For more than 80 years, Kirkus has been a leader in editorial excellence in the publishing industry. Now we have developed a book editing division to offer unpublished and self-published authors access to the publishing industry’s top editors. We’re dedicated to making it simple for an author to get insightful, useful feedback, notes and corrections from the same editors who work on books published by the likes of Knopf, Viking, Simon & Schuster, Tor and Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

For a quick overview of all editing packages:

• Basic Copyediting - A thorough cleanup that focuses on the mechanics of language—correcting grammar, punctuation, spelling, and typos. Copy editors also look for continuity errors (e.g., a character’s eyes are blue in one chapter and brown in another), and they will make sure the timeline tracks and the details are consistent. But they will not go as deep with the developmental feedback as the collaborative editors do. The standard turnaround is 15 business days from the day you place the order. The price is 2 cents per word, with a minimum charge for books that are less than 13K words.

• Collaborative Editing - A developmental edit that focuses on big-picture issues like structure, pacing, tone, and characterization. The editor will also do some line editing to clean up typos and punctuation issues, but they will not perform a copyedit. Along with the marked-up manuscript, you’ll receive a memo outlining the manuscript’s strengths and weaknesses, with suggestions on how to approach revisions. Once you review the editor’s comments, you’ll have a one-hour follow-up phone call during which you can ask for clarification or further advice on next steps. The standard turnaround is 20 business days from the day you place the order. The price is 3 cents per word plus $99 for the phone call, with a minimum charge for books that are less than 13K words.

• Professional Editing Package - This consists of three rounds of editing and most closely resembles the editorial process at traditional publishers. It includes 1) the collaborative editing service and phone call as described above, 2) the copyediting service as described above, and 3) a final proofread to catch any lingering typos and finalize formatting. There are no time limits between each stage—you can take as long as you need to make revisions before moving on to the next round. The price is 6.5 cents per word, with a minimum charge for books that are less than 13K words.