FOR EDITORS, PROOFREADERS AND WRITERS

A note from Louise: This article was written back in 2012 by my colleague Anna Sharman. For those of you looking for other avenues to explore in a bid to build up your work flows and client portfolios, especially if you have a scientific background, this is a must-read. Anna now runs her own dedicated scientific editorial consultancy, Cofactor, but back in 2012 she worked for a number of editing agencies.

Over to Anna ...

What do I do? 
I am a copyeditor and proofreader specializing in biomedical journal articles. As well as working for journals on articles that have been accepted, I also work with scientists to get their articles ready for submission to journals. Some of this work comes through editing agencies.

I got into this field through doing a PhD and postdoctoral research in developmental/evolutionary biology and then working as an in-house editor on three biology journals. I went freelance in 2005.

What are editing agencies?
Academic editing agencies act as a bridge between freelance editors and authors. Authors who want to have a paper edited can find it hard to know which of the many editors out there are any good.

For freelance editors, working directly for authors can be hard because each author will only have a small number of papers a year. So agencies have sprung up to help authors find editors and vice versa. 

Generally, these agencies offer editing of the language. Some also offer developmental editing: a report on the content of the manuscript, with suggestions on any obvious gaps in the logic or areas that are unclear. 

Academic editing agencies have probably been around for a long time, but I think they have increased in number in recent years. They have arisen in response to pressure from journals for well written manuscripts. Journals are generally happy to consider manuscripts that have minor errors or that don't read as if they were written by a fluent English speaker. However, if a manuscript is so badly written that peer reviewers cannot work out what experiments are being described, the journal cannot reasonably send it for peer review without further work. 

In addition, journals are always trying to cut costs, and freelance editors (unfortunately) are seen as expensive. Manuscripts that do get through peer review generally still need copyediting, to ensure that they make sense, use consistent terminology and symbols and are in good English. To cut down on copyediting costs, some publishers are asking authors to get their articles edited at their own expense. 

The expansion of editing agencies is also the result of an enormous expansion of science in China and other Asian countries. Although many non-fluent researchers ask fluent English-speaking colleagues to check their work, in most Asian institutes there are not enough fluent speakers to check all the papers being produced. In addition, Chinese academics are often rewarded financially for publications in English-language journals, which means that it can make sense to pay for editing to make this more likely.

Some publishers have now entered into partnerships with editing agencies. This means that if a manuscript is rejected because of language problems, or if revision is invited after peer review but language problems have been mentioned by the reviewers, the journal suggests that the authors get their manuscript checked by a fluent speaker, and sometimes recommends a particular editing agency.

Sometimes authors from that journal publisher receive a discount on the agency's fees. Other publishers list a selection of agencies, without recommending one in particular, in their instructions for authors (see, for example, this list from Public Library of Science and this list from Wiley). And some publishers have set up their own editing services (such as Elsevier and Nature Publishing Group). 

What's distinctive about working for editing agencies?
I enjoy working for editing agencies for several reasons. In general, this kind of work has a lot of the advantages of working directly for authors but without many of the disadvantages.

I prefer working on pre-submission research papers because I am seeing the research soon after it happens, rather than months or years later. I like helping people get their science published despite language barriers, contributing in a small way to levelling the playing field caused by the predominance of English in academic publishing.

I also enjoy the challenge of working on a piece of writing at an early stage, because it means I can concentrate more on the meaning and less on fine points of formatting.

When copyediting for journals, I spend a large proportion of my time applying house style, adjusting spacing, fonts, capitalization and other such minor style points. With pre-submission editing, I can ignore most of that and concentrate on working out what the author is trying to say and how to make the meaning clearer.

Developmental editing gets even closer to the science and further from the stylistic details. 

Like working for publishers, however, working for an agency has the advantage that if the author disagrees with you on any change, the agency can arbitrate. And, as I mentioned above, agencies can channel a steady stream of papers your way, from many authors, saving the time and effort needed for marketing your services to a lot of different universities and institutes.

When you work for researchers, whether directly or through an agency, bear in mind that they often work weekends and through holidays, and that weekends and holidays differ between countries.

​The agencies I work for all give deadlines in calendar days not working days, and if I want to have weekends off I have to specify this. Generally you can specify which days of the week you normally work and inform them when you will be on holiday, and they send work only when you are available. You have to remember to tell the agency about public holidays in your country – they won't necessarily know about them automatically. 

What are clients looking for? 
Academic agencies generally want editors who have experience in academia in the right field, which generally means a PhD and some published research. Some of them also want qualifications, training and/or experience in editing, though others do not – some even recruit active scientists who want to earn a little on the side. The agencies I work for, however, want experienced editors. 

