Our editors have worked for many years on all kinds of fiction and nonfiction manuscripts. We have worked on staff at major publishers or have taught writing and editing in academic settings. We know what a piece needs to make it stand up, shine, and yell, “Look at me!”

Editing is essential if you want your book to reflect the best of you. Never skimp on editing, because poor editing shows. Don’t rely on your friends, family, or new college grad to do your editing for you, because they may not have the experience needed to do book editing. Bluefish Bay has a team of professional book editors, with many years’ experience in editing and proofreading.

The Editing Process There are three main phases a book should go through in the editing process: content editing, copyediting, and proofreading. They all correct mistakes, but each concentrates on different kinds of errors. Check out our article, Finding Problems in Your Manuscript, for more specifics. We endeavor to make your manuscript significantly better. However, editing is not an exact science, and one reading does not always find every error. The most error-free manuscripts are read through and edited several times. Thus, we suggest that after editing, you have your work proofread. Then review the final manuscript carefully yourself to double-check for those tiny nagging errors. Price Estimates for editing Want a free estimate? Just ask. Include your manuscript’s word count and attach a 10-page sample of your manuscript. Or you can call us toll-free at 1-866-999-2583 Our editing and proofreading prices are reasonable. We’ll give you a quick estimate for the whole job.

What Kinds of Editing Do We Do? Editing from Bluefish Bay can significantly improve your manuscript. Look at what we do: Content Editing or Substantive Editing Content editing, or substantive editing, is a heavy editing pass. It takes a comprehensive look at the overall intent and feel of a manuscript. Much of the content editor’s efforts are to help the final product make sense, to improve overall clarity and accuracy, and to challenge the author to be certain that the manuscript’s content is correct. A content edit generally includes looking for improvements in imagery, setting, foreshadowing, context, point of view, proportion, characterization, dialogue, plot, and general readability. For nonfiction documents, we look for clarity, continuity, tone, structure, organization, and layout. A content editor may reorganize paragraphs and sentences, and rewrite segments to improve readability and presentation. See sample. Copyediting or Medium Editing Copyeditors find problems with organization, coherence, redundancy, word usage, style, syntax, consistency, run-on sentences, and fragments. Copyeditors change words and sentences if they are awkward or incorrect. In addition, they look at paragraph and sentence structures, and may move sentences around to help the reader more easily follow the topic. See sample. Proofreading Proofreading is yet another kind of editing. A proofreader looks closely for typos, spelling errors, hyphenation problems, and punctuation. Proofreading picks up the problems that word processing spell-checkers do not find. See sample. General Editing (combination) General editing is a single editing pass that combines content editing, copyediting, and proofreading. A general edit can correct 95% of a manuscript’s problems, but because this is done in a single reading pass, it is not as exacting as several readings consisting of content editing, copyediting, and proofreading. Manuscript Review A manuscript review is a critical reading of your manuscript to identify areas that might need improvement. For instance, we can tell you if your manuscript needs more conflict, dialogue, or narrative. We’ll tell you if there are disconnects or inconsistencies, confusing passages, or if there is too much telling rather than showing. Then, we will offer a few hints to help you fix problems. Rather than edit the manuscript itself, an editor provides a report to the author with the general areas that should be enhanced or reworked. Consulting Consulting is for authors who need a little help getting through the rough spots. Our manuscript consulting service puts you in direct, one-on-one contact with our editors, usually by phone or e-mail. Writing tutors address your specific problems; they can help you develop better dialogue, plot, and characters, as well as ensure you consider balance and organization in your manuscript