Cheapest way to edit?
The manuscript is done and dusted. Now I can kick back and let an editor do the grunt work. That's what editors are for, right?
Absolutely.
They will take my lousy to mediocre sentences and make them sing. I have tons of brilliant sentences, but a few escaped my creativity. The editor will have some cool ideas for sure, right?
Of course.
I have typos, lots of them, and by that, I mean a crap-house. My spelling sucks and my grammar sucks worse. Never mind, the editor will fix those things, right?
Right.
My plot is all over the show, but I know what I mean. In my head it runs perfectly, it just needs to be put in order on paper. No worries. That's the editor's job, right?
Right.
My characters have blue or green eyes that miraculously become brown or amber halfway through the book or hair changes color, with no visit to a hairdresser. Ah, no problem, the editor will sort out those glitches, right?
Indeed.
I have plenty of sequence problems--the character gets a fright, then the door bangs. I'm too busy crafting a great story to worry about such silly little things. It's the editor's job, right?
Sure.
My formatting is way off. I use different fonts and colors. Sometimes I have double spacing, sometimes not. I did Google this stuff and everyone says, don't do it, but what the hell, I was having fun, and that's for my editor to fix, right?
Ah-huh.
Research is boring, so I have a few areas where I just took a stab in the dark. Someone pointed out the flaws, but I don't have time for that crap. I have a sequel to write when this book is published. My editor will have to sort it out, right?
Yup. (Editor pulls up calculator.)
Oh, then one more small thing, all those pesky "how-to" people on the internet keep bleating about, "Show don't tell, dialogue tags, point of view, then deep POV and so forth." Don't even know what half of them mean. But not my problem, right?
Ah, who's writing this thing?
If my editing needs tick all the above, or even half, then we have a problem, Houston. The prices rocket exponentially--no pun intended--from 3 cents to over 15 cents a word! Ergo, this is NOT the way to get the most cost effective edit for my manuscript.
I crawl back into my cave, make a cup of coffee or just hook up an IV line to the coffee machine, and edit, edit, edit, then edit again. I put it on ice for a few weeks, then edit again. Now, the cost is creeping down.
However, all is not lost. Go to www.InspirationForWriters.com or email Sandy Tritt at ifweditors@gmail.com
Sandy is an amazing, kind person and will match you up with one of her team of editors, who each have specific fields of expertise. You will be offered a 500 word FREE sample edit with a brief overview of your weaknesses and strengths--plus she will send you tutorials to help you with your weak areas. All this is FREE--it ain't gonna get cheaper than that.