This is as much question as anything else. I'm shopping around for an editor for Smooth Running. I have one in mind and I thought I'd lay out what I've found and invite any other comments or feedback.
There are a couple of editors I am considering. One works by the hour, the other by the word. Both are reputable and have worked with authors I've at least heard of. (It's important to get the bona fides from whoever you work for. Make sure you can look at their work and approve of it.)
Cost is a big consideration, of course. I have a day job, so I have a little money of my own to spend on this. My goal is to get the whole book ready and released for under a grand. I should be able to do this if I'm frugal. Now you can spend thousands of dollar on the editing alone (let alone what it would cost to get Tim Bradstreet to do the cover).
But I need to commission cover art and pay for the editor out of that. How much I have to spend on one, determines how much I have available to spend on the other.
So, for instance, if one editor charges $.004 a word and the other charges $100/hr and the book is 125k words...
Yeah, I suck at story problems, too. All I can do, is try both of them out and see which will give me an estimate I can afford. I'm not trying to chisel someone out of their livelihood. I want to pay what I can afford and hope that someone else can afford what I can pay.
Any of you have ancedotes you can share? How much should I expect to pay for an editor.
There are a couple of editors I am considering. One works by the hour, the other by the word. Both are reputable and have worked with authors I've at least heard of. (It's important to get the bona fides from whoever you work for. Make sure you can look at their work and approve of it.)
Cost is a big consideration, of course. I have a day job, so I have a little money of my own to spend on this. My goal is to get the whole book ready and released for under a grand. I should be able to do this if I'm frugal. Now you can spend thousands of dollar on the editing alone (let alone what it would cost to get Tim Bradstreet to do the cover).
But I need to commission cover art and pay for the editor out of that. How much I have to spend on one, determines how much I have available to spend on the other.
So, for instance, if one editor charges $.004 a word and the other charges $100/hr and the book is 125k words...
Yeah, I suck at story problems, too. All I can do, is try both of them out and see which will give me an estimate I can afford. I'm not trying to chisel someone out of their livelihood. I want to pay what I can afford and hope that someone else can afford what I can pay.
Any of you have ancedotes you can share? How much should I expect to pay for an editor.
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