How to Hire an Editor, Part II: Types of Editing Services
There’s a difference between knowing what you need and keeping an open mind to what the professionals tell you.
When an editor comes back with their quote, they’re going to tell you if they really think your manuscript needs just that proofread you asked for, or if it needs an overhaul.
This is hard to digest for several reasons:
We don’t want to think our books aren’t ready to be polished and published. So we might just not want to think we need more work.
It’s possible that the editor is upselling you to get more out of you. It’s not ethical, but it happens. So how do we know they’re telling us what really needs to happen, rather than trying to get more money out of us?
The book might just not work for them. They might just not like it, so they offer you changes to make it more their style. After all, that’s what you’re paying them for—to make you better. But you need to think long and hard about whether their changes are beneficial for you or if their changes would change your work into something totally different.
The most important thing for you to remember is this: stay true to your voice and keep an open mind. It might not happen the first time you get a quote back, but you will find an editor who meshes with your style. Just keep looking, querying, and asking around. Once you find them, treat them right and you will forever have a good editor.
Proofreading
Most proofreaders charge around $300 to read a 100,000 word manuscript. This is the cheapest service you’ll find because it involves the least work—a proofread is a once-over that catches typos and grammatical errors. That’s it. Don’t expect them to tell you about plot holes or inconsistencies in character action. That’s deeper editing that requires more focus and takes longer, so it’ll be more expensive.
The Copy-Edit, or Line-Editing
Copy-editing is the “moderate” level of editing. It’s time-intensive and involves what’s called a line-level focus, or a look at each detail in the manuscript. This is your chance to catch both big and small errors. A copy-edit analyzes for plot holes and for minor oddities, like if someone is wearing a blue shirt in the beginning of a scene and a yellow one at the end—all without a costume change.
A copy-edit is the error hunt.
I charge $0.008/word for copy-editing, but I know a lot of editors charge more than that. I also offer a free proofread with my copy-edit, so technically it’s even cheaper than that.
Every editor has a different setup, but I think the industry average for copy-editing is from $0.01 – $0.05 per word, depending on your editor. Those with decades of experience and hundreds of clients will obviously be more expensive.
What you need to expect out of a copyedit is a detailed analysis (with notes and comments) that dissects the details of your story. Your editor should look at character motivations, description and setting, writing style, and more to give you a full snapshot of your novel’s strengths and weaknesses.
Copy-editing is my personal favorite because I love the level of detail it requires.
Critiquing
This is your high-level revision process, where you’re discovering plot holes and reworking large chunks of the text.
Usually, you critique with your writing circle and not with an editor. There are a few great sites set up for this specifically, including Critique Circle and my personal favorite, Scribophile. These sites allow others to critique your work and give you feedback on a points system—you can’t upload your own work without points, so it creates a strong give-and-take community. I love the people on Scribophile—I have gotten great feedback there on my short stories.
I also recommend you find a group of writers in your genre with whom you can swamp manuscripts for a critique. Point is, you don’t really need to hire an editor for a critique, though it’s usually offered.
What’s your personal favorite part of editing? Which of these three areas would you say you need the most help in developing?
This is a three-part how-to series, so the rest of the posts will be going up in the next few days. Here’s the schedule:
The Basics
Types of Editing Services
How to Approach Editors
