Are you in the planning stage for a new story? Maybe you’ve started a first draft, but you’re stymied by some aspect of plotting or writing. Wouldn’t it be great to have a sounding board to discuss your ideas, options for structure and plot, POV choice, narrative tense to use, and so on? It can’t hurt to get an educated opinion about your approach before you begin writing or during the writing process. That’s where story coaching comes in.
What is story coaching?
Story coaching is consultation that a seasoned editor provides. It’s a discussion with dark fiction writers about literary aspects of their work and choices they could make to develop a sound blueprint from which to construct an effective story.
Story coaching is for you if you’re noodling an incomplete idea or wrestling with an unfinished manuscript you’re unsure what to do with. Story coaching—which I provide through video consultation (link coming soon)—will help guide you toward completing a solid draft. I’m also available if you simply have burning questions about writing craft.
Story coaching is typically most helpful early in the story development process. Instead of spending days, weeks, or months writing a story that doesn’t work, story coaching prepares you to draft the most powerful story you can write—a story that will connect and satisfy readers, readers willing to shell out more of their book-buying dollars for your future work—along with positive reviews.
Story coaching can also take place well after the first draft to gain feedback and insight about challenging aspects of your dark fiction project.
What I provide with story coaching
As a certified editor, I can review early pages you send (a partial or complete manuscript). Or I can simply discuss your story with you through video consultation (link coming soon).
Here are a few story coaching services I offer:
Determining acceptable word count for your genre (dark fiction only)
Maximizing setting and grounding your characters and their action in your story world
Evaluating possible plot and structure choices
Developing deeper characters
Understanding the importance of conflict
Choosing point of view and narrative voice
Avoiding clichés
I don’t provide any of the following with story coaching:
A written editorial report
A marked-up manuscript with edits
Your job after story coaching
A story coaching session with me will arm you with suggestions and directions for drafting, which you’ll be able to undertake with more confidence and clarity. Then, you’ll write, write, write!
The next step beyond story coaching is manuscript evaluation, which is an entry-level edit after you’ve finished writing your manuscript. For more information, see Fiction Editing Spectrum.
Cost of story coaching
My rate for an hour of story coaching is $58. For more information about editing rates, see Dark Fiction Editing Rates.
How to prepare for story coaching
If you’re considering booking a story coaching session with me, here are a few ways you can prepare:
Take a few days to jot down some issues with your story and how you might go about writing it. Include any questions about this and writing in general.
If you’ve written pages, review the topics in the first list under “What I provide with story coaching.” Then make notes or record more questions about these aspects of your story.
Complete the exercise of writing a 100-word blurb for your story, novella, or novel. It will help you discover what your story’s about. For instructions, go here.
When you’re ready for story coaching, contact me and let me know where you are in your writing process and what you’d like to discuss. I’m available to help you learn more about the craft of writing dark fiction and develop a better, more successful story.
You’ve made the wise decision to have your dark fiction manuscript line edited and copy edited. Is it ready for submission or self-publication? Not quite. If you want to polish your prose to perfection, you’ll hire a proofreader.
What is proofreading?
Editing involves major changes to your story, its structure, and language, but proofreading is the final stage of the editing process, when a skilled proofreader fixes minor misspellings, typos, punctuation mistakes, formatting issues, and other inconsistencies.
Editing stages leading up to proofreading
The number one mistake writers make when hiring a proofreader is that they believe they need only proofreading when, in most cases, their writing would also benefit from a previous level of editing. (For a pictorial representation of the entire editing spectrum, see What Do You Need on the Fiction Editing Spectrum.)
Manuscript evaluation
Manuscript evaluation offers an educated opinion, in writing, about how your draft stacks up to published fiction standards. The editor evaluates and reports on such elements as structure, plot, pacing, characterization, point of view, description, setting, and more. Most importantly, a professional critique includes what you could do to sharpen these elements and make your story better.
Developmental editing
Developmental editing evaluates the building blocks of a story, checking that they’re present and working well together. It ensures that your structure and plot are solid, characters well-drawn and motivated, point of view correctly executed, setting and description vividly drawn, dialogue rings true, mood and tone support the overall story.
Line editing
Line editing enhances your writing style so that your language is clear, flows effortlessly, and reads well. Refining paragraph and sentence construction ensures that all the right building blocks are in place and maximizes the effectiveness of your ideas. Misspellings, wrong words, awkward phrasing, and more are corrected. Line editing tightens your writing.
Copy editing
Copy editing hones your writing style by correcting spelling, grammar, syntax, and punctuation errors; ensuring that your writing adheres to editorial style standards; clarifying the text by eliminating ambiguous or factually incorrect information; flagging continuity inconsistencies; and producing a smooth reading experience.
Proofreading
While line editors and copy editors correct inaccuracies and hone your writing style, they won’t catch every mechanical error. The proofreader’s job is to scour your manuscript and find any mistakes that may have slipped through the editing cracks. This means proofreading falls at the very end of the editorial process, after your manuscript has undergone both line editing and copy editing.
Make sure you’ve thoroughly revised and edited your work before you pursue the final stage of proofreading. (There’s no point spending time and money fixing minor errors if you might later cut entire sections or restructure paragraphs and sentences.) Only have your manuscript proofread after you’ve completed a final edited draft that you’re pleased with.
