Services

Something in your manuscript just isn’t working, but the worst part is that you’re not sure what it is. Maybe you’re too close to the work, you’ve been working on this project for too long, or you’re not sure how to turn your dissertation into a book. You need fresh eyes. A manuscript assessment analyzes how your argument, evidence, narrative, and analysis are working together to communicate your big ideas to your target audience. The revision plan provides clear, actionable suggestions for communicating your argument and its implications more effectively to your reader. I’ll figure out where the problem is and come back to you with solutions. This service does not include direct editing of the text. Clients receive an editorial letter with detailed feedback and recommendations for revision.

A hands-on developmental edit involves direct editing of the text to improve its organization and content. I reorganize material to improve coherence, ensure the logical progression of ideas, and shape the narrative and expository flow to suit the target audience of the work. I focus on eliminating repetition, ensuring completeness and coherence, and strengthening argument. A structural edit also includes revising, cutting, or flagging missing content. This service is often a useful add-on to the Manuscript Assessment + Revision Plan.

Sentence-level problems got you down? Do you need help smoothing out your prose? Do you (like me) struggle with verbose sentence structure? Line editing (sometimes called stylistic editing or heavy copyediting) brings your voice out from behind the clutter of unnecessary words, too many clauses, and stylistic shifts. I specialize in line editing for multi-lingual authors, but this service is useful for anyone urgently seeking to communicate too many ideas in a single sentence. Stylistic editing clarifies meaning, ensures coherence and flow, and refines the language of a text at the sentence, paragraph, and section levels while maintaining authorial voice. This service is often combined with Hands-On Developmental Editing.

The final, maddening, hair-pulling, just-want-this-book-done step in the publication process. More often than not, an academic publisher will task you with finding an indexer for your book or, worse, doing it yourself. Don’t put yourself through that. A well-structured, professionally-produced index makes your book infinitely more useful to your reader. I provide back-of-the-book indexes in history and Latin American studies.