Line & Copy Editing
The last pass, and the one people judge you on
Line editing is about how the sentences move. Copy editing is about whether they are correct. They are different jobs and most manuscripts need both, in that order, after the structure has stopped changing. Doing this work too early is the most common way writers waste money on editing: you polish prose that a later structural pass deletes.
What's included
- Line editing for rhythm, repetition, and clarity, sentence by sentence
- Copy editing for grammar, consistency, and continuity errors
- A style sheet documenting every choice, which you keep and reuse
- Tracked changes so every edit is yours to accept or reject
- A short call to walk through the patterns worth learning from
Worth asking any editor
If an editor offers to line edit a manuscript you describe as a rough draft, be careful. Good editors will tell you to wait.
★★★★★
“She sent back a style sheet with forty entries I did not know I had opinions about. I have used it on everything since.”
See the edit before you buy the edit
Send your first ten pages and I will edit them properly and send the notes back, free. Not a summary of what I would do, the actual marked-up pages. If those notes are not worth having, we both learned something cheaply and you owe me nothing.
Thinking about line & copy editing?
Send the first ten pages. I will edit them properly and send the marked pages back within a week, free.