THIS BLOG HAS MOVED!

easyreaderediting.com/blog

For those who haven't read the fine print under my banner:

I moved my blog in early 2019 so I could have my website and blog for editing services all in one spot. Most of my regular readers have found me there, but if you've ended up here and you're not sure how, please click HERE to be redirected to easyreaderediting.com, where you can find:

• editing services (includes line editing and copyediting packages)
• biweekly blog posts with writing tips for authors
• paid beta services
• partial manuscript evaluations
• proofreading services for blog posts, query letters, websites, newsletters, and more

You can also find a list of writing and editing resources and Amazon links to a selection of the books I've edited (fiction and nonfiction).

See you there!

Lynda

But Why Does Editing Cost So Much?

Photo source: Skitterphoto via Pexels

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If I had a quarter for every time someone expected me to edit their work for free ("have fun with it" was my all-time favorite) or questioned the project's cost, I'd be . . . maybe not rich, but I'd probably have enough to cover a project.

Whenever I hear someone complain about the cost of things, I mentally go through a few scenarios. First, I try to find out the specific item and the dollar amount that's being discussed, and then I attempt to reason out what is being provided for the cost.

BUT WHY: THE VALUE
In some cases, I want to know what it's made of (is this desk pressboard or solid wood?) before making a determination of value. Is $100 reasonable for a high-quality piece of stainless steel cookware because I'll only buy it once in my lifetime, rather than replace a cheaper type every few years because it wears out or cooks unevenly? (Spoiler alert: this is a no-brainer for me. I'm a firm believer in good cookware.)

BECAUSE: THE VALUE
A well-edited manuscript has greater value to the reader than an unedited (or poorly edited) one. A reader doesn't want to slog through sentences that need a second look to make sense . . . or typos, bad grammar, and so much repetition that the story becomes tedious. Well-written books are cherished and reread, given as gifts, and recommended to others.

BUT WHY: THE TIME INVOLVED
If a service is being performed, I need to decide what's more valuable to me: the time that's freed up by having someone else do the task, or the money I'd save by doing it myself. It may well be worth paying someone to come to my home to vacuum, dust, and mop once every week or two if I'm extremely busy and the house is falling apart because we're all going different directions at once. On the other hand, if I'm home all day, am able-bodied, and don't have small children around, it might be difficult to justify that expense when I have the time and good health to take care of things myself.

BECAUSE: THE TIME INVOLVED
Editing an average manuscript for a novel can take me about 40 hours or more. If the edit is a heavier one, that number can easily double. I've logged in over 70 hours on just a first round of heavy edits before. If a book edit is going to take weeks of my time, then it needs to compensate for weeks of income because it's time I can't use to schedule anything else. This is why it's always a good idea to get your manuscript in the best shape possible before sending it off to an editor. A more polished manuscript means the editor can often work faster, which usually means a lower cost to you. It's fine to not worry about it and "let the editor catch that," but that will directly affect the price.

BUT WHY: THE SKILL/EXPERTISE
Face it: there is no possible way for a person to exhibit a professional level of skill in every area of life. Just ask anyone who's ever done a major home renovation. There's a reason that contractors hire out the specialty things like drywall finishing, plumbing, electrical wiring, and more. I may be able to change an outlet, but it doesn't mean I'm capable or licensed to rewire my whole house. I can create decent enough images for the editing quotes I post weekly on Instagram or Twitter, but I hired a graphic designer to create the branding for my business because it was important for my logo to not look like a DIY project.

BECAUSE: THE SKILL/EXPERTISE
There's a great quote I love by Amy Einsohn, author of The Copyeditor's Handbook:

In many ways, being a copyeditor is like sitting for an English exam that never ends: at any moment, your knowledge of spelling, grammar, punctuation, usage, syntax, and diction is being tested.

