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WELCOME TO MY EDITING SERVICES!

My purpose is to provide affordable, comprehensive editing services to indie authors or those looking to give their manuscript its best shot before querying to agents! 

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Check out the FAQ below for service options, cost, and more!

EDITING FAQ

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Q: DOES MY BOOK NEED EDITING?

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A:  It does! No matter how good a self-editor you are, you can easily overlook technical and mechanical issues in your own work; a good edit is an important part of the publication process. Where critique partners can help you develop your draft and beta readers give you insight into audience reactions, an editor is there to help you on a variety of fronts. Different kinds of editing include:

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DEVELOPMENTAL EDITS: These edits tend to be more broad, an overview that looks at how everything in your book weaves together - pacing, characters, POV, consistent tenses, plots, and dialogue. Developmental edits tend to take the most amount of time due to their extensive nature.

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LINE EDITING:  These edits involve taking your book line by line and analyzing word choice, impact, style and syntax, and the beats and pacing of the lines themselves. For example, line editing will catch if you have too many sentences of a similar length back-to-back that could make the book ready in a choppy way.

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COPY EDITS:  These are the edits that provide a professional polish to a book and involves a review for mechanical edits such as spelling, grammar, and punctuation. 

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PROOFREADING:  These are the last edits your book will undergo. Proofreading looks specifically for typos, grammatical errors, and small issues that may have slipped through while implementing developmental and line/copy edits.

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Q: WHAT KIND OF EDITING DOES MY BOOK NEED?

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A: It's best to get all three! For some people the developmental editing and critique partner processes blend, so you may find you are in need of less developmental edits. However, it's good to have an editor look at your manuscript just in case.

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Q: WHAT KIND OF EDITING SERVICES DO YOU PROVIDE?

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A: I have experience in all three fields of editing. I've worked on fiction and non-fiction books, research articles, and blogs through developmental, line, and copy edits in my professional job for over a decade.

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Q: DO YOU EDIT ALL GENRES?

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A: While I am willing to venture into most genres for COPY and LINE EDITS, my strengths for DEVELOPMENTAL EDITS lie in Young Adult/New Adult, Middle Grade, Fantasy, of all ages and Christian Self-Growth literature. For hard ADULT including Sci-fi, Romance, Historical, I suggest seeking DEVELOPMENTAL EDITS from editors more experienced in the technical aspects of those genres.

 

In addition, for personal reasons, I do not edit erotica, LGBTQIA+-centric, or politically-based manuscripts as I cannnot provide the optimal editing eye for those stories.  

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Q: WHAT DO YOU CHARGE FOR YOUR SERVICES?

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A: My updated rates as of 2024 are as follows:

 

Developmental Edit: $0.006/word ($6/1,000 words)

Line & Copy Edits: $0.007/word ($7/1,000 words)

Proofreading: $0.004/word ($4/1,000 words)

 

If you would like to hire me for both developmental AND line/copy edits of the same manuscript, it will be split into two rounds (one for developmental, one for line/copy) with a fee of 0.004/word ($4/1,000 words) for each round.

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Q: WHAT IS THE PROCESS TO HIRE YOU AS AN EDITOR?

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A: If you are interested in having your manuscript edited, please fill out the form below so we can discuss availability based around your schedule and mine. At this time I am only opening one editing slot per month so that I can guarantee to fulfill my commitments. Once slots are full, I will contact interested parties if new spots open up.

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Once we've established contact and discussed availability and the type of editing you require, I will solicit a  summary of your book and sample chapter, and return it with an example of your requested editing. If we find our styles are a good fit, we can move ahead with the process!

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IMPORTANT NOTES:

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1) I reserve the right to forego manuscripts based on certain content, which is why the summary is an important part of our process!

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 If, for any reason, after the first 20,000 words are complete, it becomes clear for any other reason I am not a good match for your book, I will be honest about this and let you know in a timely fashion; I will then send any completed edits and you will only be charged for the words completed, NOT FOR THE FULL MANUSCRIPT WORDCOUNT. 

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2) There is a $100 down payment required at the beginning of your editing slot; a second installment will be required halfway through the manuscript's total word count and the third installment will be required at the manuscript's completion.

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NOTE: I am accepting manuscripts on an extremely limited basis.

This is due to time constraints in my current season of life.


If you have any questions or concerns, or would like to speak personally about my availability, please reach out via email at renee.s.dugan@gmail.com

Does Your Manuscript Contain Erotic Content?

Thank you for reaching out! I'll be in touch with you as soon as possible!

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