In fact, if you send a proofreader a manuscript riddled with grammar mistakes, difficult sentences, and convoluted paragraphs—things you’re unable to see but stand out like flashing neon to an editor—they may decline the job and recommend a previous editorial service.
Why is proofreading important?
A manuscript sprinkled with typos, grammar errors, or textual inconsistencies will derail readers from the fictive dream you’ve worked hard to induce. Proofreading is crucial because it enables your narrative to mesmerize readers without disruption.
Proofreading polishes your work with a professional finish. This is vital if you want agents or publishers to consider your work or, if you’re pursuing self-publishing, you desire to build a loyal readership. When readers encounter an unedited or unproofed book, they’ll probably assume you couldn’t be bothered to invest in your own work. If you skipped these essential steps and your work shows it, why would they read any more of your dark fiction?
Writers naturally want to earn money from their fiction writing. But you must invest money to create the best possible product before you can effectively sell it. That’s today’s business of writing and publishing.
Proofreading is indispensable because, if you omit it and readers encounter more than a few typos or grammar errors in your novel, any remaining errors will negatively affect their reading experience. Many disgruntled readers are willing to go out of their way to complain about slipshod editing and proofing in reviews of your work. Falling stars = dwindling sales.
In today’s world of self-publishing, proofreading is a nonnegotiable step in the editorial process. As in indie author, you may be looking for ways to cut costs and thus be tempted to proofread on your own. But indie books have grown in quality in recent years, raising the bar and increasing competition. Getting your work professionally proofread is now not only common practice but a necessity for success.
What does a proofreader do?
Proofreaders won’t overhaul your story content or provide in-depth feedback on your work. This is the job of previous editors (see What Do You Need on the Fiction Editing Spectrum?). Proofreaders arrive like Mary Poppins at the tail end of the editorial process to fine-tune and polish your edited work.
This means proofreaders won’t copy-edit your manuscript, making changes they’re not being paid to make. But a reliable proofreader will ensure that your manuscript is free from spelling, grammar, and other errors that could ruin the reading experience and discredit your writing—and you.
Proofreading for print publishing
In print publishing, proofreading is done after the manuscript has been laid out and a “proof” copy printed. This version is what a proofreader works on.
The proofreader’s job for print layout is to conduct a thorough quality check before the book goes into print production. They may compare the original, edited manuscript to the proof, making sure there are no omissions or layout errors. The proofreader checks line spacing and page numbering, and fixes awkward word or page breaks. If the proofreader encounters too many errors, they may return the proof to the copy editor for further work.
Proofreaders consider the entire book, not just the chapter text. They’ll check your epigraphs, acknowledgments, and dedication pages, as well as your table of contents—everywhere text appears.
Tasks of a proofreader
Although professional proofreaders possess a keen eye for detail, that’s not enough. They must also employ a reliable and repeatable method to detect every minor error in your text, from misplaced commas to misused words. They’ll also correct typographical and layout issues in print proofs, such as inconsistencies in font use or incorrectly spaced lines in a paragraph.
The following list is by no means exhaustive, but here are some issues proofreaders check:
Words that sound alike—homophones (for example, they’re, there, their)
Definite and indefinite articles (a, an, the)
Prepositions and prepositional phrases
Comma use
Hyphens (-), en dashes (–), and em dashes (—)
Apostrophes
Capitalization of terms, titles, and proper names
Treatment of numbers
Formatting of dialogue
Paragraph indentation and spacing
Page numbers, headers, footers
Pagination
Effective proofreading requires multiple passes, each round focusing on only one task.
Can you do your own proofreading?
The short answer is, “Yes, but.” The long answer explains why not.
Any kind of proofing you do yourself helps to produce a cleaner manuscript. Whatever gets your work closer to the finish line is a good thing.
But you, as author, being the only one to proofread your own work? I caution against it. No matter how sharp you are, you will skip over typos and issues you’ve seen dozens of times during revision because you’ve become used to seeing them.
So, relying on only your own proofreading isn’t recommended. You’re so accustomed to your text that you could miss mistakes. A professional examines your manuscript with fresh eyes and is less likely to skip over errors.
Bottom line: catch as many errors as you can, but don’t skip hiring a professional proofreader.
The cost of proofreading
How much does third-party proofreading cost nowadays?
Proofreading and editing businesses usually advertise set per-word rates, sometimes with different prices based on turnaround time. On average, expect to pay $0.01–$0.04 per word (around $2.00–$10.00 per page).
The editing and proofreading service, Scribendi, lets you calculate the cost of proofreading based on your word count. For example, an 80,000-word novel takes two weeks and costs $1602.86 (as of the date of this post). That comes out to $0.02 per word, or $5.01 per 250-word page. A 4000-word short story with one-week turnaround time costs $129.33 ($0.032 per word, $8.08 per page). With 24-hour turnaround, cost increases to $163.17 ($0.041 per word, $10.20 per page).
Reedsy proofreading costs about $0.015 per word, or $3.75 per page.
When a fiction writer says, “I need an editor,” what exactly does it mean? What kind of editor? What kind of editing? This post discusses different levels and types on the fiction editing spectrum.
