I offer developmental editing, line editing, and/or copyediting services, or I offer proofreading services. (Proofreading, the final pass through a draft before publication, can't reliably be performed by someone who has already edited the text.) These terms mean different things to different people. Here's how I use them:
Developmental editing, commonly known as substantive editing, is an assessment of high-level concepts such as overall story arc, character development, pacing, and themes. After I read your manuscript, I'll send you a detailed editorial letter describing areas for revision, along with ideas for how to achieve those revisions.
Line editing is a close reading that examines the cadence and style of prose, all the way down to the word level—sometimes even the syllable level. With a line edit, I tease out ways to add clarity while maintaining your authorial voice. I'll send you a Word document with tracked changes and comments.
Copyediting (or copy editing, depending on your style guide) focuses on grammar, spelling, syntax, and punctuation as prescribed by a dictionary and a style guide. Copy editors also check for consistency. (A famous early example of inconsistency comes to us via Daniel Defoe. Robinson Crusoe lands on shore naked as the day he was born, but later on he has pockets. Also, I just looked up Daniel Defoe and Robinson Crusoe to make sure I had them spelled right.)
While I am not a sensitivity reader, I have a professional knowledge of common cultural faux pas, such as:
I'll point these out as part of the copy edit.
I include light fact-checking as part of copyediting. Was your character drinking Starbucks coffee in 1984? Playing a tuba in 1776? Not without time travel, they weren’t.
Deeper fact-checking is available for an additional cost, as is deep copyediting for bibliographic citations. When the edit is finished, I'll send you a Word document with tracked changes and comments as well as a custom style sheet.
Proofreading is a waste of time until the manuscript is in its final stage. By this point in the editing process, we've moved on from Word to PDF page proofs. I'll check for any leftover typos and look for formatting mistakes, consistency in headers and footers, accuracy in Table of Contents page references, and any errors that made it through the previous rounds of revision, and then I'll send you a marked-up PDF with the changes.
Not sure what you need? Contact me and we'll figure it out. Initial consultations are free!
Developmental editing, commonly known as substantive editing, is an assessment of high-level concepts such as overall story arc, character development, pacing, and themes. After I read your manuscript, I'll send you a detailed editorial letter describing areas for revision, along with ideas for how to achieve those revisions.
Line editing is a close reading that examines the cadence and style of prose, all the way down to the word level—sometimes even the syllable level. With a line edit, I tease out ways to add clarity while maintaining your authorial voice. I'll send you a Word document with tracked changes and comments.
Copyediting (or copy editing, depending on your style guide) focuses on grammar, spelling, syntax, and punctuation as prescribed by a dictionary and a style guide. Copy editors also check for consistency. (A famous early example of inconsistency comes to us via Daniel Defoe. Robinson Crusoe lands on shore naked as the day he was born, but later on he has pockets. Also, I just looked up Daniel Defoe and Robinson Crusoe to make sure I had them spelled right.)
While I am not a sensitivity reader, I have a professional knowledge of common cultural faux pas, such as:
- referring to your American Indian character as wise
- calling your Asian character exotic or petite
- saying your elderly character is spry
- falling into the Magical Negro or Extra Special Disabled character tropes
I'll point these out as part of the copy edit.
I include light fact-checking as part of copyediting. Was your character drinking Starbucks coffee in 1984? Playing a tuba in 1776? Not without time travel, they weren’t.
Deeper fact-checking is available for an additional cost, as is deep copyediting for bibliographic citations. When the edit is finished, I'll send you a Word document with tracked changes and comments as well as a custom style sheet.
Proofreading is a waste of time until the manuscript is in its final stage. By this point in the editing process, we've moved on from Word to PDF page proofs. I'll check for any leftover typos and look for formatting mistakes, consistency in headers and footers, accuracy in Table of Contents page references, and any errors that made it through the previous rounds of revision, and then I'll send you a marked-up PDF with the changes.
Not sure what you need? Contact me and we'll figure it out. Initial consultations are free!
You’ve already been through the hard part, only to find you’re responsible for the index. If this is your first book, you probably had no idea how expensive an index is—and now you’ve got to budget the personal time to figure out how to do it yourself, or you’ve got to budget the money to pay someone else. And the publisher wants the index back within a month, maybe sooner, to say nothing of the final edits.
Does my manuscript need an index?
Indexes make your manuscript more accessible to readers and researchers. Full-length academic, scholarly, professional, and technical nonfiction manuscripts invariably benefit from an index. Indexes also benefit popular nonfiction manuscripts. While there are exceptions (especially for memoirs), most readers should reasonably expect to find an index in a nonfiction book—and book reviewers do not look favorably on their exclusion.
If your nonfiction manuscript is being published traditionally, your publisher will decide for you. Consult your contract or ask your contact at the publishing house. If you are self-publishing your nonfiction manuscript, you probably need one. Contact me if you’re unsure.
My nonfiction manuscript is going to be e-published only. Do I still need an index?
Even with digital keyword searching, an index is still a valuable time-saving tool for readers, students, and researchers. Reputable publishers still overwhelmingly include indexes in nonfiction books (with limited exceptions for certain genres).
Can I prepare my own index?
Writing a book and writing an index are two different skill sets. If you have the time to learn a new skill—if exhaustive attention to detail is your idea of a good time—then you can do it, deadlines permitting. That’s how I got started. But remember, there’s so much more to indexing than keyword searching.
Does my manuscript need an index?
Indexes make your manuscript more accessible to readers and researchers. Full-length academic, scholarly, professional, and technical nonfiction manuscripts invariably benefit from an index. Indexes also benefit popular nonfiction manuscripts. While there are exceptions (especially for memoirs), most readers should reasonably expect to find an index in a nonfiction book—and book reviewers do not look favorably on their exclusion.
If your nonfiction manuscript is being published traditionally, your publisher will decide for you. Consult your contract or ask your contact at the publishing house. If you are self-publishing your nonfiction manuscript, you probably need one. Contact me if you’re unsure.
My nonfiction manuscript is going to be e-published only. Do I still need an index?
Even with digital keyword searching, an index is still a valuable time-saving tool for readers, students, and researchers. Reputable publishers still overwhelmingly include indexes in nonfiction books (with limited exceptions for certain genres).
Can I prepare my own index?
Writing a book and writing an index are two different skill sets. If you have the time to learn a new skill—if exhaustive attention to detail is your idea of a good time—then you can do it, deadlines permitting. That’s how I got started. But remember, there’s so much more to indexing than keyword searching.
Maybe you've got a story idea, but you don't know where to start. Maybe you need guidance on querying agents or going the self-pub route. Maybe you tried researching your problem and found conflicting results.
Contact me! We'll talk in real-time by phone, video, or chat—dealer's choice—or we can communicate through email. The first consultation is free! I've got bills to pay, same as anyone, but not every little thing in life needs to be monetized.
Contact me! We'll talk in real-time by phone, video, or chat—dealer's choice—or we can communicate through email. The first consultation is free! I've got bills to pay, same as anyone, but not every little thing in life needs to be monetized.