You can love to read and not know all the rules. You can get irked by other people's grammar mistakes and still not catch the ones you make. You can be a writer and still have to look up some of the usage and trends of our ever-changing language. You wouldn't want someone who made a birdhouse once to be the person you hire to put an addition on to your home. Let the professionals do what they're best at; we love what we do and will take care of things you didn't even know were in need of attention.

I'll leave you with a direct quote from an editor I know, because I've also been hired for those re-edits she mentions.

My own thoughts when someone says they can "find someone else to do it for only $200" usually run along the lines of "Yes, you can. A lot of my work has come from re-editing those $200 jobs, so I know those kinds of prices can be found."

Respect the value. Respect the time spent. And respect the expertise. You won't regret it. 

WRITING MISCONCEPTIONS: The Myth of the "Perfect" Edit

I'm sure you've all heard the phrase "If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is." In the writing world this adage applies to the famed Perfect Edit™.

I'll be blunt right off the bat: the Perfect Edit is like a unicorn in that it doesn't exist. In fact, if anyone promises you a perfect job for your book, they're lying, because no one can promise perfection. Nor should they.

Often, new authors seek out a copyeditor and don't have a clear idea of the scope of the job. Sometimes they just don't know that it's common practice to hire a proofreader after edits are complete and the book is typeset. Whatever the case, there is sometimes a "situation" at the job's completion where an author is dissatisfied because they've found an error or two in the MS. Sometimes, they even demand money back in compensation.

Here are the facts:

1. Guaranteed perfection is an impossibility. Impossible for humans, impossible for grammar-checking software.
2. An editor is not suddenly an amateur or a hack just because something got missed. There should be no accusations of "You call yourself a professional?" bandied about.
3. The industry standard for error rate is 5%. This applies to Big Five publishers and everyone else, all the way down to the freelancer. Most editors, including myself, consider that more than fair, and in fact have error rates much lower, closer to 1% or so. The basic idea is that if there are 100 errors in the MS, an editor should be expected to catch 95 of them. When a manuscript has 2000 revisions, missing 100 of them is not likely to happen. Missing 5? Maybe. And we're talking actual errors, not style choices. What about those heavy line edits that end up with 13,000 revisions? If I've even missed up to ten things, I'd still be counting myself a success because of the job's scope of work, since—by the book—I could have over 600 misses and still get a 95% catch rate.

I suppose the biggest hurdle to overcome when dealing with an author who expects perfection boils down to asking a few specific questions:

1. What is an error? Often, a client will see what they think is an editorial mistake that is in fact correct usage. Real-life example: did you know that the process of rummaging through someone's belongings or the quick turning of pages in a book is called riffling? That's right, it's not a typo. There is an extra letter in that word and it's correct. But we've heard it called rifling, we've said the word with the long "i" sound, and we've spelled it with a single "f" without a thought. And why do I know this odd fact? Because I missed it on an editing test six-plus years ago. If I'd seen "riffling" in a book, I would have thought it was a misspelling and that the editor missed something.
2. Is it a rule or a style? This goes along with with the "what is an error?" question. A while back, I did an entire series on "The Rules" and showed how zombie rules are simply styles or tradition, but not genuine grammar or usage rules. (If you ever want to know more about zombie rules, all you have to do is visit any forum where grammar trolls abound, quoting . . . from somewhere other than their mouth, of course . . . what they think they know.) An author I worked with once got a scathing comment from someone on Amazon who told him he needed to learn what the word "decimated" meant. In the context of that book, the word was used to describe a city's destruction after a bombing. Historically (almost archaically) the word has meant "to select by lot and kill every tenth man" or "to exact a tax of 10 percent from," but the usage in my author's book was correct, drawing from the additional definition, "to cause great destruction or harm to." That's all according to Merriam-Webster and completely legit. But the commenter on Amazon was so intent on proving how much smarter he was that he ignored the changing language and its usage.
3.  Are we, as editors, somehow promoting the impossible when we point out trivial editorial glitches in published work? After all, we can't say perfection is impossible (beyond the occasional one-pagers) and then point out the missing punctuation we would have caught if we were the editors for a particular bestseller.

