Frequently Asked Questions

There are some steps to hiring and working with our editors, but don’t worry; it’s not complicated.

Step 1: Questionnaire and Zoom Call (optional)

Every project and author is unique, so we like to start by determining your project's specific needs. When you fill out our questionnaire, it gives us a lot of information about your book and your editing needs. Having a quick chat via Zoom will also help us determine what service(s) is right for you and allow you to ask questions and discuss your manuscript. If you’re not into talking face-to-face, we are always available to hash out specifics via email, but it will likely take just a little bit more time. 

Step 2: Team Review

Our editors will discuss your project and determine who is both the best fit for your project and available on your timeframe. Because we are a team, we often have at least one editor who can start a project within a month, but if we are completely booked out for more than three months, we will let you know during your Zoom call. All decisions on who will edit for you are also based on your preference (if you indicated one when you filled out your contact form).

Step 3: Sample Edit (optional) 

For copy editing and line editing, the editor(s) we selected as the best fit for your project can perform a sample edit of up to 3,000 words. Turnaround on this sample can take up to two weeks due to our workload. We are available to answer questions about your sample edits to ensure you are comfortable making a choice between editors or services.

Step 4: Proposal

We’ll send you a personalized proposal for your project with a cost estimate and a proposed timeline for when we can start and return our edits based on our current availability. The editing window is based upon the service(s) being received—developmental editing being the most time consuming—and length of your manuscript. Generally, we expect it to take between a month and a month and a half for us to provide excellent editing, but there will be outliers. (Please note, we may be available for rush work and fast turnaround for additional fees—just ask!) We also are glad to hop on another Zoom call or discuss options via email to help you make the best decision for your manuscript.

Step 5: Sign the Contract, Applicable Subcontracts, and Pay your Deposit

We do require all our clients to sign a standard contract and pay a nonrefundable percentage-based deposit to block your editor’s time. For verbal consultations and query services, we require complete payment upfront. For coaching, we require a booking fee to be paid the week prior to any session. Payment plans can be arranged in most instances.

Step 6: Submit Your Manuscript and Forms

Submit your manuscript to your editor via email or your personal client portal. For some services like line and copy editing, we will need you to fill out questionnaires to help guide our editors, ensure continuity, and help us learn about proprietary elements in your story. All questionnaires we send you and your manuscript must be returned by the start date for your edit, or we may need to adjust your timeline. 

Step 7: Sit Back While We Make Magic

Your editor will be busy at work evaluating and improving your manuscript. We often have questions during the review—for instance, if we see a character change names in the middle of the manuscript and need to confirm what name you prefer—and will ask them via email. We ask that you respond promptly to any queries so we can do our best work.

Step 8: Read through your Deliverables

All services come with printable deliverables (excluding verbal consultations). Copy and line edits will also be returned with a style sheet so that you can maintain consistency between editors and subsequent books in the same universe.

Step 9: Exit Zoom Call (optional)

We encourage you to discuss your deliverables with your editor so you can ask questions about your feedback or discuss solutions. We want you to be secure in your understanding of your next steps and feel confident in your ability to continue on your publishing journey. We are also available via email to discuss feedback for your project. If you’ve elected to take advantage of our multi-service package discount, you’ll start the process for the next round of editing at Step 6 after you’ve made revisions.

The prices of all our editing services are determined based on median ranges from the Editorial Freelancer's Association (EFA). You can view the current EFA rate chart HERE.

At Tomeworks, our rates allow us to pay ourselves appropriately for our expertise, which enables us to give every manuscript the time and attention it deserves, rather than having to stack multiple clients at a time just to break even. This ensures the quality of your edits will always be top-tier.

You can see the rates for each of our services on their individual pages.

AI is a great tool in many ways, but it doesn’t replace the value of a human editor with an eye for story and style. AI is not truly intelligent. It uses data sets and predictive algorithms to determine output. That means it isn’t evaluating the human elements of your story, how a human will respond to the twists and turns, or has comprehension of themes and motifs. It only knows the data it’s been fed and spits out a textual prediction which is often off. That’s why Grammarly will often flag fake problems, miss real ones, and give recommendations that stilt your prose.

