English-class heroes, literature snobs, aspiring journalists, creative writers, unapologetic grammar nerds—passionate readers and book lovers of all stripes: the Brown Books Editorial Internship is waiting for you!
The BBPG Editorial Internship is offered year-round on a seasonal basis, winter, spring, summer and fall (though we’ve been known to stretch our internship seasons forwards and backwards—or Frankenstein into being monstrous new seasons altogether—to accommodate the availability of students and professionals alike).
Why explore the BBPG Editorial Internship versus those of other publishing outfits? For one, our internship provides a unique opportunity to actually, tangibly, really get your foot in the door of book publishing and learn about the entire publishing process, from submissions all the way through book layout, marketing, and distribution.
But our internship is not merely a sit-back-and-learn type of affair—far from it. If you are a Brown Books Editorial Intern, that means you are taking direct part in the early acquisitions process, reading and assessing manuscript submissions and establishing a basis for communications with any of our prospective authors.
Yet it doesn’t end there, not by a long shot. Make no mistake, our editorial interns are razor-sharp, crazy-motivated, super-creative people who love the written word, and love to read and provide feedback to authors across any background or level of experience. But they always will emerge from the BBPG Editorial Internship on a whole new level as both a reader and a writer. The honest truth is that most of us chronic page-turners stick to our preferred lanes in terms of genre and subject matter, a sci-fi nut here, a nonfiction zealot there, a romantasy geek around the corner, a literary fiction snob just down the hallway. But what is guaranteed for the BBPG editorial intern is that they will encounter a surprisingly wide array of manuscripts that will force them out of their comfort zones and expand how they understand genre, voice, and narrative itself—possibly reshaping their sense of what a book can be. Meanwhile, our editorial interns engage in a form of structured but highly independent writing that encourages the articulation one’s own unique perspective. These aren’t your typical “book reviews” but rigorous editorial exercises that involve a degree of decision-making well beyond reader recommendation.
Yet the rewards of the BBPG Editorial Internship go beyond building these hard linguistic skills. We’re living in a new era of remote work and work-from-home, which has its undeniable advantages, but which has also revealed so much that has been lost since its wide adoption—including the soft skills of human interaction. Regardless of time, place, generation, or historical era, there is no replacement for truly in-person interactions. Thankfully, young people today, especially Gen Z’s and millennials, are hungering for a less online, more analogue, visceral, connective experience of the world. And this is in large part what makes any of BBPG’s internships successful: its in-office component. Our editorial interns enjoy a dedicated office space and immediate access to not only their editorial supervisor but the rest of the team. Any given week, an editorial intern may find themselves interacting directly with anyone from Operations to Design to the Top Brass. Let’s be frank: While a BBPG Editorial Intern is always professional in their demeanor and style of communication, in a real-world office environment there’s simply no room for exhaustively curated communications or spit-shined avatars—just us as we are, in all our glorious imperfections. To explain this is not just to celebrate the enduring reality of People Being People, but to highlight a unique opportunity in the current corporate environment to build communication skills through what is at time the uncomfortable but enriching activity of face-to-face interaction.
Ultimately, the Brown Books Editorial Internship is for those who want to read deeply, think critically, communicate honestly, and grow—both as editorial professionals and as people. It is an internship grounded in real work, real relationships, and real conversations, offering an experience that is as demanding as it is rewarding. If you’re energized by the idea of engaging with books at every stage of their life cycle, contributing meaningfully to a collaborative publishing environment, and learning what it truly means to work in the world of books, we’d love to hear from you. If you’re interested in the Brown Books Editorial Internship, please email your résumé and cover letter to publishing@brownbooks.com.