Really, how do we present the concept of "acceptable error rates" to a client without sounding like we're making excuses ahead of time for what we're going to miss? All I can tell people is that I do my very best to make sure their work is as error-free as I'm able to get it, and if they have questions about errors or perceived errors, I'm always open to take a look and discuss them.

Errors happen. We don't want them to, but they do.

It's considered a courtesy for an author to send their editor a complimentary copy of the book they've worked on. Probably half the authors I've edited for have sent me their signed, completed books, and I'm thrilled to have them on my bookshelves. But here's the weird thing: I am usually hesitant to open them, other than to read whatever personal message they've added. Why? Almost every week, an editor in one of my groups talks about making the mistake of opening the thank-you book and immediately finding an error they missed. This happened to me a few years ago, when I worked on a series of books that that author sent me as a set. The first book was misprinted, and started on page 30. When I opened it up to look for the acknowledgment, all I saw was a glaring error on that first page of narrative: Bob side. Not Bob sighed, as it was meant to be. Who even misses something that obvious? I was appalled. Thankfully, when I pointed it out to the author, he was gracious and said, "You went over that text and I rewrote things so many times. At some point, we have to call it 'done.' So let's call it done and don't worry about it."

Sometimes, you just have to let go and call it done.

And besides, we all know the best way to find those lingering errors is to hit "send." Right?

Editors: We Are Not the Grammar Police!

Editors.

We are a long way from what most people think we are. We are not the bossy know-it-alls who glory in telling authors how bad they suck. We're not J. Jonah Jameson, shouting at the writers who hand us their copy with trembling hands. We're not inflexible about THE RULES and how they should be followed.

We're not even the people who correct everyone's Facebook posts, believe it or not.

We're people who just enjoy polishing words and phrases. People who help to clarify meaning by adjusting structure. People who like to make sure the image a writer wishes to create is the image that comes across in the narrative.

One of the things that grows old fast for an editor is when someone calls us the grammar police. (Worse yet, a grammar Nazi, because only the Nazis were/are Nazis, and it's an abhorrent term that should not be tossed about lightly, comparing someone who corrects text with someone who committed genocide. But I digress.)

The term "grammar police" implies that editors lie in wait, hoping for someone to mess up so they can publicly shame them. Even the real police don't do that. Well . . . maybe the state troopers who ticket speeders on the highway do that.

But back to me.

I mean, other editors.

Okay, me. AND other editors.

We love a well-turned phrase, but honestly, the feeling of the fix and polish is more of a feeling of accomplishment for our own skills, not a feeling of superiority over the person whose work we're reading through.

I can't tell you how many times I've had acquaintances make a comment to me along the lines of "I'm so paranoid to write anything on your Facebook wall without rereading it a dozen times" or "Gosh, you're probably cringing as you read my post" or any number of variations on that theme. Let me set the record straight:

• I don't correct someone's writing unless they're paying me for it, or have specifically asked me to do so. 
• I don't always use proper English when I speak—just like everyone else when they talk. 
• I don't use proper punctuation (other than for clarity) when I'm typing in a private chat window or text with a friend.
• And I never EVER correct someone publicly on social media, especially strangers.

Those people who take joy in that type of overzealous behavior are jerks, plain and simple. Half the time, they don't even know the real rules (or the change in language that makes a certain style now obsolete) but simply want to show someone (strangers? and why?) that they're smarter than someone else. Quoting what we call "zombie rules," i.e. habits or styles that are/were popular but not actually rules that must be followed, is almost always done by those who have no basis for what they're insisting on. And yet the drive-by editors still do it with regularity.