One of the things we’ve seen often with stories copy edited with generative AI, especially ChatGPT—besides it creating word salads and mangled sentences—is its inability to comprehend new and novel words, which are pretty standard in sci-fi and fantasy. It often will stamp them out or confuse them for other existing words which adds errors to the prose instead of removing them. Imagine having a fantasy character named Cirquu Dragonborne and ChatGPT conflating the character with a fire pit popping out babies when it tries to “clean” up your prose. Most people are not into reading gobbledygook, and honestly, since you’ve done the work of creating new worlds, whole characters, and dramatic circumstances, don’t you deserve edits that complement your monumental efforts?

Likewise, we are in this profession to help writers, not bots. We do not work on texts that have been created using generative AI like Squibler. We will accept manuscripts that have had light intervention through ProWriting Aid and other assistive AI editing applications. If we determine a manuscript was primarily produced by AI due to a lack of coherency and/or an evaluation by ZeroGPT, we reserve the right to cancel the project.

Just ask! It can still be overwhelming figuring out what kind of editing your manuscript needs, even with the samples we provide here on our site. But we love helping educate authors. After all, we are readers first, and we want you to produce the best story you can to charm your readers, not get hung up on complicated processes and misinformation. You can CONTACT US anytime for a complimentary 15-minute consultation so we can walk you through the options available for your manuscript and give you tips on how to find the editor & service that is best for your book.

Yes! If you have a preference for one of our experienced fiction editors—from previous projects, from reading their profile, or feeling the right vibe from watching one of their presentations or reading their blog posts—select the editor(s) you prefer when filling out your questionnaire for service. If they’re scheduled out, we will hold their next available slot for you with a booking deposit.

Tomeworks exclusively edits genre fiction. This includes science fiction, dystopia, urban fantasy, alternate history, steampunk, supernatural, paranormal and shifter romance, magical realism, apocalypse, gaslamp, superhero fiction, climate fiction, action/adventures, mysteries, suspense, thrillers, or any other speculative fiction subgenre. If you’re not sure if your manuscript fits, just ask! We can help you determine if your project is in our wheelhouse. If it isn’t, we’ll provide resources to help you find another editor.

Book piracy is no joke! We understand how important your manuscript is to you, and we would never contribute to piracy or intellectual-property theft. Tomeworks will never share your work with anyone outside our collective. You retain the rights to everything you send us to edit. For your peace of mind, we include an intellectual property clause in all our contracts. All example edits and quotes from previous clients have been shared with their explicit permission.

We can do everything but! Getting the agent to take you on as a client is outside of our purview, unfortunately, no matter how passionate we are about your story. Any editor who promises they can get you an agent is unfortunately exaggerating or they have connections with unscrupulous actors. However, our book query services will streamline your query letter and improve your sample to give you the best chance of getting an agent’s attention. You can also review our Writers Lunches on writing query letters HERE to give you a great start on writing your own. If you are looking for an assistant to help send out your communications, fill out our contact form, and we’ll provide you with an up-to-date list of virtual assistants we recommend.

We provide coaching and other custom services on a case-by-case basis. Coaching is extremely personal to both the editor and client, and we don’t enter into a relationship until we’ve evaluated goals and personalities to ensure we’re going to make an amazing partnership. We also provide accountability partnerships through our Patreon for clients who benefit from interacting with us on an ongoing basis. We can develop personalized workshops for your writing group, create in-house style guides, and assist publishing houses with bulk edits and world/character continuity reviews for developed IPs. The best way to determine if we can provide you assistance is to ask. Use our general contact form, and one of our editors will be able to discuss your project within a few days.

The Tomeworks editors all come to editing via non-traditional paths. Our varied education and career backgrounds have given us invaluable knowledge and skills that you might not find with other editors. We have collective decades of experience editing all kinds of writing, not just fiction. We’re also subject-matter experts in biology, climate change, medicine, hand-to-hand combat, relationships, and more, and we absolutely bring this knowledge to bear to make your work more realistic and engaging for your readers.

In addition to being editors, at Tomeworks, we’re also all authors. This gives us an in-depth understanding of all stages of the writing process and makes us uniquely qualified to help you improve not just a singular manuscript but your craft in general. No matter where you are in your writing career, we’ve been there, and we would love to help you level up your skills.

No editor is perfect, including those of us at Tomeworks. We all have our own strengths and weaknesses as editors, but because we’re a collective, we work collaboratively to cover each others’ blind spots and deliver higher quality editing services. Together, we help you build better books.