Last November, J.W. Judge and Barbara Hinske interviewed me for The Write Approach podcast. I published the first part of that interview about working with a writing coach last month. Here’s the second part of the interview, which focuses on the different kinds of book editing and how to figure out which type of book editing you need. But, I’ll let J.W. set this up in his own words:
“In our second episode with Linden Gross, we discuss the different kinds of editing that are available (and usually necessary) for writers. We shed light on how to distinguish between what you need (developmental editing, copy editing, line editing, and proofreading) and at what point in the process you need it. We also get personal and practical in this episode by having Barbara Hinske talk about a scene she wrote that wasn’t as emotionally effective as it needed to be, how Gross identified the problem, and what they did to resolve it.”
https://writeapproachpod.com/the-write-approach-episode-12-figuring-out-what-kind-of-editing-your-story-needs-with-linden-gross/
You can listen to the podcast here. Or, you can read the transcript below:
J.W. Judge:
This is the right approach. We are your hosts. I am J.W. Judge, and with me is Barbara Hinske. This is a podcast for writers to learn more about the craft of writing as we explore a new topic every week. Our guest today is back for a second episode is Linden Gross. Uh, we talked last week about her experiences as a writing coach and specifically as the writing coach for Barb. And today, since Linden also does editing work, we are all, we’re going talk about, all about editing. It’s all about editing today, what different kinds of editing look like, and how to figure out what you as a writer need. So welcome back for round two.
Linden Gross:
Thank you.
J.W. Judge:
Okay. Let’s start with what the different types of editing are. Cause I think a lot of writers, especially less experienced writers, you know, they’re, they’re doing their work, they’re getting close to the end and they think, I need an editor. I know I need an editor, but you don’t really know what you need. And so let’s break down what’s available and what each one means. Yeah.
Linden Gross:
So let’s start from the top. Sort of go big picture to small picture. There’s, uh, developmental editing. So a developmental editor is going to look at the book, uh, as a whole, if you’re writing a novel, they’re going to be looking at does, um, the evolution of the story, the characters, does it work on, on that big storytelling front? Character evolution front. If you’re writing nonfiction, they’re going to be looking at what is the argument that you’re making in the book? Is that argument substantiated? They’re going to be looking at whether certain pieces of the book need to move to other places. Whether the the the order is logical. Um, they’re looking at big picture. From there we go to line editing line. A line editor is going to be looking at language, at flow, at um, uh, uh, how you are, you know, if, if you’re using active versus passive, uh, lang verbs.
They’re looking at that piece of it, sort of the quality of the writing itself. Now we move down to copy editing, which is the piece that, um, I always hire out. Period. I’m, I’m, I feel like, uh, you know, we all gotta know our strengths and I feel like I’m a, a strong developmental editor. I feel like I’m a strong line editor. A if I’ve worked on a project, I can’t see it enough to be a copy editor. And b I feel like I’m a, an adequate copy editor, which isn’t good enough for anybody, including myself. And so a copy editor is really looking at what I call the minutia, cuz I don’t like doing it. It’s a grammar spelling. It’s, it’s, uh, sometimes depending on, um, the agreement with your copy editor, it could be fact checking. It’s consistency. They look at the little stuff.
If, uh, you are, they’re going to look, they’re gonna be looking for style. There are, um, happily enough a number of different styles depending on where you’re publishing. If you’re writing a magazine article, most magazines use AP style. If you’re writing a book, most book publishing companies go with Chicago Manual of style. And of course, they don’t always agree on how to do serial commas or no serial commas or how to handle numbers. And because why would it make sense to have one consistent set of rules that make it easy? So the, that’s the copy editor’s job. They’re looking at all that little stuff. How, how citations are handled or footnotes or block quotes or it’s all that kind of stuff.
J.W. Judge:
Right. And then,
Barbara Hinske:
And then proofreading.
Linden Gross:
And then there’s proofread.
Barbara Hinske:
Yeah. Right at the very end. Yeah.
Linden Gross:
Which is sort of the, the, the backup on everybody. Yeah.