Denise Cowle has a great blog post about why the grammar police aren't cool. When it was recently shared in an editing group, almost every editor in the group agreed that they don't like being viewed that way and don't behave that way. Again, it's always those who don't actually know what's what who shout the loudest. Where she reminds us that we need to be kind, she says, "If you're lucky enough to have benefited from a good education, and you don't have to wrestle with a learning difference such as dyslexia, be thankful and be gracious."

Graciousness and kindness never hurts. You never know when someone is writing in their second language, or with a disability, or whose speech-to-text program doesn't quite catch everything.

Another terrific post that addresses this is "4 Reasons Why Freelance Writers Shouldn't Be Grammar Police" by Linda Formichelli. It might be more aptly named "Why Grammar Police Make Boring Writers," because that's what inevitably happens when rules (or supposed rules) are adhered to without nuance or voice being considered: it's sterile and boring.

Grammar police? I think I'd rather be known as the Shiny Word Fairy or something like that. Since my goal is not to sterilize anything, but to make someone's work sparkle, I think it's fitting.

Thanks for listening, folks!

Love,

Lynda, the Shiny Word Fairy

WRITING MISCONCEPTIONS: We Don't Want to Steal Your Book

At least once a month, I see a question on writing or editing forums that sounds roughly like this:

"I am almost ready to hire an editor for my manuscript, but I'm scared of someone stealing my work. What legal measures do you all have in place to make sure this doesn't happen?"

I'm going to generalize quite a bit here, so if you don't feel this way or haven't run into this before, please don't get indignant. I understand that every writer doesn't think like this. However . . .

I've found that if there are only writers in the group, there are always at least a few who "have heard of this happening so often" and that's why they either self-edit only, copyright their work beforehand, or have a recommended editor sign a nondisclosure agreement.

If there are a lot of editors in the group, the general response runs more along the lines of this:

• I have never considered stealing someone's work.
• I have been in this business for over twenty years and have never heard of this actually happening to anyone.
• I have never met anyone who can give me a real name of someone they know who has had this happen to them.
• The people who need the NDA the least (e.g. new/inexperienced authors) are usually the ones asking about theft, and those who have the most experience typically don't ask. Those who insist are also the people who are generally difficult to work with and don't deal well with changes or criticism.
• I already have a confidentiality clause in my contract and if that's not good enough, I don't want to work with that person. An NDA request from an indie fiction author is often a red flag that they don't understand how the publishing process works.
• I'm a writer myself and have my own story ideas to worry about, and don't have the time or energy to redevelop yours . . . OR
• I'm not a writer. I'm an editor. Editors are not "frustrated writers" who need to steal ideas to feel validated in the writing world.

I saw it pop up again just the other day as I was working on this post. This time, the author was asking about beta readers and how a writer can feel safe, sending their work off to strangers who might steal it. Yet, he was having trouble getting friends and family to beta for him. (The whole "friends and family" thing is fodder for another post. No worries, you'll read about it here.)

The general concensus among experienced writers and editors is that some authors spend a lot of time on author-only pages, and the misinformation they come away with in regard to publishing is astounding. It reminds me of the Yahoo Answers boards where a bunch of people "answer" a question with "I don't know," or "I've always thought [fill in the blank]." There are no legitimate answer-givers and no one to contradict anyone with actual facts.

Here are some facts—from real editors I interact with—that will hopefully reassure any skittish writers:

• If I stole people's work, I wouldn't be in business very long.
• Anyone who knows anything at all about copyright and intellectual property laws knows it wouldn't be worth the risk.
• No self-respecting professional would even think about it.
• Most of stolen books are stolen AFTER they're published. They are stolen by people who have never had contact with the author, and who don't care about copyright.
• Even if you are the next Stephen King or J.K. Rowling, we would still not steal your work, but we'd be very happy to make your acquaintance and be your editor. VERY happy.

It's the End-of-Year Reflections Post!

The end of the calendar year signifies a particular thing to each person; it's a natural thing for people to reflect. It may mean the end of a nightmare year of bankruptcy for one person, or it may celebrate a major life change like having a baby or getting married.

