What Type of Editing Do You Need?
Copy editing
A light copy editing includes checking grammar, spelling, punctuation, tone, word usage, awkward phrases, sentence structure, and consistency.
A medium to heavy copy editing includes checking for redundancy, wordiness, passive voice, extraneous phrases or sentences, tone and cultural sensitivity, appropriate language for your subject and audience, ensuring that content is properly credited and cited, checking references against the manuscript and proper formatting of references. While copy editing your document, I will follow the appropriate style (APA, MLA, Chicago) and the style required by the academic institution or journal.
Substantive editing
Substantive editing is heavy editing and addresses the bigger picture—the organization and logical flow of paragraphs and sections of text. With the author’s goals in mind, I examine the overall structure, eliminate repetition, rearrange paragraphs, sections, or chapters to deliver coherent and organized writing. Although I also do some basic copy editing along the way, a final copy edit cannot be done until after the substantive edit is complete. That material will then need to be copy edited.
Development editing
A developmental editor assists the author with the many decisions inherent in writing a book, from how many chapters should be in the book to what is the market for the book. A developmental editor may suggest that a chapter at the end of the book be moved earlier, or that a section in a chapter be moved to another chapter. These decisions are based on the mission of the book, the author’s vision, competing books, and the market. Other developmental editing tasks include: creating a development plan for the book, creating pedagogy and visual content, analyzing peer reviews, analyzing competing titles, a chapter-by chapter edit, paring down the overall length, digital content creation, and media integration. I also offer:
- Manuscript evaluation
- Editing the book proposal and sample chapters
Style
I am proficient in APA, and also edit in MLA or Chicago styles. Please provide any specific style guidelines required by the journal or university.
Rates
I provide clients with a project rate based on the number of words to be edited. The project fee is based on one round of editing.
A partial payment is requested up front. The final payment must be made prior to your receipt of the final edited document. For longer projects, payments may be made incrementally.
Please note that 2 or more phone calls are charged at an hourly rate. Rush jobs are projects that have a deadline less than one week from the start date. The fee for rush work is an additional 15 percent.