There is nearly always an editing test, at least for big agencies, to check whether you can cope with the kind of editing required. This will test not only what changes you make but also how you word your queries to the author (of which there will be a lot).
  

How to access the field
If you search online you will find lots of academic editing agencies, and many of them are looking out for qualified editors with PhDs all the time. I have heard, however, that some of them pay pretty badly, and of course it is always important to check out a potential client with whom you hope to have an ongoing working relationship. So how do you find reliable ones to start working for?

The best way is to go via the publishers, particularly any publishers you are already working for. Check in their online instructions to authors for agencies that they recommend. Then send a speculative email to an agency, giving a brief summary of your qualifications and experience.

​The chances are that you will be given an editing test (which will probably be unpaid). Then, if you are accepted as one of their editors, there may be a period of training when your editing will be checked carefully and the rate of pay may be lower. If you fail the test, consider any feedback carefully but don't worry too much about not being good enough. It could be that your style of editing simply doesn't fit what the agency is looking for. Try another and don't give up unless you have taken several tests. Alternatively, this kind of editing might not be for you (see below). 

What’s the pay like? 
Agencies generally pay by number of words rather than by the hour. This means that it is difficult to work out how much you will get per hour, and that the hourly rate can sometimes work out low and sometimes high. I prefer working for a fixed fee as I tend to be quite a fast worker and enjoy finding ways to work more efficiently.

Because they are acting as intermediaries, agencies always take a cut of the fee that the author pays them. Working directly for the author would therefore pay more, in theory – but only if you can do enough marketing to get as much work as you would get through an agency. 

When trying out a new agency, check the pay rate per thousand words (this will either be supplied when you enquire or be published on the agency's website). Then try to work out the speed at which you can edit this kind of material. If you are more used to editing accepted papers, assume this kind of work will be considerably slower. I suggest giving an agency a try for a few months to see whether the rates work out OK for you. 

Some agencies pay very quickly after each job is completed; others pay two months or more later. Watch out for international bank charges, too – charges can be levied by intermediate banks that aren't in the control of either the sender's or the recipient's bank. Bear this in mind when working out whether the fees are worthwhile. 

Is this kind of editing for you?
Editing material by authors whose English is limited isn't for everyone. You may prefer to work on manuscripts at a later stage, when they have already been approved by a publisher.

​You may not know whether you enjoy this kind of work until you try it. But if you have a research background and some editing experience, I'd recommend it for the challenge. And if you want to work with pre-submission papers, going through an agency has definite advantages. 

Copyright 2012 Anna Sharman

Working with adult material (pornography and erotica) is clearly not for everyone, and it can occasionally be challenging, but it requires the same care and thought as anything else on the editor’s work pile.

​My guest this week is editor and journalist Louise Bolotin. Here, she offers an editor’s guide to sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll, with a bit of blasphemy thrown in for good measure.

What’s your first thought when an editor offers you work that is quite clearly what’s usually described as 'adult material'?

Do you think, 'Eww, how disgusting!' and reply with a 'Thanks, but no thanks'? Or do you, like me, say yes because, you know, it’s just work and there’ll be a nice cheque at the end of it?

Hovering around as I do on professional forums, on the rare occasions the topic comes up it’s clear that most editors fall into the 'no way!' camp. 

Your choice
Working on anything explicitly sexual is always going to be a personal choice, although there’s a world of difference between editing a sex guide aimed at teens, with info on STIs and using condoms correctly, and hardcore or even medium-core erotica, the latter being the kind of material I’m most likely to work on in the genre. I’ve yet to be offered any Mills and Boon titles.  

I’ve often found that when I’ve been approached to take on projects, it’s been accompanied with an apology and a warning of the content, particularly from large, well-known publishing houses.

Most memorably, an email I received offering work came complete with a chain of internal emails below the line, suggesting that the project should probably be given to a man as it was potentially offensive. Heaven forfend that a woman should edit anything explicit because we all know how difficult it is to buy smelling salts these days! I assured the project manager that I’m neither prudish nor easily offended and the manuscript was duly sent to me.

Editing strong language doesn’t bother me at all. I cut my career teeth as a journalist and newsrooms are renowned for their high swear word count – you won’t survive if you can’t cope with your editor telling you several times a day to 'get your fucking act tofuckinggether or get your fucking P45 on the fucking way out'.

Sensitivity
However, there’s more to editing explicit work than not fainting at any effing and blinding in print. Material needs to be handled sensitively, whether it’s fiction or factual – this is someone’s work, after all, and it’s essential to put personal feelings aside. All the usual editing decisions need to be made – clarity, consistency, cutting and queries, plus creating style sheets for those trickier spellings.  

