Services

Editorial

Structural or developmental editing: £250 for up to 10,000 words, and £10 per additional 1,000 words (i.e. the fee for an 70,000-word novel would be £850)

This service is best suited to fiction, and involves editorial feedback on ‘big-picture’ structural and developmental issues such as plot structure, narrative voice, characterisation and themes. I am happy to review either complete or partial manuscripts. I will produce a feedback report, usually of around two pages, and also add some comments to the manuscript to give concrete examples of my suggested developmental edits.

Line editing: £26 per hour (or about £13-£15 per 1000 words, depending on the level of editing needed)

This service is similar to copyediting in that it involves a close focus on language at the sentence and paragraph level, and is usually carried out in Word using tracked changes and comments. Line editing, however, tends to go into greater depth than copyediting and is more of a creative collaboration between editor and author, addressing elements of prose style and reader experience. This stage of editing generally comes after a structural/developmental edit and before a copyedit.

Copyediting: £24 per hour (or about £10–£12 per 1000 words, depending on the level of editing needed)

This involves a meticulous sentence-level check for spelling, grammar, punctuation, syntax issues, repetition, consistency and continuity. It usually means working with tracked changes and comments in a Word document, before the text is typeset or laid out for publishing.

Proofreading: £22 per hour (or around £7–£8 per 1,000 words)

This service is the final polish before publication, and involves carefully checking for errors that have slipped through the net at earlier editorial stages, as well as typographic issues introduced at the typesetting/layout stage. At this point the text should already have been thoroughly edited, and only minor changes can be made to avoid affecting the layout and pagination. For books, proofreading usually involves working on a PDF proof using the Adobe markup tools.

Query package review: £350

This service is for authors with a completed manuscript that they are planning to submit to agents and/or publishers. I will read the opening 10,000 words (i.e. the standard extract length requested for an initial submission), along with a query letter and synopsis, and write a detailed feedback report including guidance on how to make the submission more appealing to agents and publishers.

I’m happy to discuss flexible tailored rates for any projects that don’t quite fit the descriptions above, or for a combination of editorial services. I can also offer discounts to small presses and to independent authors on low incomes.

Translation

My translation rates vary based on the project and language combination. In some cases I can charge an hourly rate similar to the line editing rate above, while in others it makes more sense to agree a per-word rate. For literary translation projects, the Translators Association's ‘observed rate’ is a useful starting point. I also offer reader reports on French and Italian books for a flat fee based on word count.

Please get in touch for a quote!