What have you got for me: Personal letters or emails? CVs or business proposals? Essays, short stories or even novels? Bring them on!
In a nutshell, Basic Copyediting and Advanced Copyediting are two separate stages. Advanced will look at word choice, wordiness, sentence construction, redundancy and repetition. Basic will look at grammar, spelling and punctuation.
BASIC COPYEDITING
WHAT IT IS
- Looking at spelling, punctuation and grammar. (e.g. never worry about the infamous they're, their and there trifecta of confusion)
- Checking on facts and errors (e.g. no, a duck's quack actually doesn't echo.)
- Checking on technical consistency (e.g. did you use e-mail in one paragraph and email in another?)
- Checking on internal consistency (e.g. did your character suddenly change outfits without reason?)
WHAT IT ISN'T
- Pointing out poor word choice or sentence construction
- Fixing the flow of the document
- Adding and deleting text to make it read and sound better
WHEN DO YOU NEED IT?
Best as final step before publishing your document. It's generally well-written and edited thoroughly and just needs a second pair eyes to make sure everything is okay.
RATES
Contact me and we'll work out the rates.
ADVANCED COPYEDITING
WHAT IT IS
- Ensuring the document flows well and its messages come across clearly
- Looking at word choice, wordiness, sentence construction and overall technical soundness
- Rewriting and moving existing content as necessary to help with flow
- For fiction: focus on story elements, plot, character, dialogue, scenes, pint of view, voice, setting, words, syntax, pace, etc.
- For non-fiction: logic, consistency, flow, info is well-presented, conclusions are sound
WHAT IT ISN'T
- Crafting new content and information
- Basic Copyediting. While they will naturally overlap, that service is best done separately once you have a final version of your document. Advanced Copyediting is not a combination of both.
WHEN DO YOU NEED IT?
This is useful when you have a rougher draft (but all the major elements are in place) and need help tightening things up or getting better clarity out of your text.
RATES
Contact me and we'll work out the rates.
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