It took me thirty years of struggling through my own writing process to realize there’s more to producing an effective, salable story—whether it be a short story, novelette, novella, or novel. Much more than merely throwing X number of words on the page and running spellcheck before rushing the a manuscript to an agent or publisher.
The most important thing I’ve learned is that editing is not only necessary, but crucial to successfully placing stories in today’s markets, including self-publishing. And “editing” isn’t a one-size-fits-all service; there are different types of editing, depending on where your manuscript is in the writing and revision process.
Five levels of editing
I provide story coaching (link coming soon) for consultation during the planning and drafting stage of story development.
When you’ve produced a manuscript draft, I offer comprehensive fiction editing at the following levels that range from very high down to the nitty gritty:
Are you ready to take the leap into full-spectrum editing?
The types of editing at each of these levels exist on the following spectrum.
The editing spectrum
As a results-oriented editor of dark fiction, I provide all five levels of editing, along with a few other services.
Wherever you are in your writing process with a piece of dark fiction, I can help you improve your work.
If you’re here…
You’ll benefit from this kind of editing…
Perhaps you’re still in the planning stage and haven’t yet begun drafting a new story. You could use a sounding board to discuss your idea, options for structure and plot, POV choice, narrative tense to use, and so on. You’d like an opinion about your approach to writing before you begin (or during) the writing process.
Story coaching is for those who are noodling about an incomplete idea or wrestling with an unfinished manuscript you’re unsure what to do with. Story coaching—which I provide through video consultation (link coming soon)—will help guide you toward completing a solid draft. I’m also available if you simply have burning questions about writing craft.
You’ve drafted a story, novella, or novel that you need to have evaluated at the story level. Are you heading in the right direction? Are all the pieces in place, or is something missing? Are they in the most effective order? Does it need developmental editing or more? What could you do to make this story better before you revise and polish? You need a broad, comprehensive analysis of your manuscript.
Manuscript evaluation gives you an educated opinion, in writing, about how your draft stacks up, evaluating such elements as structure, plot, pacing, characterization, point of view, dialogue, description, setting, and more. Most importantly, it includes what you could do to improve these elements and make your story better. Part of evaluation is determining if further editing would benefit your work.
You’re trying your best but need hands-on help to include all the elements of a strong story: structure, plot, characterization, point of view, and so on. Are the necessary pieces in place, in the most effective order, and in the right proportion? Have you made any glaring errors at your story’s foundation that would lead to rejection?
Developmental editing evaluates the building blocks of your story, checking that they’re present and working well together. It ensures that your structure and plot are solid, characters well-drawn and motivated, point of view correctly executed, setting and description vividly drawn, dialogue rings true, mood and tone support the overall story.
You’ve written a solid story (thanks to developmental editing), and now it’s time to focus on how you communicate those ideas to your readers. You’ve got a unique writing style that you want to preserve. But the way you build and connect paragraphs and sentences could use refinement. You want a seamless reading experience to keep readers reading.
Line editing enhances your writing style so that your language is clear, flows effortlessly, and reads well. Refining paragraph and sentence construction ensures that all the right building blocks are in place and maximizes the effectiveness of the ideas you communicate. Misspellings, wrong words, awkward phrasing, and more are corrected. Line editing tightens your writing.
You’ve written a solid story (thanks to developmental editing), which line editing further improved. Now it’s time to polish your work so it doesn’t get rejected because you submitted a less than professional manuscript. You know you need help with sentence structure, grammar, and spelling. That help is available.
Copy editing hones your writing style by correcting spelling, grammar, syntax, and punctuation errors; ensuring that your writing adheres to editorial style standards; clarifying the text by eliminating ambiguous or factually incorrect information; flagging continuity inconsistencies; and producing a smooth reading experience.
Your story, novella, or novel has undergone line editing and copy editing. Now it’s time to go over the text with a fine-toothed comb to catch all those minor but pesky errors that bother some readers. You’ve proofed the manuscript yourself, but you need a second set of eyes before bringing your baby out in public.
Proofreading ensures that your manuscript is free from spelling, grammar, and other errors that could ruin the reading experience and discredit your writing—and you. Proofreading will detect any remaining minor errors in your text, from misplaced commas to misused words, and correct typographical and layout issues.
You may only want to work on early issues with story coaching, manuscript critique, or developmental editing. Many writers skip these early steps and instead contract for a simple proofread to finalize their work before seeking publication. I learned the hard way in my own fiction-writing career that this is a big mistake—one that cost me decades of constant rejections.
If you plan to produce a market-ready manuscript for self-publishing or submission to an agent or traditional publisher, you’ll want to run your work through the gamut of editing levels.
Here’s why this is important…
The importance of editing in stages
Why edit in stages? Simply because it’s humanly impossible to flag every kind of error in one pass.
Instead, to maximize the effectiveness of comprehensive editing, it’s industry best practice to perform each editing stage individually, progressing to the next only when the current stage is thorough and complete.
In other words, you should send your manuscript in order through each of the four editing stages. Doing so ensures you’re addressing problems logically and not wasting time and effort correcting passages that need to be rewritten or may be removed.
Editing out of order is like painting sheets of drywall before nailing them to the wall studs, and patching the seams. Not smart.
This means you complete story-level work (manuscript evaluation and developmental editing) before doing text-level work. Line editing should always come before copy editing, not after or at the same time.
