Write your words without fear. Edit your words without mercy.
If you're unsure about the readability of your manuscript— clear points, creating an engaging narrative arc, or just want to speak broadly about your manuscript—this is the service for you!
manuscript overview and feedback
With the Overview, I will read your entire or partial manuscript and then give you written big picture feedback. If you're unsure about the readability of your manuscript—whether you’re getting the points across that you want to convey, whether your narrative arc is engaging, or if you just want to talk in broad terms about your manuscript—this is a great way to avoid the cost of in-depth written editing. Know your strengths and points for improvement at the beginning of your writing process, instead of learning about them once you’re chest deep into your manuscript when it’s harder to change course.
The quote I send will include my reading and consideration time before we begin. The base price is $499 and includes a manuscript of up to 5,000 words. Long manuscript fees are assessed by word count. As an example, I would charge $1199 for a 60,000-word manuscript, which includes written feedback. If you are interested in this service, please inquire with your word count, and describe what you'd like to get out of my read of your manuscript. Please note that this service is for full written feedback on all aspects of your manuscript, not for a call. Client feedback has let me know that the written feedback is more valuable because authors can always refer back to it and use it as a guidepost.
“I want to thank my editor, Felice Laverne, for molding and shaping this book beyond my own expectations and hopes. As many edits as were made, Felice never once allowed me to lose my voice.”
OUTLINE RENOVATION
This editorial service is a phenomenal way to hit the ground running with your book baby! Perhaps you’ve started writing your manuscript but you’re hitting a few snags, or maybe you know you have a book growing inside of you, but you don’t know where to start from. Is there really a story there? Of course, there is! So, let the Renovation of your ideas and your outline help you get there.
With this service, we’ll go over your outline and character list together, filling in your plot gaps and sharpening your characters until they feel so 3D you’d know them if you saw them in a crowd. My developmental edit of your idea, outline and characters will help you dive into the world that your book seeks to build, pointing out areas that need work, plotlines to reconsider and where your idea could fit in the contemporary marketplace of books in your genre—valuable advise from a literary agent. I’ll offer personalized next steps so that when you start writing the first words of your book, you’ll know that you’re going in the right direction.
This service offers up to 3 rounds of written back-and-forth feedback to ensure that you’ve ironed out all of the kinks from your foundation before you get started writing your book baby. The outline maximum length is 20 double-spaced pages at this price. Longer outlines will incur an additional fee. If you feel that you only need 1 or 2 rounds of feedback, each round is priced at $299. Other services and editing can be added on, depending on your needs.
GHOST EDITING
Ghost editing is also known as book doctoring. It’s a cross between an intense developmental edit and ghostwriting, which entails taking a big-picture view of your manuscript and doing some creative writing and revising. Whereas a ghostwriter starts with your idea and a blank page and writes your book for you, a ghost editor starts with one of your early drafts and reworks it until it’s a viable book.
Ghost editing is ultimately useful if you want help revising a rough draft into a final manuscript with a minimum amount of frustration and time. By partnering with a ghost editor, you can finish the book you've started with much less work on your part. If you don't have time to revise a manuscript or you feel unqualified to rewrite your own book in full, you could benefit from ghost editing. Ghost editing is ideal if you’ve written a book but are short on the time, patience, or technique required to finish it. It cuts down on the number of drafts you have to endure so that writing a book becomes a less painful prospect. It’s also ideal if you’re the kind of author who expresses themselves better verbally than in writing.
“Felice is a joy to work with, and such a warm, sharp, and indefatigable editor. We worked together closely on a book that we were publishing quickly into an election season, and Felice dove right in without batting an eye. She met every deadline, however tight, with grace. And, she helped us shape an exquisite manuscript. A gift to both authors and publishers.”
BETA READ/MANUSCRIPT EVALUATION – DEV EDIT LETTER ONLY
This is for authors who are serious about revising their manuscript and want a detailed list of suggestions and priorities that they should focus on. A manuscript evaluation is offered as a 6-8 page editorial letter outlining the high-level strengths and weaknesses of your manuscript. For each area where edits are recommended, I’ll point to specific examples and give recommendations and options for how to revise these areas.
COPY EDIT
The copy edit is one of the final steps you’ll need to ensure that your manuscript is sharp, tight and free of grammatical errors before submitting it to agents or self-publishing it. The copy edit ensures that the dialogue is authentic and flows, tightens wordy sentences and checks for readability, pacing, clarity, and consistency. I also make minor corrections to spelling, grammar, capitalization and punctuation.
“Working with Felice Laverne improved my manuscript significantly. Her objectivity and full understanding of how to best present the story elevated my manuscript and invigorated my passion for my novel’s completion. She is a wonderfully reliable, impressive professional, a champion of authors, and a delight to work with. I look forward to working with Felice on my next manuscript.”