I worked five years as a freelance copy-editor and commissioner for the fetish magazine Skin Two, aimed at people into rubber sex and clothing. While the photo spreads tend towards the erotic and daring, most of the feature articles are distinctly intellectual in tone rather than sexy – during my stint we ran serious articles on everything from censorship and depictions of non-mainstream sex in mainstream film to the subversion of Nazi symbolism for erotic enjoyment and the works of illustrative authors such as Alan Moore.

These features were usually between 3,000 and 5,000 words in length and on a par with anything you’d find in a dedicated arts magazine. 

Flicking through back issues, it was clear my first task would be to create a style book suitable for such a distinctive magazine. I recall lengthy discussions with the editor about whether to opt for 'perv' rather than 'perve' or 'pervert' – our readership, chiefly A, B and C1, liked to call themselves thus with a knowing and cheeky nod to the more tabloid usage of such words.

The style guide needed to reflect both their intelligence and their community’s own home-grown terminology. Putting it together was an interesting crash course in the culture of a distinct sexual minority. 

Perhaps the most memorable title I worked on was Jack the Ripper’s Secret Confession, one book in a long line of theories on the true identity of the UK’s first known serial killer. I’ve worked on several Ripper books and as an avid reader of crime fiction I’m used to gore.

This particular book theorised that the Ripper was a wealthy Victorian gentleman known only as Walter, a rapist who was obsessed with prostitutes and knives. His deeply explicit diaries were published in the same year as the Ripper began his spree.

Fewer than 20 copies were printed, they were banned for obscenity and the few surviving editions even today remain locked in the British Library’s famous 'closed cupboard', where scholars need to apply for permission to study them. 

The diaries are, of course, out of copyright so the book authors were free to quote as much of them as they wished to stand up their theory – and quote they did. Whole chapters often consisted of fifty per cent or even more of passages from Walter’s pornographic journal.

Every sexual encounter of his was described in explicit four-letter word detail. I quickly became desensitised to the repetitive use of 'fuck', 'cunt', 'cock', 'minge' and more on almost every page.

​Even filth needs editing
The temptation when this occurs is to glaze over the explicit passages and focus on the author’s own words. A bad mistake, as even filth needs editing.

I made an editorial decision to leave all spellings in the original (and being Victorian, they varied a fair bit from the standard spellings of today) as long as they were understandable, but to edit the punctuation rigorously for clarity.

Walter didn’t care much for commas or speech marks, you see, and some of his passages required extensive scrutiny to figure out what on earth he was saying. 

These were highly challenging issues for a book that not only needed to be accessible for the modern reader and ensure the authors’ edited work was of sufficient merit as any other Ripperology title but also paid tribute, bizarre as it might seem, to the diaries the book had inspired.

I was secretly rather chuffed when one of the authors emailed me after publication to thank me and let me know that the Los Angeles Times had described it as a 'hyperventilating noxious stew wallowing in depravity' and called for it to be banned.

At least it was a well-edited noxious stew… 

The challenging stuff ...
In truth, I found an earlier manuscript I worked on, about Jack the Ripper and other notorious serial killers throughout history, much harder.

There was little sexually explicit material but a very graphic description of what one murderer had done with his victims’ body parts burned my eyeballs and gave me sleepless nights for some time after.

Sometimes you edit stuff you’d rather not know about, but like the intrepid blokes who clean our sewers it’s a dirty job but someone has to do it. With pride for doing a job well done. And, frankly, my trauma must have paled in comparison to that of the police officers who had to deal with that. 

It's not for everyone
More recently I copy-edited a debut novel from a youngish author – a blackly comic yet highly literary tale about the Norwegian heavy metal music scene, rippled through with wall-to-wall blasphemy and explicit sex scenes that were nasty, brutish and (thankfully!) short.

Having begun my career as a rock journalist, this project was one of the most enjoyable I’ve ever been offered but, like the others, it came with a warning – about the blasphemy in this case.

I’m an atheist so I was able to approach this with no misgivings but I completely understand that an editor with a faith, of any sort, might find this difficult material. The explicit sex I took in my stride but dealing with the religious issues, which were as much about Satanism as Christianity, needed a lot of care to ensure that the novel rang true while avoiding causing offence unnecessarily.

I did a huge amount of fact-checking on the internet – mainly on the Christian issues plus the heavy metal genre – as well as coming up with a style sheet that provided consistency on religious and other central themes. 

Can you do it?
My take on editing adult material is that it really shouldn’t be beyond any experienced copy-editor worth their salt although I can understand that some will feel it’s not for them because of their personal beliefs, as is their right.

