Photo use courtesy of photographer Suat Eman
Lately, I’ve been hearing about writers, both published and unpublished, getting their work professionally edited before submitting to a publisher or agent. I decided to seek out editorial services for this project since I keep getting rejected, and it’s a bit of a different book than the category romances that I write.
I kept hearing about this editorial service on blogs that I read regularly. Since I recognized some of the staff members as former editors at large, commercial CBA houses and some were former agents of large, highly respected literary agencies, I felt comfortable using their services.
I used the manuscript evaluation service and this included a short write-up from the editor who was assigned to me, as well as a forty or fifty minute phone call. I was surprisingly pleased with the outcome of the notes and the phone call. My evaluation was only based upon first three chapters and synopsis, but the editor was able to point out things in my writing that I didn’t see myself. I have pages of notes from our conversation and I hope to sell this manuscript someday. I’m not one to give up easily.
Have you ever used a professional editor before submitting your manuscript? If so, who did you use? Were you pleased with your experience?
Yes, I both offer them [as part of Writing Career Coach] and use them [since I’m also an author].
I have to tell you that for many years I thought it wasn’t worth the money, but then I had an edit. It radically changed the way I write. In fact, that manuscript won a national award [the Daphne du Maurier award].
Thank you so much for sharing your experience. So many authors want to find that magic bullet that will shoot them to the top of the slush pile. They’ll spend time and money trying to word their query and pitch JUST perfectly.
But excellent craft always wins out no matter how you get it in front of them.
Great post and thanks for telling the ACFW Bookclub. That’s how I found the post.
Thanks for commenting, Tiffany! I’ll check out your editorial service website, too!
I have twice with excellent results. Camy Tang was one. The other is Caroline Tang former Executive Editor at Pocket Books. BTW she will be in Seekerville on Friday addressing this.
I have not used one yet but intend to. Several people at conference recommended various editorial services. I was told that if you have a particular house in mind then you might want to use someone they utilize. I am blessed to have someone who does editorial work who is one of my CPs. What she is looking at is often different than what the others see. Thanks so much for sharing your experience and thanks for the link.
Thanks much for telling me about this, Tina. I follow the Seekerville blog, so I’ll be sure to check out that blog post.
I have also used and independent editor and found the experience priceless. The advice given included a high level look at what did and didn’t work in my MS AND some line-by-line help where I had reoccurring mistakes(that I just kept making:). Highly recommend it if you can swing it.