Congratulations you have completed your book and now it’s time to start the editing process.

When submitting a manuscript to a publisher it is vital that the work you provide has been professionally edited. It is equally important when approaching an editor for assistance that you know what it is that you want, and the particular service you are commissioning. In this guest post Donna Costello of LunaCreativeAcademy.com explores the different variations of editing so that you can make an informed choice.

Developmental Editing

Developmental editing is an entire overview of your manuscript. This is for writers who are looking to ensure there are no plot holes within their novel or may need assistance in identifying problem areas.
Development editing usually involves:

• Identifying big picture issues such as characterisation, plot and structure.
• Guidance on how to resolve them and elements of the writing crafting.
• Line by line suggestions.

Copy Editing

This is the fine tuning of the manuscript, the editor reviews sentence structure, focuses on prose and makes corrections based on the flow of the text.

Copy editing includes:

• Reviewing the text, removing repetition, awkward dialogue and the dreaded purple prose.
• Identifying overwriting and underwriting and making adequate corrections.
• Direct edits on the manuscript unlike developmental editing where comments are usually made identifying the issues and providing solutions to the writer.

Proofreading
This is the final stage of the editing process and where all the nitty gritty bits of work get done.

Proofreaders usually review the manuscript for grammar, spelling and punctuation mistakes. This should be done after the developmental and copy editing stages as changes will be made to the text throughout these stages which will affect the manuscript.

Donna Costello
Creative Writing Coach, Book Editor, Digital Marketer & Author.
donna@lunacreativeacademy.com