Editing is something that makes or breaks a story. Good editing can make a mediocre story shine, while poor (or non-existant) editing can ruin the very best story idea.
Editing comes in a variety of types, some of which sound perilously similar.
The one most people think of when they think of An Editor is ‘copy editing’ or ‘proofreading’, where the editor goes through a manuscript and fixes any errant grammar or spelling. (This is sometimes referred to as SPaG, which amuses those of us who grew up calling tomato pasta sauce with meat and vegetables as SpagBol.) This editing should be one of the last things done to a manuscript, as its easy for mistakes to creep in with later revisions.
Developmental editing is a different thing. Developmental editing can happen anywhere in the creation of the story, from ideation through finished manuscript. Developmental editors look at the story as a whole, as well as character creation, world-building, pacing, and every other part of story creation. They help ensure coherent and consistent characters, rich world-building, and gripping pacing.
Some people have developmental editors look at their work at the outlining stage, as having this sort of input can make writing a clean first draft much easier and makes all subsequent drafts simpler to produce. However, some authors prefer to have developmental editors look at their first draft, to clear up any issues which have grown in the writing.
I provide all varieties of editing services, from copy editing through full read-through and re-writes. For developmental editing, I provide documents supporting all my suggested changes; these documents range from re-written manuscript sections to clearly show what changes I think should be made, as well as links to places online where authors can learn more for themselves about story writing techniques, so they can improve their skill set.
Stasia, Editrix 