It's a good habit to reflect as the year comes to a close, to learn what worked and what didn't, and to plan for the future. I like to do this personally, but in the past couple years I've been doing it for my business too. 

One of the big lessons I didn't start to learn until a few years into the business was that there is more than just working for the business. There is working at the business. Working to ensure that there will be more business, in fact—something I didn't have to think about in the first year because clients were somehow finding me. I was busy and didn't even have to try to stay that way. 

If I had to sum it up, I'd say this is the year I tried to make the best use of my time. I looked through my analytics to see what was working and what wasn't. I kept a spreadsheet of completed jobs and how much time I invested in them. I used a timer app to break down where, exactly, my computer time was spent. (I was shocked to know that sifting through and answering email was one of my biggest time sucks.) I decided to learn everything I could to make my work more efficient and to broaden my skills so I can provide a wider variety of services someday. I took some classes, and I read an awful lot of books. I'm proud to say that I'm a better editor today than I was four years ago, or even two years ago. 

The happy result of this has been that 2018 has been a year of growth, and I'm pretty excited to look over my job list and note how many new clients I've gained and where I've gotten them from. Some have become friends and others are simply clients I've enjoyed getting to know while working on their projects. It's been a lot of fun to work on a handful of nonfiction projects this year as well.

I've done beta reading for a few authors, numerous line edits and copyedits, worked on doctoral dissertation papers, and even proofed someone's website. All that variety kept me fresh.

So THANK YOU, J.T. Buckley, Marcia Caton, Ciofki, Raylene Demeester, Adam & Peggy Dresden, Darrell Haemer, Rhonda Denise Johnson, Heidi Love, Carol Mills, Kim Mower, Kristen Snarski, Jack Tyler, Kim Watt, and Stephanie Workman. You've helped to make this a great year!

Tell Me Your Favorites

Today's post is going to be a cheater post of sorts. For all the planning I do and all the ideas I have running around in my brain, I somehow managed to not have a post ready for today.

I've been busy with edits, which is always fun. It means I'm honing my skills, getting to know new people, and expanding my horizons. Always a good thing!

This may seem a little early—and it in no way implies that I'm actually organized about it—but I'm looking ahead to next year and what it means for this blog and my business in general. As I plan out my weeks and months and seasons of 2019, I'd like to get a grasp on what interests my readers the most.

Honestly, I have no idea how many people read this blog. A look at my analytics tells me I have hundreds of followers. I have hundreds of views per month, on a variety of posts. But I have only about a dozen regulars who comment. And I love the comments, not just because you guys are loads of fun—and the comment section can often be more interesting than the post itself—but also because they let me know who is actually reading. For all I know, half the numbers are bots.

Are my readers experienced authors who already know what I'm writing about? Am I just confirming good information and reassuring them that they're doing it right?

Are there new writers out there who have never heard some of this stuff before? Am I a helpful resource for commonly tricky topics? Jack Tyler's blog, Riding the Blimp, has a huge variety of topics (depending on the day) but his advice posts are geared toward young/new writers who need basic guidance on how to start off well. I'm certain he saves a lot of newbies some relearning time in the long run. The IWSG (Insecure Writer's Support Group) blogs about writing and resources and publishing, and it's geared toward writers old and new. Writers After Dark has a library full of resources and checklists, a writers' podcast, blog posts from award-winning authors, and—if you just need a break and some laughs to refocus—a "Wit Without Wisdom" podcast that covers all the topics on the internet no one else will touch.

What would you like to see for the upcoming months? For next year? I have a handful of authors lined up for Book Talk, and I'm excited to introduce them to you. I'm sure I'll never run out of Circular File examples to share, where strangers ask me to work for them for free. I have a few multi-post series ideas up my sleeve. But what is interesting to YOU? Is there a topic no one else has covered, or something you struggle with in your own writing? I'd love to know.