J.W. Judge:
Is there a general, and it may be that there’s too much disparity to be able to answer this effectively, but, um, you know, authors don’t, when they don’t know what an editor is or does, they also don’t know what costs are associated with that. Are there, you know, so for each of those, there’s going to be a different type of cost that is incurred or a different amount. Um, I, I don’t know if there’s anything that’s close enough to be able to say what the expectation should be there, but I don’t know if there’s, you know, sense per word that you should expect for, you know, line editing versus copy editing versus developmental editing. But how does, how does that gen in general terms, what does that look like?
Linden Gross:
Um, developmental editing is probably the biggest variant. Um, and I think a lot of it has to do with who you’re hiring, how much experience they have, which is what they charge. Um, so that one’s a harder one to answer. I can tell you what I charge and it’s a fair amount. It’s, uh, I charge 1750 and that includes reading the book and submitting a very detailed memo that starts with, uh, as I mentioned last week, that starts with what I think works in the book. That part is always pretty short because if it’s working, we really don’t need to talk about it. What I think does not work and what I think needs to be done, and we it, and I then go from big picture to language to grammar and spelling and that kind of thing. So again, it’s, it sort of follows that developmental line editor copy editing idea, um, a line editor and a copy editor.
There is a website and I’m afraid, I can’t remember exactly what the URL is, but that does spell out sort of, uh, suggested standard editing rates for freelance editors and a number of editors that, uh, that I work with and who I know Barb works with Yeah. Will follow that. Um, you know, there’s also, uh, I think that, that the, so how much you’re gonna pay is going to, to vary. I would, uh, offer two caveats that what I hear a lot, um, from clients are two things. One is they say, well, I need a copy of it. And I say, no, you actually need a line at it first. We’ve been working together, but you need a line editor. And most good copy editors will not copyedit a project that has not been professionally line edited. The other thing I hear a lot is my neighbor was a school teacher. My cousin is a, oh yeah. My wife is very good at proofreading. No, we, if if, if you’re gonna do a professional job, you need to hire a professional. Yeah. Your neighbor, cousin, spouse, maybe your proofreader possibly or one of, but they’re not gonna be your editor. Does that make sense to
Barbara Hinske:
You? Yeah. Oh, absolutely. If I can jump in here, a couple of comments. Hollywood has lot. There are lots of films that center on writers and then there’s the editor relationship is in there. They almost always get it wrong from my perspective. So anybody who hasn’t worked with an editor don’t watch, you know, something’s gotta give or whatever, it’s not gonna be like that. <laugh>, that’s number one. Um, and I think it is helpful and, and number two, you get what you pay for. So don’t always go the cheap option, I think in terms of where you put your money on a book, editing is right up there at the top. I’m in indie published, so, um, you know, and I’ve made a living at it. It isn’t just a, a hobby I feed. So I know that spending the money is worthwhile. I also know that it’s wise to, to make your, your work as good as possible for you send it to your editor.
So if you can run it through pro writing aid or Grammarly and clean up as you can’t clean it all up, it won’t catch it all. But clean up as much of that, that stuff as you can. When I’ve sent my work to, I’ve got a couple of copy editors, line editors that I work with and proofreaders, when I send it to them, I get the comment back. They’re willing to like slot me in maybe a little sooner because they know that I will be giving them a pretty clean manuscript and it won’t be such a big project. It still costs me the same. But I’ve moved up the queue a couple of times cuz somebody said, oh, well I found, you know, somebody’s canceled. I have two weeks. I know I can do yours in that amount of time. So even if it doesn’t save you money, it could save you time. Um,
Linden Gross:
You know, I think the other thing is, as an editor, if I get a manuscript that’s just a mess in terms of spelling, that means I have to devote my time to correct that. That’s not really what you wanna hire my brain power for. Right. When a, when a, when a when a spell check can do the job for you, you know, you wanna sort of hire my brain for the, the piece that you can’t take care of. Right?
Linden Gross:
The, the, the part where, where my experience, you don’t need a lot of experience to, uh, correct the spelling of a word. You need experience or you know, that subjective, uh, opinion that, that, that, that to, to weigh in, to give a sense of why something might not be working and how to make it work better. That’s the part that you wanna hire me for and that’s where you want my energy to go.
