My books and what I wore

I've been a professional book editor since 1981, specializing in memoir, self-help, psychology, women's issues, parenting, and health. Since 2002, when I left Random House as an executive editor, I've been a full-time editor, ghost writer, and writer, critiquing, creating, and editing proposals and manuscripts.

My latest collaborations include working with media powerhouse Pat Mitchell, founder of TEDWomen among other plaudits, on her memoir Becoming a Dangerous Woman; Candice Bergen on her bestseller A Fine Romance; Maureen Chiquet, former Global CEO of Chanel, with her six-figure proposal for Beyond the Label; and Chris Kresser with a seven-figure proposal for his bestselling Personal Paleo Code. I also served as outside editor for Boyd Varty’s Cathedral of the Wild, a deeply moving, spiritual, and often hilarious memoir of a South African raised on Londolozi Game Reserve.

I've been extraordinarily lucky to work with amazing best selling authors like Dr. Martha Beck, President Jimmy Carter, Carrie Fisher, Marci Shimoff, Lucinda Franks, Mary Matalin, Rosalynn Carter, Dr. Daniel Amen, Dr. Susan Love, and many more. I particularly enjoy working closely with authors to develop polished proposals and sample chapters that agents can take to auction. (Almost all my proposals sell for six—and sometimes seven—figures.) I also work with folks I call “FAA’s”—Famous Anonymous Authors—as both editor and ghostwriter. Because I've signed non-disclosure agreements that compel me to surrender internal organs of which I am personally fond if I name names, I won't do so here. I can say that these people are extremely prominent in their fields; working with them has been an honor and a pleasure.

I'm also a published author, so I'm familiar with the writer's hyper-caffeinated hundred-yard stare, the cloud o’ doom that follows rejection, the aerobic checking of the email inbox following submissions, and other tics of the authorial trade. My essays and articles have appeared in The New York Times, The Huffington Post, Good Housekeeping, Salon, Ladies’ Home Journal, Redbook, and Sky Magazine (Delta's in-flight magazine) among others. My humor essays have been anthologized in Mothers Who Think, Creme de la Femme, Life's a Stitch, and A Friendly Game of Poker from Chicago Review Press. (Let it not be said that I'm not a well-rounded individual with a mean bluff.) I'm also a coauthor with Rosalind Wiseman of Queen Bee Moms and Kingpin Dads, optioned by Tina Fey (who turned the companion volume, Queen Bees and Wannabes, into Mean Girls.)

I'm also a master life coach, personally trained by my author and mentor Martha Beck, who writes the life coach column for O, The Oprah Magazine. (My coaching website is imaginatively named betsyrapoportlifecoaching.com.) In April of 2007, I received my certification as a hospice volunteer. For the last eight years, I’ve co-led a trip along the famed pilgrim’s route, the Camino de Santiago, for my coaching clients.

I live in White Plains, New York. Although I generally swan around in yoga pants these days, I clean up nice.