You've completed the manuscript of a novel, a memoir, or other nonfiction work. You've gone over it yourself to check for typos, places where the meaning needs to be clearer, misspellings, grammatical errors. You feel it is ready either to be sent to an editor or a publisher or to publish it yourself.
But is it ready??
No matter how many times you review your manuscript, you will not catch all the errors. It is always wise to have it read by other eyes. If you are a careful writer, well-grounded in spelling and grammar, you may not need a professional editor. You do need someone who will be reading the manuscript for the first time. And I can tell you with near absolute certainty that that person will find errors you missed. Why?
When reading your own work, you tend to see what you know should be there , not necessarily what is there. It's just human nature. You know, "To err is human." But if you are a careful writer, and you do have excellent knowledge of grammar and spelling, having your manuscript read by a trusted friend, a fellow writer, or by "beta readers" will probably be sufficient. You won't need to hire an outside editor. What you must NOT do is rely on the spell-checker in your word-processing program.
If, however, you do not know a direct object from an object of a preposition, or a subordinate clause from a pile of dirty laundry, hiring a professional editor may be exactly what you need to avoid the embarrassment and frustration of being told by a prospective agent or publisher, "Clean up the spelling and grammar and send it back to me, and I may consider it." If you go the independent route and self-publish, you'll want to avoid getting reviews like this: "There may be a good story here, but I was too distracted by the many errors in spelling and grammar to care."
Arucadi Enterprises offers services that will protect you from such embarrassing situations. We will do a thorough edit of your manuscript, either making corrections or using the "track changes" feature of Microsoft Word to allow you to review all corrections and suggested changes and accept only those with which you agree. For writers who wish to self-publish but aren't sure how to go about it, we can format a manuscript to give it a professional appearance. We can do copy-editing, limited to catching grammatical and spelling errors, misused words, and sentences that need clarification. We can also do limited content editing, though we will not rewrite your work. We may point out that it needs extensive revision, but doing that revision will be left up to you.
To learn more about this business and the services it offers, click on the menu pages above.
When reading your own work, you tend to see what you know should be there , not necessarily what is there. It's just human nature. You know, "To err is human." But if you are a careful writer, and you do have excellent knowledge of grammar and spelling, having your manuscript read by a trusted friend, a fellow writer, or by "beta readers" will probably be sufficient. You won't need to hire an outside editor. What you must NOT do is rely on the spell-checker in your word-processing program.
If, however, you do not know a direct object from an object of a preposition, or a subordinate clause from a pile of dirty laundry, hiring a professional editor may be exactly what you need to avoid the embarrassment and frustration of being told by a prospective agent or publisher, "Clean up the spelling and grammar and send it back to me, and I may consider it." If you go the independent route and self-publish, you'll want to avoid getting reviews like this: "There may be a good story here, but I was too distracted by the many errors in spelling and grammar to care."
Arucadi Enterprises offers services that will protect you from such embarrassing situations. We will do a thorough edit of your manuscript, either making corrections or using the "track changes" feature of Microsoft Word to allow you to review all corrections and suggested changes and accept only those with which you agree. For writers who wish to self-publish but aren't sure how to go about it, we can format a manuscript to give it a professional appearance. We can do copy-editing, limited to catching grammatical and spelling errors, misused words, and sentences that need clarification. We can also do limited content editing, though we will not rewrite your work. We may point out that it needs extensive revision, but doing that revision will be left up to you.
To learn more about this business and the services it offers, click on the menu pages above.