Barbara Hinske:
Well and that’s, that’s a very good point because just as the edit or the author themselves, you’ve written it so many times, you are not just, your brain is not going to see all the errors in there. They just are not, um, all the times where you’ve should have been. She, but you typed key, um, cuz your s didn’t, you know, didn’t hit the key hard enough. You, you won’t see that. You don’t. So as you go through the editing process, you don’t wanna use up someone’s like lyndon’s brain power on that little stuff because then they, they get immersed in it and they won’t see that stuff. Right. Um, it’s the same for all of us. And anyone who thinks that the same person can take it from developmental edit through proofread, I think that is would be extraordinarily unusual to find one person that has the ability to do that accurately. And I spend a ton of money and I have a separate, so Lydon and I write it together in essence development editing as we go along. I have a copy line editor and I have a proofreader and I have art groups that read my books for reviews and I always get typos on the arcs. Always. Yeah. So it’s, but Barb part of it.
J.W. Judge:
Yeah. Let me ask you this. Y’all work in chunks, you write some and send it and I, so this is an established relationships. It’s different than someone you worked with for the first time. And when y’all did work together for the first time, it was the whole manuscript. So when you’re submitting it now to Linden in these chunks, are you cleaning it up first or are you sending it, cause I know y’all are working out, does this work, so is that still in a rougher form or have you already put in work to make sure it’s cleaner and put it through pro writing aid or, or whatever?
Barbara Hinske:
I thank you for asking that now that my eyesight is good enough that I can use pro writing aid, I put it through pro writing aid for both of us so that a lot of that stuff is gone. Um, the one thing I haven’t learned how, but you told me I can do this, is I’m pro writing aid and I’m gonna put that on my list this afternoon, is figure out how to screen for repeated words that I’ve still gotta do. But I try and do that little bit of cleanup before Lydon puts her eyes on it so she isn’t distracted by all of that.
J.W. Judge:
So, Lindon, let me ask this. We’ve talked about four, my math is right, I’m a lawyer, we don’t have to do math. Um, four different kinds of editing, uh, with developmental editing and copy editing, line editing and proofreading that all have different functions. Does everybody need all four of those steps?
Linden Gross:
Not necessarily. Um, so the developmental edit, a lot of people skip, Barb and I have that because we’re working together as the writing coach piece. I feel that that’s an incredibly important piece because that’s, you know, how your whole book hangs together. Um, but a lot of people will skip that. Do you need a line editor? I mean a a developmental editor. I think it helps. Yeah. Um, so, so, so that’s a kind of a non-answer, you know, ideally, yes. We’ll most will an awful lot of people skip that piece. Yes. Uh, you know, again, for me, just as most, a lot of copy editors will not touch a book that has not been line edited. I will not edit a book that I have not done a critique on, which sort of ends up having me function as a developmental editor because that is my way of looking at the book and saying, yes, it works, or no, I think that there’s some rather large pieces that need to addressed.
And again, it is, and, and even talking about the language so that the person I’m going to be working with, uh, knows that we’re on the same page. And there are times when yes, at that point we end up working together in a writing coach capacity before we get back to the editing. Um, I think it’s important. I had one writing coach client who ended up, uh, um, uh, quitting our, uh, writing coach relationship because she wanted to get her Master’s of Fine Arts from Mills College and took the project there, worked with a professor for about an assistant professor for about six months. And only at the end of that six months did she realize that he had a different vision for the book than she did. And so the six months worth of work had taken her down completely the wrong path. That’s a lot of time and a lot of money to spend heading the wrong direction.
So that’s the developmental editor piece that’s key is if you are gonna hire a developmental editor, you better make sure that you’re developing along the, the, the path that you actually wanna be on. Um, there are times in terms of line editing and copy editing, depending on how clean your manuscript is. Sometimes you can get away with, um, hiring somebody who will do both, who will do what we’re sort of calling a deep copy edit. Uh, but that is usually, for example, I’ve been able to do that, but I’ve done my own line edit and since I’m an editor I can do that. But then I also realize that I’m very close to the material. So I will say I’ve done my own line edit, but I’m pretty darn close to this. So I need you to do copy editing, but I need you to throw in some li a little, you know, line wear your line editor hat while you’re doing it. Yeah. Um, you can get away with that I think if you have experienced line editing. Otherwise, I would sort of say your line edit and your copy editor are pretty critical.