Let's have your best ideas, folks! Tell me your favorites, if you've had any, and let me know what you'd like to see more of. I'm open.

Worst Writing Advice: Get Rid of ALL the Adverbs!

If you've ever gotten a group of writers or editors together, you are probably aware that there are as many opinions as there are people. Sometimes the number of opinions actually outnumbers the people present, which should defy all logic but somehow doesn't.

In the editor groups I'm part of, it's generally agreed upon that there are rules that shouldn't be broken. It's also agreed upon that there is something called "best practice" that is subject to circumstance. The thing about best practice is that it can vary from editor to editor, depending on a number of factors. The important part about best practice is that it has to make sense.

Take adverbs, for example. Please. Take them all. Take them far away. In fact, anything that ends in -ly should be banished from the language entirely.

Is that what you've been told? Stephen King even says in On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, "I believe the road to hell is paved with adverbs, and I will shout it from the rooftops."

I tend to agree with Mr. King, but not for the reasons you may think. I've done posts about adverbs on this blog, including "What's So Bad About Adverbs?" in a previous Editor's Notes, so some of you are already aware of my views on this.

Here's the thing: there are many convincing reasons why you should get rid of as many adverbs as you can, and many convincing reasons why they are not, in fact, from the devil himself. The most important thing to remember is that this falls under the "advice" column and not the "nonnegotiable rules" column. So what is the best practice for adverbs?

The advice, when followed sensibly, reminds writers to get rid of the types of adverbs that create redundancy.

He shouted loudly across the field. She ran quickly to the door. He pounded forcefully on the table.

All these adverbs are redundant. Shouting is loud. Running is fast. Pounding shows force. "Quickly" might be used if the sentence read "she made her way quickly to the door" instead, but in this case, the verb used gives a different feel to the movement.

The other reason writers are so often advised to get rid of their adverbs is because they're using them to write in a lazy fashion. It's easier to say "Oh, no!" she cried despairingly than it is to describe what she looked like in her moment of despair. What about "Oh, no!" She choked out the words as her gaze darted back and forth from one family member to another, looking for a different answer than the one she'd been given.

Which one gives a visual to the reader? The first tells us how the character reacted. The second shows us. This is where the "show, don't tell" advice comes from, and is what prompts so many writers to panic if they find a sentence that tells.

DO NOT PANIC. Listen to me here, because this is important. YOU ARE ALLOWED TO TELL. You are even allowed to tell with an -ly adverb if you so choose. Sometimes you want to say "she walked quietly to the door" because she didn't creep, or tiptoe, or sneak. She simply walked quietly and that's that.

The important thing to keep in mind is that advice like "remove adverbs" becomes advice because in a lot of situations, it's sensible, removes redundancy, and helps to keep the writing interesting. But it's not a rule, and there is no need to make yourself crazy with a search & seizure of anything that ends in -ly. Adverbs are a legit part of speech that can be used to great effect in the right place at the right time.

Just like good food, fine chocolate, or necessary medications, a little is good, but that doesn't mean that a lot is necessarily better.

Worst Writing Advice: When the Rules Aren't Rules

Not all writing advice is created equal.

That sentence above is a prime example. It's not the perfect construction, but I like it and since my blog is written the way I'd speak if we were face to face, that's how I wrote it.

It's not a big deal, but there are people out there who twitch at sentence structure that's not "perfect" according to the rules. They wag an index finger at the offending writer and tout THE RULES to prove their case.

Rules are great. I won't deny that. We can't have anarchy in the grammar world, after all. But there are times when rules are broken effectively—as long as they're purposeful—and other times when the rules need to be the rules and that's that.

The problem arises when a rule isn't exactly a rule; i.e., when something is thought of as a rule, but is merely tradition—or worse, tradition based on misinterpretation or misapplication.

Can you end a sentence with a preposition? Can you begin one with a conjunction? Can you use contractions in dialogue? What about fragmented sentences? Are you allowed to split infinitives?

