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BOOK EDITING
That's me. Well, that's me on a good hair day.
I provide premium book editing services at competitive rates.
I specialize in editing book manuscripts in all genres except children's and comic books. I am passionate about my clients' work and support them from idea to shelf.
My role as your editor is to tell the truth, correct, encourage, and educate.
I earned my bachelor's degree in English from the University of Montana and my master's degree in Writing: Book Publishing from Portland State University, one of only eight graduate publishing programs in the nation. I am skilled in all levels of editing, including copyediting and developmental editing (see below). I have more than a decade's experience professionally editing print media of all kinds, many of which have landed on bestseller lists and won national awards.
Today my true love is book publishing. My clients range from self-published authors to major publishing houses, such as Bloomsbury Publishing, the original publisher of the Harry Potter series.
Bloomsbury’s Apartment is just one book I edited that received many awards: New York Times Editors Choice; longlisted for the 2020 Simpson/Joyce Carol Oates Literary Prize; longlisted for the 2020 Simpson/Joyce Carol Oates Literary Prize; one of Vogue.com’s “Best Books of 2020 So Far”; one of Elle’s “Best Books of 2020 So Far”; named A Most-Anticipated Book by the New York Times, Vogue, The Boston Globe, Salon, The Millions, Inside Hook, and Vol. 1 Brooklyn.
Publications have featured my writing more than 100 times, and I've been the recipient of an editor's choice award and the James Welch Jr. Memorial Award for outstanding writing.
I love the sun, road trips, and music.
I am based out of Missoula, Montana and am terrible at chess.
Missy provided excellent insights regarding aspects of my novel's plot, character, and pacing. Her expert eye caught errors in grammar, spelling, and usage in my manuscript that made it clear she truly cared about my project."
—James Briggs, author (fiction)
COPYEDITING
$11/1,000 words
DEVELOPMENTAL EDITING
$17/1,000 words
Email MissyLacockEditorial@gmail.com to discuss your project today.
SERVICES
COPYEDITING
My goal for copyediting is to make copyedited books error-free.
I follow the four Cs of cleanliness (clarity, coherency, consistency, and correctness) and enforce The Chicago Manual of Style.* This includes copyediting for general typos, correct punctuation, subject-verb agreement, parallel structure, grammar, capitalization, tense, hyphenation, spelling (Merriam-Webster), etc. This edit also includes copyediting for style (clarifying meaning, polishing language, and editing line-by-line for smoothness and clarity while maintaining author’s voice and style).
The COPYEDITING PACKAGE will include:
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the fully copyedited, clean manuscript with comments
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an editorial letter detailing consistent errors, as well as how to get published traditionally or self-published
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track changes instructions
* I edit the manuscript using the most recent edition of The Chicago Manual of Style (CMOS), which is the standard stylebook of choice in the industry. It is considered the “Book Publishing Bible” and indeed is much larger than any Bible. All standards are in the CMOS, from how to write numbers in every unique instance to when to use an en dash. It's my job to know the CMOS well and look up anything in question so your manuscript is as consistent and professional as possible.
DEVELOPMENTAL EDITING
For developmental edited books, I'll offer thoroughly evaluated manuscripts for "big-picture issues," including plot, characters, dialogue, argument, audience, and more.
The DEVELOPMENTAL EDITING PACKAGE will include:
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the read manuscript with comments
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chapter notes for every chapter: chapter title, chapter length, summary, "good stuff," queries, character notes, dialogue notes, language notes, and suggestions
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an editorial letter detailing big-picture issues, as well as how to get published traditionally or self-published
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track changes instructions