An example of editing in stages
Here’s a writer’s original passage:
The toothless hag hissed; spraying blood over her furowed chin and the bouquet of leafy twigs she proffered. Her drooping body was covered with vines. He took them from her and she screamed to curdle the blood in his heart.
Here’s what a line editor would do to improve the passage:
The toothless hag hissed; spraying blood over her furowed chin and the bouquet of leafy twigs she proffered. Vines covered hHer drooping body was covered with vines. He took accepted them twigs from her and she screamed, to curdlingethe his blood in his heart.
Reads better, doesn’t it? But editing isn’t complete. A copy editor would clean it up like this:
The toothless hag hissed,; spraying blood over her furowed furrowed chin and the bouquet of leafy twigs she proffered. Vines covered her drooping body. He accepted the twigs from her and she screamed, curdling his blood.
Even better. A proofreader would use a fine-toothed comb to ensure the final edited paragraph was the best it could be:
The toothless hag hissed, spraying blood over her furrowed chin and the bouquet of leafy twigs she proffered. Vines covered her drooping body. He accepted the twigs from her, and she screamed, curdling his blood.
Granted, inserting a necessary comma isn’t much of a change in a single paragraph, but proofreaders find and fix many other minor issues in a whole manuscript.
Important: You should complete both developmental and line editing before you query agents or traditional publishers. If you’ll be self-publishing, you should complete all editing stages (developmental, line, and copy editing; then proofreading) before putting your book on the market. (Although, even if your book is already on the market, you may have the manuscript edited at some level and re-upload the corrected content.)
As a comprehensive editor of dark fiction, I supplement every level of editing with an editorial letter that explains and provides context for comments and edits I’ve made in your marked-up manuscript.
The bottom line
What you want most of all is a seasoned editor who understands the differences between the four levels of editing and who can explain what each will do to improve your dark fiction.
When you’re ready to take the next step to improve your writing, I can evaluate your manuscript, discuss your options with you, and lead you through the process of producing a polished piece of dark fiction. For more information, check out Dark Fiction Editing.
What an editor can—and cannot—do (and that includes me)
An editor can:
Tell you why your story doesn’t work.
Show you how to fix what needs fixing.
Improve your story so that it reaches its full potential.
Help you become a better, more skilled writer.
An editor cannot:
Fix your manuscript for you.
Guarantee anything, especially publication.
It’s up to you to make (or not make) the suggested changes. And, although no editor can guarantee publication, I can move you closer to your goals. Every edit is a learning experience that will help you become a better writer.
If you don’t know what kind of editing you need
Not sure what level of editing would benefit you most? Read through the following list and pick one or two that best represent your situation.
If you’ve completed a story and want an analysis of story elements, revealing what’s working, what isn’t, plus suggestions for improvement, you need manuscript evaluation.
If you simply need a sounding board to discuss your idea, get an opinion about your approach to writing, and ask writing craft questions, you need story coaching (which I provide through video consultation).
If you have an incomplete idea or unfinished manuscript you’re unsure what to do with, you need story coaching or developmental editing to help you complete a solid draft.
If you’ve finished an early draft of a work and need help to solidify it at the story level, you need developmental editing.
If you’ve completed a manuscript and think it’s pretty good but you want it streamlined and tightened, you need line editing.
If your manuscript has been through line editing, you need copy editing.
If your manuscript has been through the previous levels, you need proofreading.
If your manuscript has been through all the above, congratulations! You’re ready to submit or self-publish.
If you’re still not sure what kind of editing you need or have questions, contact me and ask. We’ll figure something out that will best serve you, your story, and your writing career.
You’ve been toying with a deliciously dark story idea but need professional direction before and during the writing process. Or you’ve drafted pages you’d like an opinion on before continuing your work.
Perhaps you’re nowhere near a polish; your manuscript needs evaluation and suggestions on the story level before you finalize writing.
Could be you’ve finished a short story, novelette, novella, or novel. Bravo! Now it’s time to polish your work for submission or self-publication. But, if you’re honest with yourself, you’re not so good at it.
Although you’ve done all you know to improve your dark fiction, you remain under-published—you’re still not getting those acceptances you long for. Or, if you’ve self-published, reviewers complain about mistakes in your writing. Cringe.
Is your writing as good as it could be?
Hey, we all know getting published is tough. But is the quality of your storytelling—or the way you write—prompting rejection?
If so, you could benefit from the services of a seasoned professional who specializes in editing dark fiction.
Why hire an editor?
You need editing:
When you don’t know what’s wrong with your writing or how to fix it
To give your readers an optimal reading experience, one that brings them back for more
What’s wrong with my writing?
If you’re just getting started writing dark fiction, you’re perplexed about why a manuscript isn’t working, or you’re less than stellar at self-editing, consider hiring a fiction editor. A qualified, professional editor can help you find what’s amiss in your manuscript, why it’s causing problems, and how to fix it.
As a teaching writer and editor, I’ll bring not only 35+ years of experience to bear on your project, but share the tools in my toolbox with you. This means I’ll review your work to identify areas for improvement and explain how to fix them—thus helping you become a better, more successful writer.
Why not give readers your best?