Such work needs the same meticulous attention to detail as any other. For those new to the industry it could be as good a way to gain experience as any, particularly as there seems to be a dearth among us who are willing to tackle the more challenging manuscripts. 

Ian Dury sang 'sex and drugs and rock ’n’ roll, is all my brain and body needs' – I like to think they are an important sector in the manuscripts I edit, too. 

Copyright 2012 Louise Bolotin

Additional reading

• Beginner fiction writers – 8 tips to stop you stumbling (Louise Harnby)
  
• Editing fiction for independent authors (Ben Corrigan)
• Editing genre fiction (Marcus Trower)
• How to edit fiction with confidence (by Sophie Playle)
• Proofreading for trade publishers (Louise Harnby)
• Talking fiction editing on the Begin Self-Publishing Podcast (Louise Harnby and Tim Lewis)
  
• What makes a good fiction editor? (Louise Harnby)
• Self-publishing resources for fiction writers (Louise Harnby)

The Fiction Freelancing series presents the individual experiences of editorial freelancers working on the genre of fiction within both the publishing sector and the independent-author market. Here in Part II Ben Corrigan focuses on editing for non-publisher clients. Ben has been a freelance proofreader and copy-editor since 2009. Prior to that he was a proofreader for Yell and a TV-listings writer and sub-editor. He lives in Bristol. You can contact him via his website: The Whole Proof; and on Twitter: @thewholeproof. 

Other posts in the series cover proofreading for trade publishers (Part I; Louise Harnby), editing adult material (Part III; Louise Bolotin), and editing genre fiction (Part IV; Marcus Trower).

As a freelance proofreader and editor with a passion for fiction, I consider myself extremely fortunate whenever I have the opportunity to work on poetry or prose.

Independent authors might approach an editor or proofreader for a number of reasons. In my experience, a significant proportion are thinking of sending their work to an agent or publisher and want to make sure the manuscript has been polished before they do so. I have also worked with authors who are planning to self-publish their work, or who have already self-published and want the next edition to be free from mistakes; who are intending to enter their writing in a competition; and who are curious about what an editor will bring to their work.

I did an MA in Creative Writing at Bath Spa University, graduating in 2008. The MA was a challenging, occasionally terrifying, and always inspiring experience. I would do it every year for the rest of my life if I could, because if you are passionate about writing, then being able to write, to share your writing with other writers, and to talk about writing week in, week out, is an amazing way to spend your time. As a colleague of mine said after the course, you really felt, for that year, as though you were a writer.

While I do not think that you need to be a writer to be an editor of fiction, the course taught me two important lessons: first, how to be a better reader; and, second, how it feels to receive feedback on your work. I can remember all too clearly how I felt the first time my writing was workshopped. I had not really shared my writing before then, and to have it subjected to such close scrutiny was bizarre. I understand that, whatever your subject, writing is extremely personal and an extension of yourself, and I try to keep that in mind whenever I am editing fiction, and to be sensitive when suggesting changes.

In the vast majority of my work with independent authors, my role has been as a copy-editor, or has covered the area between copy-editing and proofreading that Louise mentioned in her post. To date, I have not worked with an author who has wanted a structural edit. I have found that authors are generally happy with their story and are more concerned with the nuts and bolts of the writing. Naturally, having a clear brief before starting out is a must. For longer pieces, I will always offer to provide a sample so that the customer can see the kinds of changes and suggestions I might make.

My own approach to copy-editing when working with independent authors is to intervene as little as possible. Unless they have stated otherwise, I will assume that the writer is happy with what they have produced. This might seem self-evident. But it is important to be aware of how easy it can be, when editing, to start imposing your own style. For instance, I am aware that I am quite fond of commas. Where commas are preferential, I will prefer them. This may not be in line with the author’s style, and may not be appropriate for the writing. Of course, we all have our preferences, and that is one aspect to be conscious of when copy-editing. Does the writing have three or four semi-colons in each paragraph? Do you keep noticing the same adjective or the same expression? This kind of repetition might have been employed for effect, but if you are certain it hasn’t, you might feel you can improve the writing by varying the style. Any verbal or grammatical tic that might distract a reader, and break their suspension of disbelief, is worthy of consideration while editing.

The layout of the document can be a thorny issue, and is best discussed with the client. Poetry is a separate case, but for fiction, I will encourage an author to adopt a traditional layout that is easy to read: double spaced, a simple font (Times New Roman is fine), with paragraphs indented and with no spaces between them. (I use Word 2007 and do not understand why the default setting is to have a space between paragraphs … But that is a gripe for another time!) It helps to have an understanding of how fiction is (more often than not) presented: for instance, how to indicate a break in a chapter. The author might not know, and you can therefore help to bring clarity to a story by making the right changes.

