Behind every great author is a great editor — and behind every brilliant author might be several. The quality of editorial work that goes into a manuscript can be what makes or breaks a book’s success.

The primary goal of an editor is to locate and revise anything in a book that might distract a reader from enjoying the content. Editors keep an eye out for everything from a big picture perspective, like confusing organization or plot holes, to small details like typos or improper citations.

While editorial work as a category covers everything to do with a book’s content, “book editing” is not a single job. There are several levels of editing that books go through to ensure the content is clear, compelling, accurate, and consistent.

Developmental Editing

This type of editing deals with large chunks of text and either adding, removing, or restructuring portions of a manuscript to improve the logical argument and arc of the book. Editors may add short passages of new content or rewrite current content for clarity and flow, and prompt the author to address content issues that require subject matter expertise. The edit may include focusing the manuscript by removing extraneous and repetitive content, and reworking unclear or overly wordy passages.

A dev edit is often recommended for manuscripts that are overly short,long, or require a structural rearrangement to better communicate the author’s message.

Substantive Editing

Substantive editing includes any comprehensive editing that requires structural and organizational changes and substantial improvements to the quality of prose and style.

A sub edit is often recommended for manuscripts that use language that doesn’t attract the target audience, such as high level and technical writing in a book intended for non-experts.

Copyediting

A copyedit will address issues of style, clarity, and usage, improving sentence structure where necessary and increasing the overall readability of the text.

Pre-composition Proofreading

A pre-composition proofread occurs before the manuscript has been laid out by a designer and will review for any issues of spelling, grammar, punctuation, and other oversights.

Post-composition Proofreading

A post-composition proofread occurs once the interior pages of the book have been designed and laid out. The proofreader will look for any page layout issues such as heading and font inconsistencies, or new typos that may have arisen with the new organization of the page.

Editorial Diagnosis

An editorial diagnosis is used to determine what kind of editing a manuscript needs. Through a diagnosis, an expert editor reviews a manuscript, taking note of what works and what doesn’t. The diagnosis is a document that includes detailed feedback on what changes are needed for the book to shine, along with a prescription for how many hours of editorial work at each level are recommended to make the book the best it can be.

While many editors can perform multiple levels of editing, typically at least two different editors are recommended. An editor who is familiar with the book from completing a developmental and substantive edit might not be able to catch as many proofreading errors as someone with fresh eyes would.

Even the most experienced writers may have blind spots for their own work; editors are responsible for seeing what authors miss.

Book publishing also has a collection of stylistic rules and requirements that take years of experience to memorize and learn to implement. By working with professional editors, authors can share that burden with experts who will refine any book into top shape.

If you’re interested in exploring next steps for your manuscript and potentially receiving an editorial diagnosis from a head Greenleaf editor, you can submit your work for consideration here: greenleafbookgroup.com/submissions.