Services

When I was young, I dreamed of moving to a quiet cabin by a lake and writing the Great American Novel. I thought being a writer meant huddling in isolation, wearing the same hoodie for weeks at a time.

OK, the hoodie part is true.

But other than that, being a writer is a lot different than what I thought. Yeah, it’s writing a lot. But it’s also a profession of giving. Helping other writers. Sharing what I’ve learned.

It also means making a living by offering a variety of services to other writers who don’t have the time or the inclination to do the things I do well.

Editing

Editing is like sculpting. It’s the art of taking a rough, dirty block of words and ideas, carving away the chunks and smoothing the edges until the truth of the message glitters in the sunlight.

It’s about drawing out the most important elements of a message and forming them in a way that the reader walks away feeling or doing exactly what the author needs them to feel or do.

I’ve worked with everything from business emails to full-length books. I’ve written and edited for senior executives and young readers. I’ve written instruction manuals and poetry. I’ve edited pieces to inform, inspire, and elevate.

And I want to share that experience with other writers.

I offer both developmental editing (sharing feedback and advice on structure, theme, focus, and tone of your work) and line editing (polishing and proofreading) services. Projects are priced based on complexity of content and start at $500/10K words for developmental edits and $300/10K words for line editing, with a minimum project charge of $500.

Copywriting

Much as I’d love to fall back on the purity of art, let’s face it: Novels don’t pay the bills (at least not right away). Even many of the literary greats had day jobs or did copywriting to fund their art.

I’ve written everything from sales campaigns and web copy to informative articles and inspiration pieces, in every length from facebook ads to full-length books.

All projects are individually priced based on scope.

Tech for the Technophobe

Most writers are artists. It’s easy for the more creative among us to find technology baffling, but in this world of authorpreneurs, it’s up to us to earn the attention of readers. And that means leveraging technology to get our words out there.

I was fortunate to fall into jobs where I learned a lot of technology. I wrote my first website (several of them, in fact) before the turn of the century. I understand how to set up a blog and optimize graphics and execute a social media marketing campaign and format an eBook.

And maybe for you, that stuff just takes too much time that you could be devoting to your writing. If so, I can help.

WordPress Installation and Setup

Starting a new self-hosted blog can be time consuming and can distract you from doing what you really love — writing. For $400, I’ll walk you through the things you’ll need and we’ll hold a meeting via Skype to plan how you want it to look — design options, and what you want to appear in your menus and your sidebar. Then I’ll install WordPress at your hosting provider and get your new blog set up with a premium, customizable theme* designed just for authors — the same theme I use here at River of Thoughts. Finally, I’ll leave you with a clear plan of action to get your content filled in and get your blog started.

*Note: graphics, hosting service, and premium theme costs are not included in blog setup services.

Mailchimp Email Service Setup

If you’re ready to connect better with your readers and build your email list, but email services are just a monkey on your back, then I can help. For $300, I’ll set up your Mailchimp list, create a custom template for your emails, and set it up to send your blog posts to subscribers automatically.

Note: Mailchimp does not play well with sites hosted at wordpress.com. Mailchimp setup services are only available for self-hosted WordPress sites.

EBook Formatting

Amazon has made publishing accessible to writers in a way never before possible. It’s easier now than it ever has been to finish a book and make it available for the world to buy. But that doesn’t mean it’s easy. Sure, you can upload a Word document to Amazon and they’ll make a book out of it. But the quality of eBooks published that way is…unpredictable.

I’ve formatted several top-quality books for Amazon and other eBook outlets, and I’ve got the system down pat. I can create custom tables of contents and chapter separators and can make sure your front and back matter work for you to give your reader ways to engage and hear more from you.

For $200*, I’ll format your plain narrative manuscript — novel or standard non-fiction work. This includes creating .mobi and .epub eBook formats as well as a .pdf with the same settings. If your book requires special formatting, such as outlines/subheadings, poetry, callout quotes, footnote/endnotes, graphics, tables, or other customizations, I can take care of it for $75 an hour.

*Note: This assumes a clean manuscript in MS Word or comparable format. Conversion of manuscripts in PDF format and manuscript cleanup (fixing paragraph and page breaks, irregular formatting, etc), editing, or post-formatting corrections will be billed at standard hourly rates.

Coaching

For some writers, you’d prefer to learn for yourself, but you need someone to help you create your plan, point you to resources, and hold you accountable. You need a personal trainer.

If this is you, click here to check out my coaching packages.