellers and award-winning authors.
The better editor leads to the better book proposal leads to the better book.
Selected Works
Books edited, developed, or published by Thomas LeBien.
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Bestseller Waking Up
Sam Harris
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Bestseller Slouching Towards Utopia
J. Bradford DeLong
-
Traveling Black
Mia Bay
-
Katrina: A History, 1915–2015
Andy Horowitz
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Bestseller The Gales of November
John U. Bacon
-
What Works
Iris Bohnet
-
Their Life's Work
Gary M. Pomerantz
-
Bestseller Mirror to America
John Hope Franklin
-
Fahrenheit 451
Ray Bradbury
-
Bestseller Impeachment: A Citizen's Guide
Cass R. Sunstein
-
Bestseller Extraterrestrial
Avi Loeb
-
Health Care Reform
Jonathan Gruber
- 01 Republic.com
- 02 Traveling Black
- 03 Katrina
- 04 Democracy: A Case Study
- 05 Impeachment: A Citizen's Guide
- 06 The Gales of November
- 07 Three and Out
- 08 Law 101
- 09 Night
- 10 Island on Fire
- 11 Thomas Paine and the Promise of America
- 12 Elements of Surprise
- 13 Fortune's Formula
- 14 American Transcendentalism
- 15 Unruly Americans
- 16 Waking Up
- 17 The Last Tsar
- 01 Extraterrestrial
- 02 Slouching Towards Utopia
- 03 What Works
- 04 When Police Kill
- 05 Their Life's Work
- 06 The Great Halifax Explosion
- 07 Fourth and Long
- 08 Health Care Reform: What It Is, Why It's Necessary, How It Works
- 09 The Cartoon Introduction to Economics
- 10 My Old Kentucky Home
- 11 Pocahontas and the Powhatan Dilemma
- 12 Mirror to America
- 13 Breaking the Deadlock
- 14 The Age of Lincoln
- 15 The 9/11 Report: A Graphic Adaptation
- 16 Strom Thurmond's America
- 17 The Bonobo Sisterhood
The Better Editor
The better editor brings a breadth and wealth of experience to making your book memorable.
The better editor has acquired, edited, developed, and published books just like yours. They have experience with multiple genres and subjects. They have helped create works that meet both reputational and financial expectations. The better editor knows the shoals and deeps of publishing, its squalls and its calms.
Over three decades I've been everything from an editorial assistant to a publisher. I've acquired, edited, developed, and helped write bestsellers. I've published award-winning monographs, trade books, and graphic novels and have overseen multi-edition textbooks. Science, history, memoir, biography, business, sports: I've worked across all nonfiction.
- 01 Oxford University Press
- 02 Hill & Wang
- 03 Scientific American/Farrar, Straus and Giroux
- 04 Harvard University Press
- 05 MIT Press
- 06 W. W. Norton
- 07 Hachette Book Group
- 08 University of Chicago Press
- 09 University of Michigan Press
- 01 Princeton University Press
- 02 Farrar, Straus and Giroux
- 03 Simon and Schuster
- 04 Yale University Press
- 05 University of North Carolina Press
- 06 Basic Books
- 07 Mariner Books
- 08 University of California Press
- 09 Harper Wave
The Better Proposal
The better proposal is a sales pitch for and blueprint of your book.
The better proposal pitches who will buy your book and why, positions you and your book among the competition, and through its complementary five-part structure persuades publishers to embrace your expectations.
The day after your book is acquired, the better proposal becomes your book's blueprint, ensuring those expectations are met.
- 01 Richard Posner
- 02 Cass Sunstein
- 03 John Hope Franklin
- 04 Camilla Townsend
- 05 Franklin Zimring
- 06 Landon Jones
- 07 Ernie Colon
- 08 Tamar Gendler
- 09 O. Vernon Burton
- 10 Yoram Bauman
- 11 Jonathan Gruber
- 12 Hal Holbrook
- 13 Gary Pomerantz
- 14 Tsuyoshi Hasegawa
- 15 Ted Steinberg
- 16 William Nordhaus
- 17 Peter Diamandis
- 18 Lillian Faderman
- 19 David Moss
- 20 Paul Rosenbaum
- 21 Bruce Ackerman
- 22 Mia Bay
- 23 Andy Horowitz
- 24 Diane Rosenfeld
- 25 Jay Feinman
- 26 Paul Golstein
- 01 Emily Bingham
- 02 Eric Rauchway
- 03 William Poundstone
- 04 Harvey Kaye
- 05 Robert Self
- 06 Sid Jacobson
- 07 Philip Gura
- 08 Woody Holton
- 09 Ray Bradbury
- 10 T.H. Breen
- 11 Marc Levinson
- 12 Joseph Crespino
- 13 David Brion Davis
- 14 Sam Harris
- 15 Max Bazerman
- 16 John U. Bacon
- 17 Erika Lee
- 18 Timothy Tyson
- 19 Iris Bohnet
- 20 Vera Tobin
- 21 J. Bradford DeLong
- 22 Tom Zoellner
- 23 Avi Loeb
- 24 Elie Wiesel
- 25 Michael Holt
The Better Manuscript
The better manuscript is built iteratively and collaboratively.
How much developmental, line, and substantive editing your manuscript needs depends on your book and your expectations for it.
Developmental editing organizes content, shapes its presentation, and suggests what to add and what to cut. Line editing works at the paragraph and sentence level — word choice, style, phrasing. Substantive editing tightens arguments and sharpens themes, eliminating ambiguity while heightening persuasion and drama.
Hostwriter
And, sometimes, you hire a hostwriter.
No, that's not a typo. But it begs the question: what's a hostwriter?
What a hostwriter isn't: a ghostwriter. A ghost writes a manuscript that someone else puts their name to.
What a hostwriter is: a custom-built, collaborative team that drafts your book by curating your voice, your argument, and your ambitions.
Your voice. Your argument. Your ambitions — drafted by a team built around your book.
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