Barbara Hinske:
But I, you know, jumping into that, um, I’m at the point now where I the same person does the copy and the line edit for me. So that’s, that’s been nice. I wanna piggyback on your comment about making sure that you are on the same page with your developmental editor. Cuz one of the books that we wrote, um, one of my Who’s their Collection Serial Killer books is Final Circuit. I love that book. I’m so proud of that book. Um, and an agent I knew who we never entered into a formal agreement but wanted to take it to the Amazon imprints and wanted me to have her developmental editor look at it, her developmental editor did. And so Final Circuit has a protagonist who has a disability and who, I don’t think this is a spoiler, but, um, saves herself at the end, this editor who supposedly was very good at packaging things for purchase by one of of the Amazon imprints said, okay, you need to take away the disability of your protagonist. And the cop, her love interest needs to save her at the end. And I thought, what are you talking about? Are we not in the two thousands? You know, she said, no, no, it needs to be the damilla in distress and not this quirky. And
Linden Gross:
That was, and that a deal …
Barbara Hinske:
Breaker for you. Yeah. And that was a deal breaker. I, you know, not this quirky brainy act woman who people think because of her disability, discount her who’s really just brilliant and who saves herself. So no, um, that was something I rejected and I didn’t get published by the Amazon imprint. But, um, that’s, well, and
Linden Gross:
That brings up another topic, which is how you, how you play with your editor. Uh, and and I, I use that because I feel like Barb and I do kind of play. Yeah,
Barbara Hinske:
We do.
Linden Gross:
But the relationship is very different. If you are working with a traditional publishing house, at that point, the editor is the boss. You give the editor what they want, period. You, you really don’t have the option to, um, to say no and how you work with your editor. I remember at one point, uh, I was working actually for a friend of mine, uh, it was on my second, it wasn’t a ghost, right. It was a collaboration. But my second book for them, they had published the Legacy of Luna, which had turned into the bestseller. And uh, I was working with, um, Jay Baker, the son of Jim and Tammy Faye Baker. And he, uh, has an interesting story. Anyway, I had submitted the manuscript and she gets on the phone and she’s screaming at me, which is not that unusual with editors. It happens both on magazines and, uh, otherwise about how the, the, the book doesn’t work.
And I’m listening to her and as I’m trying to, um, not react emotionally to the fact that I’m getting yelled at, um, I’m trying to listen to what she’s saying and where the problem is. Cuz I thought I had done a pretty good job and she finally stopped and I, I finally realized, I said, so what you’re talking about is we need just need to change this one thing in the first chapter. And there was this long silence and she said, oh yeah, that would do it. <laugh>. So what you find a lot with, with some editors who you work with is that they will, one thing will color their whole sense of a project. Um, and, and so you have to sort of listen to what that one piece is or a couple of pieces and try to figure out, okay, what is, what is coloring this sense that the whole book doesn’t work? Oh, it’s just this one little piece in the opening chapter and if we switch that, then the, the problem solved. So that’s its own, um, you know, my personal reaction would be if I have my choice of editors to work with, if I’m working independently, that’s not the kind of editor I would hire for a number of reasons.
J.W. Judge:
And so yeah,
Linden Gross:
But sometimes you don’t have a choice.
J.W. Judge:
And so that’s an important distinction here that hasn’t been made until you said it just now, was if you sell the rights to your book to a publisher, they are in charge and get to call the shots cuz they have bought it. Um, whereas in the kind of relationship Barb has with you and with her other editors, she is the employer and she gets to make all of the ultimate decisions because she hasn’t sold or licensed any rights. She has hired you to work with her. And if that relationship isn’t working, it can be ended.
Linden Gross:
Mm-hmm.
Barbara Hinske:
<affirmative>,
J.W. Judge:
Um, well now I totally forgot what I was gonna follow up on that next. Um, it was a a really good point.
Barbara Hinske:
Yeah. Let me jump in on that because yeah, you retain, as the author, you retain all that, um, power and authority, but it also comes with the obligation to make sure that you are in, if you wanna be commercially successful, you need to know where the market is. You need to know what’s selling, what people wanna buy so that you’re producing that product for them. Um, so it’s, it’s kind of a high bar. Part of it is it’s kind of comforting to think, oh, I’m just gonna rely on somebody else to know and that editor will just tell me what to do to fix it, and I’ll do it and it’s, and then I’m gonna be James Patterson and back up the wheelbarrows of money. Well, that’s not realistic. But the flip side is, if you’re going it alone, you better maintain to devote time to maintain your knowledge of the market.