In this regard, the layout of dialogue is probably the most demanding area when working on fiction. Louise made the important point of authors choosing to break with convention, and there are many ways to present and indicate dialogue: inverted commas, quotation marks, em dashes, or no punctuation at all. Cormac McCarthy is a good example of a writer who prefers not to use punctuation for dialogue. He is skilled (together with his editor, perhaps!) at making sure that, despite the lack of punctuation – and thus no obvious distinction between action and dialogue – there is no confusion over who is speaking and when. Whatever style the author chooses, an understanding of how to present dialogue simply and clearly, so that there is no doubt about which character is talking, is a must. This can be a particular issue if there are more than two characters in a scene. If I can’t follow the conversation, I will flag the offending lines for the author to clarify if they wish.

Character consciousness can also be indicated in a variety of ways. I have just started to read Paul Bowles’ The Sheltering Sky, in which thoughts are presented in the same way as speech. This is perhaps unusual and old-fashioned, but is it wrong? ‘This is how to present character consciousness,’ he thought. This is how to present character consciousness, he thought. This is how to present character consciousness, he thought. I think these are all valid ways to present a character’s thoughts. The important point is to ensure a consistent approach has been taken.

I might look to sharpen up the writing by cutting out words that are redundant. An author may use multiple adjectives without realising that two are synonyms, for example. Similarly, adverbs can be abused and overused and are an element that I will sometimes be more ruthless with. If I was being pressed – which I am not, but this is my first blog post, so I am going to be bold and tell you anyway – I would say that the words most commonly (over)used by budding authors of prose fiction are ‘quickly’ and ‘slowly’. I think they are often employed to bring urgency to the writing – even in the case of ‘slowly’, which seems to be trying to add some drama to whatever action is being described. These kinds of words can be used once too often, in which case I will look to intervene and draw the author’s attention to the repetition.

There are of course basic aspects to editing fiction, such as ensuring characters’ names do not change inexplicably and that the action and description are not contradictory or unclear. I think there can be a certain mindset involved in carrying out a line-by-line edit – where you are looking closely at each sentence and the way it works – which may not involve seeing and understanding the bigger picture of the story and the way it unfolds. Louise highlighted the danger of enjoying proofreading fiction too much, and getting lost in the story. I don’t think this is such a problem when copy-editing fiction. In fact, I think the opposite might sometimes be the case, and the problem is that you don’t get lost in the story enough, and therefore fail to see holes and inconsistencies. Depending on the nature of the project, it can be helpful to read the text more than once so that you have a full appreciation of the setting, the characters, and the story.

In some cases I might go deeper into the writing and consider issues such as point of view (if the writing is in the third person). Point of view can be subtle and tricky, and I don’t want to go into it in too much detail in this post. I will say that it is generally more common for contemporary writing, when written in the third person, to take a close or limited third-person point of view, rather than an omniscient one. That means the action is seen from one character’s point of view. Authors might adopt this for the most part but slip into the points of view of other characters, turning a limited point of view into an omniscient one. If this is a mistake rather than deliberate, intervention may strengthen the writing. I might also look to move action into the moment, if possible, or at least suggest this as a possibility. For instance, a passage that begins ‘I often went to the shops’ might be more powerful if it can be turned into concrete action: ‘I went to the shops.’ This kind of intervention can involve significant rewriting and is best discussed with the author.

Freelance editing can offer up a great variety of interesting work, and, to me, fiction is the best example of this: always unique and never a chore. In a selfish sense, writers can also be a good source of repeat work! If you can develop a good working relationship with an author and perhaps bring something extra to their writing, they are likely to come back and use you again. Having gone through the process of working with an editor myself, when producing an extract for the MA anthology, I can testify to the virtues of having another set of eyes look at your writing.

I will end with a quote from a writer to an editor (the editor of a newspaper, I understand; the writer is Raymond Chandler): ‘when I split an infinitive, God damn it, I split it so it will stay split, and when I interrupt the velvety smoothness of my more or less literate syntax with a few sudden words of barroom vernacular, this is done with the eyes wide open and the mind relaxed but attentive. The method may not be perfect, but it is all I have.’ The method – ‘eyes wide open and the mind relaxed but attentive’ – sounds to me like a sound one to adopt when editing fiction, too.

Copyright Ben Corrigan 2012

Have you copy-edited fiction for independent authors? If so and there's something you want to add about your own experiences, please let us know in the Comments section.