You also need editing because your readers deserve your best. Today’s discerning book buyers want stories that are engaging and error-free. (Just check the reviews of most self-published books, and you’ll see what I mean.)
Top-notch editing ensures you’re sharing the best version of your story—one that will entertain readers without distracting them with narrative blunders. A great story told well (free of grammar and spelling mistakes, of course) encourages repeat readers who’ll tell others about your work.
Are you ready for editing?
You are if the story you’re writing is important to you, and you realize you can’t do it on your own.
But first, let me ask…
Which of these 5 dark fiction writers are you most like?
This writer…
Needs this kind of editing
I dig reading horror and have always wanted to write the kind of stories I love. If only I could come up with worthwhile ideas… I’ve tried writing stories from the few ideas I have gotten, but what I put on paper didn’t match the story in my head. I’m not sure if my latest piece has the right structure. (Heck, I’m not exactly sure what structure is. Or plot.)
Because I’ve been, well…, less than successful, I put off developing the few dark ideas I do get. I’d give my eye teeth to turn a dynamite idea into a finished story. Others have done it. How do I get there?
I’m what they call a pantser—somebody who writes “by the seat of their pants.” When a dark idea inspires me, I hit the keyboard to see where it takes me. But I’ll admit that my method, although exciting at first, honestly isn’t working so well. In fact, I’ve got a computer folder full of unfinished short stories. Ugh. I’d love to write a novel, but if I don’t finish most short stories, well….
How do I learn to write a story (or a novel—someday!) that jumps all the hurdles from start to finish? (Key word, finish.) Is there a way to “The End” for me?
I’ve written a lot of stories and even sold a few. Go, me! But those happy acceptances are unfortunately few and far between. I usually get form rejections—who doesn’t nowadays? But once in a while I’ll receive a personal note about flat characters, predictable plots, or faulty mechanics. I know I need help with sentence structure and grammar; those things aren’t my forte.
But is my story content complete and engaging? Are my attempts at structure and plot working for or against me? I don’t want to get a piece copy edited if my execution of story elements is flawed. That would be like polishing a turd. Help!
I’ve been placing stories regularly for a couple of years now. But not with the professional-paying markets I want to break into. (I need those markets so that my work reaches a larger audience, which, I hope, will pave the way to land an agent or a publishing contract—fingers crossed.)
My last story rejection recommended I pursue “sentence-level editing.” (Apparently, the magazine editor either didn’t want to do it or considered that whipping my story into shape would prove too much work for her tight schedule.) Ultimately, I’d like to learn how to fix my own problems. Can I get a leg up to the next level?
I’m a strong writer. (After twenty years of study and practice, that is.) With each piece of fiction I write, I spin a solid yarn and apply my skills to hone each paragraph and sentence into a form that communicates what I want to say. Some readers tell me I do a decent job of conveying tone and mode. But other reviewers complain about grammar mistakes and typos.
I don’t want one- or two-star reviews (ouch!) to sink my overall ratings—that jeopardizes sales! Trouble is, I went over that piece a dozen times, and I still didn’t catch everything. Grrr! To do better, I need a second pair of eyes.
Whether you’re one of the writers above, somewhere in between, or totally “off the charts,” so to speak, I’d love to help you become a better dark fiction writer.
Haven’t you spent enough effort writing stories that fall flat with readers or, worse yet, get dinged in reviews? It’s time to kiss your current plateau goodbye and advance your storytelling and writing skills. Maybe there’s a deadline you need to meet with the best story you can submit.
Whatever your situation, don’t wait any longer to make progress toward your goal of improving your craft and getting published.
If you’re curious to learn more about the kinds of editing recommended, head over to Dark Fiction Editing. Then strike up a conversation with me about your current project. I look forward to hearing from you!
Good dark fiction isn’t just about story. Equally important are the clarity, readability, and style of your writing. After finishing a work of dark fiction, if you want to improve it, you need to concentrate on how you communicate your ideas. That’s where line editing comes in.
Can you do it all?
Examine how well your paragraphs and sentences fit together. Do they flow from one to the next? Do your words successfully evoke the tone you’re going for? Is your language precise and understandable, easy to read? Have you executed point of view consistently? Can you cut extraneous words and phrases? And catch those wrong words, overused words, junk words? Did you—?
Whew! Can you do all this—and a hundred other things to simplify and streamline your manuscript? If not, a line editor can.
What does line editing accomplish?
A line edit evaluates and enhances your writing style at the paragraph and sentence level. Line editors don’t scour your manuscript for mechanical errors like copy editors do. Rather, they focus on how you use language to tell your story.
Line editors analyze your writing line by line. They examine the building blocks of your story—chapters, scenes, paragraphs, sentences, clauses—to ensure these components work together.
During this stage, a line editor’s mission is to make your writing as clear as possible by looking at the content, style, tone, and consistency of your prose. Line editing is also called stylistic editing because it focuses specifically on your individual writing style.
The goal of a skilled line editor is to tighten your writing and make it sing.
What’s the difference between line editing and copy editing?
Line editors share certain attributes with copy editors: attention to detail and interest in how language works at the sentence level. But their tasks differ.
Although both line editors and copy editors work line by line, they look for different issues. Line editing focuses on your writing style; copy editing concentrates on the nitty-gritty of mechanics—spelling, grammar, syntax, and punctuation.