SUBSTANTIVE/LINE EDIT
A substantive edit, also called a line edit, looks at the manuscript at a sentence level. It is an edit I’d recommend for manuscripts that need edits—large or small—at a line-by-line level. This is where I polish up the big-picture elements, ensure that the dialogue is authentic and flows, tighten wordy sentences and check for readability, pacing, clarity, and consistency. With these edits, I also check for consistency from scene to scene (motivations, actions, eye color, clothing, etc.). I edit to improve paragraph structure, scene structure, and transitions, and I find repetitive words/phrases/structures that may be distracting or annoying to your reader.
FULL MANUSCRIPT DEVELOPMENTAL EDIT
Developmental editing is the cream of the crop. It’s the most detailed, comprehensive, and thoughtful editing you have for your manuscript. Investing in Developmental Editing means you’ll receive everything coming to you in terms of copy editing and line editing, as well as deep feedback on your writing and storytelling craft. Developmental Editing tends to think small and big at the same time, weaving in feedback on all areas of your project, from voice at the sentence level to the overall trajectories of your character and plot. Developmental Edits ask bigger questions about your story, thinking about character change, theme, your use of imagery, and more. And, with a Developmental Editor who knows enough to be a guide for you in the publishing industry, Developmental Editing can also sometimes be even bigger, taking your place within the publishing industry into consideration. That means, giving you commentary and suggestions on how your book compares to others in your genre, changes you should make to make it more marketable (to readers, agents, publishers, booksellers, etc.), and what an agent, reader or publisher might think of it, based on other books out there in your genre. That’s an invaluable service for any author, particularly for new authors, because it’s very likely that you don’t know what to look for when it comes to questions like these.
Because of my publishing industry experience I am able to comment on your book’s market chances and how to strengthen the project with an eye toward getting a literary agent. You’re investing in full-service treatment of and guidance for your project. A great Developmental Edit is designed to draw out the best in the writer and the book. An experienced Developmental Editor will make you question yourself, your plot, and your delivery of your message in all the best ways, drawing out parts of your manuscript and your talent as a writer that you hadn’t even discovered yet, and that is what’s SO magical about this process and this service, and why I recommend it to all writers. A manuscript evaluation is offered as a 6-8-page editorial letter, with big-picture feedback on plot, character, readability, marketability, structure, pacing, character development and world-building as well as any genre considerations that may apply.
Note: After your manuscript evaluation, you can choose to work with me as your author coach to complete the revision or complete the revision on your own and then return for either another evaluation (to make sure your revision worked) or a full manuscript edit (to prepare the manuscript for pitching or publication). The pricing listed on this page applies to these two services as well.
“Felice helped me navigate the book editing process for my first book with laughs and positivity. It was the best experience and I’m not sure it’s like that for every first-time author! She is truly a pleasure to work with.”
DELUXE FULL MANUSCRIPT DEVELOPMENTAL EDIT
While Developmental Editing is the editorial cream of the crop, a Deluxe Developmental Edit is this plus Author Coaching on the page. Equally as detailed, comprehensive, and thoughtful of an edit for your manuscript, the Deluxe Developmental Edit includes a chapter by chapter analysis of your book (2k-word minimum per chapter) with new plot suggestions to strengthen your prose and plotline as well, offering pointed suggestions on how you can upgrade away from common mistakes and predictable plot twists to become a better writer overall.
Developmental Edits ask bigger questions about your story, thinking about character change, theme, your use of imagery, and more. But with a Developmental Editor who also is an experienced literary agent, #RevPit editor and on the Board of Directors of Broadleaf Writers Association, investing in a Deluxe Developmental Edit means getting commentary and suggestions on how your book compares to others in your genre, changes you should make to make it more marketable (to readers, agents, publishers, booksellers, etc.), and what an agent, reader or publisher might think of it based on other books out there in your genre on a chapter-by-chapter basis with suggestions for plot fixes as applicable. That’s an invaluable service for any author, particularly for new authors, because it’s very likely that you don’t know what to look for when it comes to questions like these. This deep feedback on your writing and storytelling craft weaves in feedback on all areas of your project, from voice at the sentence level to the overall trajectories of your character and plot.
SECOND ROUND – REVIEW OF REVISIONS
For clients who have already had a developmental edit from me (either the Developmental Edit Letter only or the Full Developmental Edit Package) who wish for me to review their revisions and make sure they are implementing the changes accurately. This 3-4-page Revisions Review Letter may also point out if there were unaddressed developmental issues following the first round. This second-round review of revisions service will not include edits in the manuscript itself. For that, you’d need a second full developmental edit package so that I can give you thorough feedback on all aspects of your manuscript.
Select Book Editing and Ghostwriting Projects
