So, I Read This Book Today . . .
Editing Fees and Guidelines
As my editing jobs have become more numerous, I have updated my Editing Fees and Guidelines. My editing and proofreading includes checking for grammar, sentence structure, misspellings, and pointing out plot inconsistencies, etc. At this time, my base charge is $0.008/word, with a minimum of $50, payable via PayPal. Editing jobs I am currently working on, received before May 1, 2014, will continue to be edited at the old rate.
If your manuscript is less than 5,000 words please let me know and we can work out pricing. I prefer to set up appointments for your manuscript, but please, send your manuscripts to me as early as possible. I can often work them in sooner than they are scheduled, but advance notice is much easier.
I use Microsoft Word 2013. I use the Track Changes application while I edit and leave the decision as to whether or not to accept those changes to you. I also tend to leave extensive notes outlining the reason for specific changes, noting uneven or awkward sentence or paragraph flow, or even if I noticed something that just doesn’t feel right.
Full editing is completed in one of two ways. The first choice is that I completely edit the book and provide you with a corrected copy, highlighting changes and corrections and making when appropriate extensive notes. Your second choice is full editing. I take the book in hand, do all corrections and changes and provide you with print ready copy. The charge for print ready copy is $0.010/word.
Please note: Books from authors who speak English as a second language, hence requiring a great deal more correction for grammar, or books with extensive re-write may be significantly more. You may send me your book for pricing if you feel there may be extensive work needed on the book. Pricing available upon request.
After I have edited a manuscript, I will send it back to you. Once you have made changes, you can always send it back to me for a second pass at no charge. Please note: If second-pass changes are truly extensive, I will reserve the right to bill a second payment for the second pass. I want to be fair to you, but I also want to be fair to myself. Just as writing is difficult, though rewarding, editing a book in a manner that will make you proud of your final product is a lot of work.
For available books on which I have worked, please see my “i-edited” shelf on Goodreads. You may contact any of the authors with whom I’ve worked for a reference. I am also very willing to provide you a sample of my work to see if we are a comfortable fit. I can be easily contacted through Goodreads or by e-mail at soireadthisbooktoday@centurylink.net
I look forward to working with you!
Lake of Tears: A Claire Watkins Mystery
War is a big and sprawling word that brings a lot of human suffering into the conversation, but combat is a different matter . . . –Sebastian Junger, War.It doesn’t require any particular bravery to stand on the floor of the Senate and urge our boys in Vietnam to fight harder, and if this war mushrooms into a major conflict and a hundred thousand young Americans are killed, it won’t be U.S. Senators who die. It will be American soldiers who are too young to qualify for the Senate. ~George McGovern
lakeoftearsI really don’t like alliteration. It just seems that I could word things so much better, in a more sophisticated or literary way. But in this case, a term comes to mind that I simply cannot shake. So, here goes. The wanton waste of war. And in the case of Lake of Tears, it is so horrifically appropriate.
The little murder mystery is purportedly about Claire Watkins, and her daughter, Meg, a soon-to-be college student, working her last fall in town before going off to Madison. Things change suddenly, when Claire is thrust into the role of Sheriff of her little county when Sheriff Talbot, suffers a heart attack and is sent to Mayo Clinic in Minneapolis for a quadruple bypass. This shouldn’t really be a big deal in their quiet county. However, everything changes before Sheriff Talbot is even sent off to the Mayo, when a body is found burned to bones in the remains of the Burning Boat, a Norse longship built out of pallets and burned in effigy, a paean to the Norse history of Wisconsin. What follows becomes the story of Andrew Stickler, a newly returned veteran from that blasted sandbox, Afghanistan. Andrew spent four years ‘over there,’ fighting for his life, and the lives of others, vacillating from the boredom of waiting to the terror of fighting, before coming home to Wisconsin and going to work for Claire as a deputy.
Here then is where the ‘wanton waste of war’ come full circle. Having dated the victim before he left for the Army, Andrew is drawn into the investigation as a prime suspect. And we begin to learn more and more of his history in Afghanistan and what he, and others, lost over there.
Mary Logue handles the story with a deft hand, never overbearing, opening up the story and bringing you into the mind and soul of the veterans who give so much. She reminds us all that the boys and girls who go to war really are just children. Some are a very young eighteen or barely more, pushed into circumstances that would send anyone into madness. As Claire’s husband says at one point in the book, “If we drafted the old men, like my age, I doubt there’d be many wars. I for one wouldn’t go.” Maybe we should expand that definition. If we sent the politicians and the generals, the corporate heads and rich old men, there certainly wouldn’t be wars. Sort of like if men had children, there would be a lot less people on the planet.
Logue tells a sad, a heartbreaking tale, of loss and death, of madness and despair, but also of hope and new beginnings. It left me sad, but also hopeful for the characters in her story.
Now, if only I could develop some hope for the fate of mankind.
I was given a copy of Lake of Tears by the Publisher in return for an honest review. All opinions are my own. Lake of Tears is due out January 18, 2014.