When you should hire a line editor
Line editing should take place after your story draft is complete. In fact, line editors prefer that you’ve done everything you can yourself and see no further way to improve your writing before you share it with them. (I’m one of them.)
If your manuscript has gone through developmental editing, line editing is the next step in the editing spectrum (link coming soon).
Tasks of a line editor
Line editors tackle many issues to make your manuscript better. Here are a few of them.
Restructure paragraphs and sentences to maximize comprehension, simplicity, and flow
Break up long paragraphs
Fix run-on sentences or incomplete sentences
Revise awkward sentences, split long sentences, streamline sentences with clauses and parentheticals
Catch misspellings, wrong words, double words, overused words
Flag POV errors and explain why and how they need to be rectified
Tighten dialogue and mend faulty attributions
What I typically do during line editing
During the course of a line edit, I may:
Point out inconsistencies in the story line
Flag scenes where the action is confusing or your meaning unclear
Query you in a manuscript comment about whether you’ve requested and received permission to include those song lyrics in your epigraph (you can’t use them for free, and if you use them without permission, you can be sued for copyright infringement)
Correct the spelling and capitalization of 7-Eleven and all trademarked names to protect you from legal action
Recast sentences that begin with There are and It is (no-nos, by the way)
Mark redundancies that repeat the same information in different ways
Indicate where tonal shifts occur
Eliminate confusing or unnecessary narrative digressions
Suggest changes you could make to improve pacing
Flag clichés and prompt you to use fresh phrasing
Vary sentence lengths
I also check for any discrepancies in your setting, plot, and character traits to ensure internal consistency. For example, if you wrote on page 29: “Derek scrubbed a hand over his blondcrewcut,” but on page 74 you wrote, “Derek tore at his long, brown hair,” I’ll bring it to your attention. Why?
Because readers hate such gaffes and will drop stars off their reviews of your book. As a writer striving for excellence, you don’t need that.
The cost of line editing
How much does third-party line editing cost?
Editing businesses usually advertise set per-word rates, sometimes with different prices based on turnaround time. On average, expect to pay $0.02–$0.04 per word (around $5.00–$10.00 per page).
The editing and proofreading service, Scribendi, lets you calculate the cost of editing based on your word count. (They lump line and copy editing together.) For example, an 80,000-word novel takes two weeks and costs $1602.86 (as of the date of this post). That comes out to $0.02 per word, or $5.01 per 250-word page. A 4000-word short story with one-week turnaround time costs $129.33 ($0.032 per word, $8.08 per page). With 24-hour turnaround, cost increases to $163.17 ($0.041 per word, $10.20 per page).
With Reedsy, line editing is lumped in with copy editing and costs about $0.02 per word, or $5.00 per page.
I line-edit for $0.02 per word, or $5.00 per page. If you contract for both line and copy editing or line, copy, and proofreading, I offer a discount. See Current dark fiction editing rates.
How we can work together
In addition to doing the edits, I will, if you want, talk through my edits and answer any questions you may have. See video consultation (link coming soon).
If you submit a clean, well-written manuscript, I may be able to do line editing in a single pass; but it will more likely involve two rounds between us. Editing, like writing, is an iterative process.
Need a line editor?
If you’re ready to take your writing to the next level, I’m here to support your goals.
If you need any kind of editing for your dark fiction manuscript, including line editing, check out The Editing Spectrum (link coming soon) and Dark Fiction Editing. I have decades of experience and can help you improve your writing. Then drop me a line about your current project. I can’t wait to hear from you!
Developmental editing, also called substantive or content editing, focuses on improving big-picture narrative elements in your writing. This kind of editing occurs early in the writing process. For fiction, developmental editing considers these aspects:
Genre concerns
Story structure
Characters and characterization
Narration, point of view, and use of narrative modes
Plot and pace
Setting
Theme
Mood and tone
Style and voice
Examples of developmental editing
As a developmental editor, I give your manuscript a careful reading to evaluate the previously listed elements. Here are examples of the primary ones.
Structure
When I analyze the structure of your story, I look for, at minimum, a clear beginning, middle, and ending. For longer works (novelettes, novellas, and novels), I check for scaffolding such as three-act, hero’s journey, or eight-stage organization. (These are just a few; there are others.) Are all signposts in place and connecting material in proper proportion?
Plot and pacing
With plot, I check for a clear cause-and-effect chain from beginning to end, keeping an eye out for possible contrivances. Does the protagonist (and other important characters) have a clear story goal? Sub-goals?
While pursuing those goals, your main character must encounter meaningful conflict based on significant stakes. In your protagonist’s monumental effort to resolve conflict and attain their story goal, are the climax and resolution logical yet satisfying?
The pace between major plot events should vary yet steadily mount toward the conclusion.
Characters and characterization
Evaluating characters and characterization asks if the protagonist, antagonist, and secondary characters are well-drawn for their purpose. Are they believable and consistent, properly motivated to pursue their story goals through heightening conflict?
Does the main character learn and change through the course of the work, demonstrating their ability to resolve the conflict?
Narration, point of view, and narrative modes
Have you chosen the most effective narrator for your story (external or internal)? How about the most effective point of view for the narrator to relate the story events and action? I have an eagle eye for catching and correcting POV errors, mistakes that can distance readers from your story or prompt them to quit reading altogether.
