What We Are Reading Today: ‘Make Your Manuscript Work’ by Laura Portwood-Stacer

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Updated 10 February 2026
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What We Are Reading Today: ‘Make Your Manuscript Work’ by Laura Portwood-Stacer

Developmental editing holds the power to make a manuscript connect with publishers and readers, yet few scholarly writers have the training to do it well.

“Make Your Manuscript Work” offers a practical method for assessing and refining the features of their texts that matter most—argument, evidence, structure, and style.

This guide shows scholarly writers how to identify what’s been holding their writing back and fix it so they can accomplish their publication goals.


What We Are Reading Today: Invisible Hands by Margaret S. Graves

Updated 14 February 2026
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What We Are Reading Today: Invisible Hands by Margaret S. Graves

In the heyday of Islamic art collecting around the turn of the 20th century, thousands of premodern ceramic objects circulated on the international antiquities market. 

“Invisible Hands” tells the story of how traditional craft skills of the Islamic world, often thought to have died out with the advent of industrialization, were redirected toward a thriving new market in the colonial era: the fabrication and fictionalizing of antiquities, especially ceramics.

In this stunning work of art history, Margaret Graves shakes the foundations of the discipline, challenging us to reconsider what is and is not art.