Does the passive voice always, always have to be adjusted? No, it doesn't, and there's a passive sentence for you right there. I wanted "passive voice" to be first in the sentence so you'd immediately know what the sentence was about, rather than adjust it to say, "Do you always have to adjust the passive voice?" Sometimes we don't want to wait for the end of the sentence to find out what it's about. What if I fell asleep while typing and only wrote, "Do you always have to adjust the" but when I woke up, didn't remember what I'd been thinking? ADJUST THE WHAT? I get interrupted far too often to remember these things.

Over the next few posts, I'll be looking at rules that aren't really rules. Some of them are worth listening to, and others . . . well, I can guarantee you that some are not the hill(s) you want to die on just to prove your point.

If you have any "rules" you've wondered about (yep, the scare quote kind), let me know and I'll look them up and feature them. I've heard a lot of bad advice out there and would love to help you sort out what's what.

What do you think, people? Got some bad advice you'd like me to debunk? Lets hear it!

From the Circular File #1: Your Good Deed for the Day

I thought I'd do something fun today and share a few special stories of what I (and other editors) receive in our DMs on a semi-regular basis.

A couple months ago, it seemed that all the "I want something for nothing" people were coming out of the woodwork. I received a note on Messenger from a guy who wrote exactly one sentence:

I'M WANTING EDITS!

Nothing else. All caps.  I knew already I didn't want to deal with someone like this, but I responded politely and asked what he was referring to: a book, an article, something else . . . He replied, "I WROTE A BOOK!"

So I did what I always do in these situations. I gave him my website address, told him to please read the page that listed the services I offer and the pricing involved, and then fill out the contact form so I could learn as much as I could about his project. And . . .

. . . crickets. Which I knew would happen, so I was not surprised but instead was relieved. I have learned over the years to put the ball back in the other person's court to save myself time and aggravation. I have wasted too many hours doing free sample edits on manuscripts that are not even worthy of being classified as first drafts, and telling a writer what will be needed to get their work up to snuff—only to have them say something like, "I don't have much money to spend." Or worse, "I don't have any money. I thought you'd just do it for free."

The following example happened to an editor friend of mine:

This type of stuff happens to her all the time. The same person who sent her this also posted it on an editing "help wanted" group, saying, "Who wants to edit my short story for $10? Think of it as your good deed for the day."

In case you don't know, this is a poor way to approach a group of strangers . . . who happen to be professional editors . . . who earn their living by editing for money so they can feed their families. A good many of those in the group edit for some big-name authors but don't brag about it. When the person was told how passive-agressively insulting her request was, she got belligerent. Belligerent—while asking strangers to work for her for free. A real prize, this one.

She then went back to my friend and asked what she'd charge for it, and was told there was a $75 minimum for any copyediting work. She ridiculed the editor, and I can't remember exactly what the phrasing was, but she basically told my friend she'd gotten too big for her britches and that she (the writer) could easily find a cheaper deal. My friend pointed out that she was being asked to do detailed, skilled work for a dollar amount that would barely buy her a cheap T-shirt at Wal-Mart. The writer came back to her again, a short while later, and bragged to her that she'd gotten someone on Fiverr to do it for something like $20.

As my friend told me this, I reminded her that she was losing nothing by refusing to work with people like this. We also wondered what a $20 edit would end up looking like. I think I have a pretty good idea.

Now, don't get me wrong: I have done my share of free or cheap work when I have deemed it appropriate. Many editors (and cover designers, and formatters, and proofreaders, etc.) do freebies on occasion. Why? Because we're just nice people, I guess. We can't give everything away, of course, because we can't feed our families on good deeds. But it's nice to offer when someone least expects it, simply because we believe in that person's work and want to help them succeed.

I've been on the giving end, and I've been on the receiving end, and I can tell you they both feel great. But it's never, ever come about as the result of bullying strangers.