Line editing more fully evaluates your use of narrative modes—dialogue, internalization (character thoughts and feelings), action, description, and exposition. But during developmental editing, I suggest how best to use these modes to narrate or dramatize particular passages.
Setting
Setting includes geographic location and time.
You should set your story in the only place it could happen.
Its sub-settings, such as your protagonist’s home or a dark alley where significant action takes place, should contribute to conflict by threatening your characters or constraining them from reaching their goals.
Time in setting refers to the time period during which your story events take place (past, present, future) as well as the time of each scene. To evaluate your story’s use of time, I ask questions such as:
Does your story adhere to the limitations of the time period in which it’s set?
Does your narrative progress along a defined timeline or, if told out of chronological order, are the time points for each scene clear and understandable?
Is time revealed at the beginning of each scene so that readers understand the progression of scenes or any skips in time?
The cost of developmental editing
How much does third-party developmental editing cost?
Editing businesses usually advertise set per-word rates, sometimes with different prices based on turnaround time. On average, expect to pay $0.02–$0.04 per word (around $5.00–$10.00 per page).
The editing and proofreading service, Scribendi, does not offer developmental editing, only line/copy editing.
With Reedsy, developmental editing for an 80,000-word novel costs about $0.0252 per word, or $6.30 per page.
The goal of developmental editing is to ensure your work is sound on a structural and storytelling level. As a developmental editor, I analyze the previous aspects of your story to identify missing elements or, if present, to determine whether they’re working.
A developmental edit may require you to restructure your manuscript. Usually, you will need to rewrite to address issues identified and resubmit for a second evaluation.
What I do as a developmental editor of dark fiction
When a writer of dark fiction sends me their manuscript for development editing, I make notes as I read carefully. I evaluate and comment on most of the above elements and suggest options and improvements. I return the commented manuscript (change-tracked Microsoft Word) with a cover email that discusses my findings and summarizes my recommendations.
As a developmental editor, I will evaluate, critique, guide, and help you shape your work—even if you’re still writing it. After you produce a strong story, I’m available to further refine your writing with line editing and copy editing. Each step will bring you closer to the possibility of publication.
What exactly are copy editors, and what do they do for writers, especially writers of dark fiction?
What copy editors are not
Copy editors are not writers (although I’m both a writer and an editor). They’re not rewriters. They’re not developmental editors, line editors, or proofreaders.
What copy editors do
Copy editors review an author’s text to do the following:
Correct spelling, grammar, syntax, and punctuation errors
Ensure that the writing adheres to the standards of their chosen (or assigned) stylebook
Clarify the text by eliminating ambiguous or factually incorrect statements
Produce a smooth reading experience
Copy editors correct mechanical errors
Copy editors must know how to spot and correct grammar and spelling errors as well as syntax and punctuation mistakes.
Copy editors adhere to style standards
Mastering grammar, syntax, and punctuation begins and continues with becoming thoroughly acquainted with the dictionary and the latest version of a style guide such as The Chicago Manual of Style or The Associated Press Stylebook. I use CMOS.
Copy editors check facts
Copy editors may also need to fact-check information in manuscripts. With a discriminating eye, they consider each statement and ask: is the information, as stated by the writer, factually correct? Some research may be required to determine accuracy.
If a fact—whether appearing in narrative or dialogue—is ambiguous, copy editors may contact the author with a polite note pointing out the issue and asking for clarification.
Correcting factual errors and ambiguities prevents misreading and misunderstanding, which could potentially prove disastrous to readers and consequently costly to the author and publisher.
The cost of copy editing
How much does third-party copy editing cost?
Editing businesses usually advertise set per-word rates, sometimes with different prices based on turnaround time. On average, expect to pay $0.02–$0.04 per word (around $5.00–$10.00 per page).
The editing and proofreading service, Scribendi, lets you calculate the cost of editing based on your word count. (They lump line and copy editing together.) For example, an 80,000-word novel takes two weeks and costs $1602.86 (as of the date of this post). That comes out to $0.02 per word, or $5.01 per 250-word page. A 4000-word short story with one-week turnaround time costs $129.33 ($0.032 per word, $8.08 per page). With 24-hour turnaround, cost increases to $163.17 ($0.041 per word, $10.20 per page).
With Reedsy, copy editing is lumped in with line editing and costs about $0.02 per word, or $5.00 per page.
I copy-edit for $0.012 per word, or $3.00 per page. If you contract for both line and copy editing or line, copy, and proofreading, I offer a discount. See Current dark fiction editing rates.
The goal of copy editing
The goal of careful copy editors is to produce clean, consistent, and correct manuscripts that fulfill the intentions of both writer and publisher. Attention to mechanics, style standards, accuracy, and readability is how copy editors achieve these ends.
Need a copy editor?
If you need any kind of editing, including copy editing, for your dark fiction manuscript, check out Dark Fiction Editing. I have decades of experience and can help you improve your writing.
How You Can Constantly Improve Your Indie-Published Work
When traditional publishing ruled, once a book was printed, it was set in stone. That’s why they employed editors and copy editors to improve the story and ferret out all the mistakes: once the book was typeset and thousands of copies printed, it couldn’t be corrected. But we’re in the digital age now.