J.W. Judge:
Just like in a lot of ways. Yeah. It’s a business decision of what’s the business model you want, if you wanna be in charge of everything, which, so my first three books were all nonfiction books about law practice, and the first one was published through the American Bar Association. Um, because they’re, you know, they are the folks who put out books about law practice stuff. And I had a good experience with them. I’m glad I did the first book with them, but I also learned that I want more control over everything than that allowed. And so every book that I’ve done since I’ve done independently, because that’s what I want to, I’ve even branched out into, um, publishing books for some other lawyers. Um, but those relationships, one of ’em was with, uh, an IP lawyer. And so we talked a lot about how we wanted to structure this, the publishing agreement and the rights.
And ultimately what we landed on was, I didn’t wanna be a rights holder for her children’s book that she was writing. She didn’t want to have to learn all of the nuances of publishing. And so I just licensed the right to publish that book in English for a period of time that would renew year to year after that. Um, and so there are other options, but you know, you gotta know mm-hmm. <affirmative> what you are willing to do and want to do as far as business wise and learning. And that should inform your decision about whether you want to be a, an independent author or try to go do it under the traditional publishing route. Well,
Linden Gross:
And you can also hire a consultant to help you with that. I think the other piece of the decision, and you alluded to it earlier, Jeremy, is control. One of the things that once a publishing house has, you know, uh, uh, once you have a contract with the publishing house, um, they are going to dictate cover design. You may get to weigh in, maybe not. They are going to dictate, um, titles. And I’ll tell you quick story, and I’m gonna have to turn, actually, hang on. I’m, I’m, I’m losing, losing battery here, but I had a, um, I, I was writing a book for Charles Schwab and his daughter Carrie or Carrie Schwa po. And it was a book about how, oops, sorry, <laugh> about creating a disaster here. It was a book about how, um, uh, we still don’t talk about money, you know, we’ve even gotten better about talking about sex, but you know, we, we don’t talk about money with anybody and that there are important money conversations that need to happen with our loved ones, with our parents, with our spouses, with our children.
And so that was what the book was about. And um, the, the editor came back and said, oh, we have come up with such a fantastic title. It’s so great. We’re gonna call it Home Economics. And we’re like, oh my God, can you say Dead Fish? I, I just terrible title. Um, luckily, and I’m gonna guess it had something to do with the Schwab name. Uh, they were willing to reconsider this brilliant title they had come up with and decided upon. And ultimately the book was published under the title, it Pays to Talk. I’m gonna guess that it had Lindon Gross been the byline person. They would’ve been like, you know, suck it up <laugh>, you know, it’s home economics. That’s what the title of the book is. So you are sacrificing that, that control. You may be able to weigh in on the cover, they may take your opinion into account, but it is their, as you alluded to it, it has become their property to sell. And so that’s a big decision.
J.W. Judge:
So I think it, we’re probably closing in toward the end of this. I see Barbara taking some notes there. I don’t know if she has something she wants to weigh in on here. Um, but I think an important part of this is where can authors find an editor?
Linden Gross:
That’s a good question. Um, for me, I try to find my editors through referral. I don’t just go online and find, you know, and type in editor. Uh, I will ask people I know who are writing or who I know, who know people who are writing, uh, for suggestions. Uh, I have, because of what I do, I’ve had a number of people come up to me locally and say, you know, oh, I, I work as a copy editor. And there have been a couple of times I’ve thought, okay, you know, let’s try you out on a small project and see if I like the, the quality of the work. And so I think that that’s another way to go. Um,
J.W. Judge:
Well, and so for folks who don’t have a referral network like that, I believe that Rezi and the Alliance of Independent Authors are two places where authors can go. Where, you know, there’s people who have been vetted, which doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll be a good fit for you individually. Um, but there are people who have been vetted that, you know, are professionals. Uh, so I think that brings us to a really great place, uh, to in this conversation. Thank you so much for both of these episodes. It’s been really informative and helpful. Um, and, uh, hoping much future success to y’all together as you work on. I guess next will be your 21st book together.
Barbara Hinske:
Yeah. Thank you so much.
Linden Gross:
Thank you.
Barbara Hinske:
This has been great.
Linden Gross:
Oh, I’m glad. Thank you for inviting me. It’s been a pleasure.
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