Copyediting
You’ve written and revised your story, and your readers will be thrilled with the plot, character development, pacing, and overall message—all the big-picture stuff is solid. You’re ready for someone to go over the text on the paragraph, sentence, and word level to ensure consistency within the manuscript, adherence to a style guide to meet industry standards, and clarity for the reader. Time for copyediting!
In copyediting, I'll be looking for
Grammar, spelling, and punctuation
Consistency in content and style
Light fact-checking
I'll keep detailed style notes to capture anything that doesn't align with the style guide of your choice (Chicago Manual of Style is my specialty, but I can also work with APA and others).
We'll work together to determine the level of copyediting that your work needs and how much "touch" you want from my edits:
In a "light" edit, I would only fix items that absolutely have to be changed for grammatical purposes and query you on everything else.
In a "heavy" edit, I would make revisions for wordy or awkward passages, repetition, or other stylistic impediments. I would query any factual inaccuracies and inconsistencies, and make suggestions for anything else I see.