Comprehensive Editing

My comprehensive editing service includes substantive editing (also called line editing) and copyediting. This is a great service for shorter work, such as articles. I would also recommend it for authors who want to learn and apply the finer points of writing for themselves.

I can perform a comprehensive edit that includes developmental editing. However, book-length manuscripts with significant developmental concerns may not be eligible for this service.

The process usually includes at least three passes.

1. First pass: I edit with a focus on the larger issues. Chapters may be revised or rearranged, and significant changes may be made. I edit on the sentence level as well. If I notice a repeated error, I will make a comment early on and give you a chance to fix the error throughout the manuscript before the next pass.*
2. Second pass: After you have completed revisions based on my first pass, I read through the manuscript again, this time more closely. I focus on sentence structure, flow, and grammar.
3. Final pass: I do not read the entire manuscript in this pass. At this stage, I’m focused on clean-up in areas that have already been revised. I look for new typos, small phrasing issues that were overlooked because of bigger structural problems, sentences that were only partly deleted, and so on.

When we finish comprehensive editing, your manuscript should be almost ready to go. I highly recommend you work with a separate proofreader before publishing—someone who can bring fresh eyes to the project.

*Since I have to consider how long a project will take when I give you a quote, and I want to be sensitive to your budget, I like giving you the chance to revise smaller errors between the first and second pass yourself. This also frees me to focus on other concerns during the next pass.

More Editing Services

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Interested in hiring me for a comprehensive edit? Let’s talk!

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