You’ve lovingly crafted the conflict and characters in your novel. You’ve labored over description and dialogue. Now it’s time to ensure each word and punctuation mark reflects the same care, down to the last hyphen.
As your copyeditor, I will help you deliver a well-crafted novel with grammar and word choices that do justice to your creative vision.
Overview
Genres: I may be an especially good fit if your novel involves fantasy, adventure, suspense, or mystery. See the bottom of this page for special genre and content considerations.
Editing stage: Copyediting is the final step before you get the text formatted and looking pretty for publication. After that, you might hire a proofreader to check for stray formatting errors and punctuation mishaps, but you shouldn’t need another in-depth edit.
Before copyediting begins, you should be satisfied with your plot, character development, and narrative voice. You’ve done plenty of self-editing, so your manuscript, as a whole, should represent your and your characters’ voices. Ideally, you’ve even added the copyright page.
Issues covered in copyediting:
- Mechanics of style (e.g., spelling, punctuation, capitalization, use of italics)
- Grammar and syntax (e.g., use of present/past tense, placement of modifiers, word order)
- Word usage (e.g., that vs. which, pore vs. pour, blonde vs. blond, pistol vs. revolver)
- Unintentionally repetitive wording
- Additional typos and small errors you would have caught if you hadn’t spent so many hours staring at the same dang pages
➼ Not what you’re looking for? If you want feedback on conflict, pacing, or character development, consider developmental editing instead. If you need help with writing natural dialogue, making descriptions “sound good,” or finding your authorial “voice,” you may benefit from line editing. You can review your options on my Fiction Services page.
How it works: We determine whether we are a good fit for each other. If you are a new client, I provide a sample edit for a nominal fee. Once the onboarding process is complete, you send me your manuscript via email. I perform copyedits using Microsoft Word’s Track Changes and commenting features. You receive the following via email:
- The marked-up manuscript, edited in Microsoft Word using the Track Changes and commenting features
- A style sheet covering notable details of spelling, punctuation, and other style matters—especially where we’ve deviated from The Chicago Manual of Style (CMOS) and Merriam-Webster
- A brief editorial letter providing additional context and explanation for the edits
➼ Style manual: I default to following The Chicago Manual of Style, 18th ed., particularly for American manuscripts. Where their guidance doesn’t apply, I reference other respected handbooks, usage guides, dictionaries, and so on. If you have a strong style preference that runs contrary to CMOS, I will accommodate it.
➼ I support a writer’s right to bend or break many so-called “rules.” For example, sentence fragments are welcome in fiction. But if a sentence fragment looks like an accident or is difficult to read, I may suggest you reword it.
Cost: $0.022–$0.029 per word
Sample edit: $45 to copyedit a sample of 1,750 words (roughly 7 pages)
Have questions? Want to schedule a sample edit? Contact me at the button below. I look forward to hearing about your book!
Genre and Content Considerations
- Fantasy and science fiction: Before I begin copyediting a fantasy or sci-fi novel, I may request a list of character and place names, vocabulary from any constructed language, and any other special spellings or vocabulary unique to your book.
- Historical and regional fiction: If your book includes many real locations, references real people, and otherwise draws significantly on cultural touchstones, that could affect pricing. That effect may be mitigated by a list of spell- and fact-checked names and dates.
- Trauma-heavy and/or violent content: I accept work involving heavy topics, but please tell me the nature of it beforehand. It may affect pacing and scheduling.
- Religious, ideological, or otherwise potentially sensitive content: I edit content involving a range of ideologies. I value human life and dignity, and I recognize that we can share these values even if we disagree on the best ways to live in accordance with them. Relevant expertise follows:
- Training in conscious editing. I may suggest alternatives to language that could be considered racist, sexist, homophobic, ableist, or otherwise hurtful. This is not about “political correctness”; it’s ensuring unintentionally offensive language doesn’t distract from your story. I work under two basic assumptions: 1) You don’t want to accidentally alienate or hurt readers. 2) The only characters who should sound racist or ignorant are those who are actually racist or ignorant.
- Extensive experience in Christian writing and publishing, combined with respect for and interest in other religions.
Words Unbound 