If you’re an indie author, you’re responsible for everything: the writing, the formatting, the editing, the publishing, and the marketing. It’s hard to guarantee perfection at every step. The good thing is, nothing’s set in stone. In today’s publishing world your books are tantamount to software. If you didn’t get it right the first time, there’s always version 2.0.
At one point I debated whether this was ethical. After my initial release of a book, should I change it? I was still recovering from the bircks-and-mortar bookstore/paper tome/traditional publishing paradigm. Now I think, If you know it needs to be corrected or can be improved, can you ethically not give your readers the best product you’re capable of providing?
If you discover you need to make corrections to a work already published, you can do so and simply upload a new version to your favorite sales portal. Along with the power of having your own digital Gutenberg comes great responsibility.
As a technical writer 25+ years in the software industry, I adhered to this principle in the millions of pages of documentation I wrote and published: If it needs fixed, whatever the reason, fix it and republish ASAP.
Going the extra mile is in your favor. If you get a less than spectacular review and the reader complains about something you can change, do so as quickly as possible to prevent others from jumping on the bandwagon. For instance, if a number of reviewers (precious few nowadays) bitch about how much they hated the ending, REWRITE IT.
Like the in-house Quality Assurance department, your beta readers don’t always catch everything before you publish. Once your work is in the hands of the public, you become Helpdesk and Support Services, fielding complaints and logging issues for product improvement. Your product.
I’m not advocating changing your fiction at the whims of your readership. If you made a decision that you know is right for your story, stick with it. Yet if it concerns some other issue you can rectify, do so. Reminder: it pays to take your time and ensure you’re putting your best out there the first time.
Sure, some readers will always own 1.0. These are the breaks. But some of your readers getting an improved pub is better than all of them getting version 1.0 with all its bugs. It’s just not necessary with digital texts.
Amazon lets you notify readers that a new version is available. I did this once for a classic I had republished because an OCR scanning error turned into a factual error that I didn’t catch. I don’t recommend you do this unless absolutely necessary. Especially with fiction, once it’s read, it’s read.
But if you get a chance to improve your published work—whether it’s to correct typos, smooth out a scene, fill in a plot hole, or post a new cover—by all means, do it. Constant improvement is the professional stepstool to greater sales.
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About two weeks ago, I got the idea to revise my Seton Hill University thesis novel, DEATH PERCEPTION. But that created a dilemma for me: revise an old project, or work on a new one? Here’s how I came to my final decision.
Since graduating from the Writing Popular Fiction masters program in 2006, I had made several rounds of revisions on the book, a supernatural crime story. I would go through it and make a lot of changes, then I’d bury it again. I never felt it was complete. Certainly not good enough to be published. And frankly I was so sick of it I couldn’t gain any perspective. Am I improving it, or am I making it worse? I could never tell. After its mouldering in the grave for a good three years, I unearthed the manuscript once more, scraped off the decay, and decided to take another look.
I was suprised. Sure, there were a couple chapters that were clinkers, churned out under the pressure of a term deadline nearly a decade ago. But most of it was good. Really good. At one point, I thought, I can’t believe I wrote this…
Perhaps my skills and judgment have matured. More so, I think I’ve gained confidence in my abilities. Somewhere during my continuing studies and coming out process, I gained that perspective I needed to be able to judge my own work with a more objective eye.
And I discovered something uncanny. Those frustrating holes in my manuscript that I didn’t know how to fill in past revisions were suddenly waiting like placeholders for knowledge I now possessed. Someday I plan to blog about the prescient and prophetic aspects of fiction writing, but for now I’ll say that not only with THE SIXTH SEED, but also with DEATH PERCEPTION, plot situations that I wrote about years ago have come to pass in my personal life. Let me explain.
DEATH PERCEPTION is about a young man who operates the crematory at the local funeral home. He discovers he has a gift for discerning the cause of death of those he cremates. Not a big deal since they’re already dead. However, when what he discerns differs from what’s on the death certificate, he finds himself in the midst of murderers.
Have I started to cremate the deceased in my spare time? No. (But the onsite research was fascinating!) Yet the abilities my protagonist Kennet Singleton develops—powers I wrote about from pure imagination a decade ago—I am now experiencing in my own life.
My study of spiritualism, mediumship, and healing through the Morris Pratt Institute is providing me with the knowledge I need to fill those holes in my manuscript. And having since experienced psychic phenomena for myself, I’m able to add realism to Kennet’s otherwordly perceptions. (For more about this, see “Visitation from the Summerland” at my other blog, Building the Bridge.)
So how did this create a dilemma for me?
I’ve been planning a new novel, DEAD CEMETERY, working on setting, plot, and characterization in my spare moments the past few months. I’m itching to spend more time on it, but am constrained by my spiritualism schoolwork. When I received the idea (actually, an intuitive prompting) to revise DEATH PERCEPTION, I felt it would only further postpone my work on the new book (which, of course, it is). But once I got into DEATH PERCEPTION, I realized that I might be able to finalize revisions and actually get it published.
So that’s what I decided to do: revise and publish DEATH PERCEPTION so that I will have something to market while I work on DEAD CEMETERY.
With the help of Spirit, I’m learning to spin plates like a real writer. I’ll let you know how it goes.