Developmental Editing and Manuscript Consultations
You need an editor who believes in your work. Without this belief, feedback is merely a series of suggestions based on the editor’s taste. Authors know what it feels like to get these types of suggestions—they lead to confusion and indecision, instead of clarity, costing you time and mental energy.
On the other hand, when your editor is a good reader (like me!), their suggestions bring clarity, fuel to keep going, and decisiveness. Approaching your next draft, you feel curious, open, and confident. I’m able to give these types of suggestions by seeing the strength in your manuscript, including brilliant ideas that aren’t landing quite yet, and giving you suggestions both for how the text itself could improve and process suggestions for how to get there.
What is a Developmental Edit? What Is a Manuscript Consultation?
A developmental edit deals with large structural questions about the book: Is a character underdeveloped? Would it work better told chronologically or through flashbacks? Is there a way to organize the book that would work better for the material? Does the pacing need to change?
A developmental edit usually does not include a lot of line editing because the overall structure and themes of the book are still in flux. In book publishing, you must complete a developmental edit before a line edit or a copy edit.
A manuscript consultation (for poets only) considers your whole manuscript. Here, we’ll talk both about the book at both a structure and line level. I’ll suggest changes to the order of the poems when necessary, possibly suggest removing poems that don’t fit, and give thoughts on how the poems themselves could improve.
Types of Manuscripts I Work With
Each developmental edit or manuscript consultations includes comments within the text, a letter describing my suggested changes, and an optional meeting to discuss any follow-up questions.
Novels and short story collections
Poetry collections
Memoir
Essay collections
I don’t work on horror, erotica, or book-length journalism projects.
Wondering if we might be a fit? You can send me 1-2 pages for a sample edit so we can see if we would work well together.
“At a time in my writing when I had hit a wall and couldn’t get over it, Megan Alpert came to the rescue. Her objective and critical eye helped me to understand where I really wanted my writing to go. In addition, her excellent editing skills took my writing to a higher level. Thank you, Megan!”
—Sandra Worsham, memoirist and fiction writer
Get In Touch
Want to know more? Fill out the contact form to ask a question or request a sample edit.