Professional Editing Services
No matter where you are in the drafting process, SRD Editing Services offers editing services for writers of self-published and traditionally published commercial fiction and nonfiction books, as well as books for children and poetry.
Not sure what editing your book needs? SRD Editing Services offers a free sample edit to help determine how to make your manuscript into the book of your dreams. Whether you have an outline or a fully completed draft, professional editing services can support making that dream into reality.
SRD Editing Services: Helping dreams become books.
Located in Central Florida. Editing Services Discounts for Florida Students and Alumni.
SRD Editing Services is located in Orlando, Florida, and editor Cortni Merritt attended both the University of Central Florida (2012) and Florida State University (2014). She is proud to be Central Florida based and loves to work with Florida writers!
Cortni extends a 10% discount to current students and alumni of both UCF and FSU! Ask for more information.
Who Is Cortni Merritt, MA, Editor at SRD Editing Services?
Hi! I’m Cortni Merritt, MA, editor and owner/operator at SRD Editing Services in Central Florida. I have been a writer all my life and began freelance editing in 2010 while completing my BA at UCF. If you’d like to get to know more a bit more, please visit this page of the site.
Throughout my years of experience, I’ve been privileged to assist both self-published and traditionally published authors on an ever-growing list of titles. Through working with independent and traditional publishing imprints, I learned how big teams get publishing done, and I bring a big-press process and professionalism to every client. My process aims to make editing your book as straightforward as possible. My focus is on polishing your writing, allowing you to attend to the “bigger picture” of your book as a whole.
Thank you for your time and consideration. I look forward to learning about you and your story!
Have you completed your initial draft? If you’re ready to see how a member of your target audience might react to your book, SRD Editing Services offers professional beta readings for books in limited genres as a professional book editing service.
The SRD Editing Services editor Cortni will review the materials of your manuscript in a Beta Read and focus feedback on areas for development (revision or enhancement), brainstorming and writing-process-related suggestions, resource recommendations, and stylistic or common errors to avoid. A beta reading focuses on issues that readers might notice, including consistency, plot, character development, and pacing in fiction manuscripts and references, tone, tense, voice, and citations/references in nonfiction manuscripts.
When writers include characters, settings, or events that are outside their personal lived experience, those writers may unintentionally treat the character, setting, or event in an insensitive way. Sensitivity readers are a specialized type of beta reader who reviews an advanced copy of the manuscript and provides feedback on sensitive topics. Readers might feel misrepresented by (and stop reading because of) an insensitive or inaccurate portrayal. Professional writers benefit from having sensitivity readers review their material and help them avoid misrepresenting or disengaging their readers.
SRD Editing Services offers sensitivity readings on a limited range of topics and genres. The editor is not able to provide sensitivity reading feedback on every manuscript, but if Cortni is not a good match for your manuscript, she may be able to recommend a match with another sensitivity reader. SRD Editing Services specifically can offer feedback on questions of psychology, including the accurate portrayal of neurodivergent characters, and topics of mental health, well-being, and traumatic experiences in addition to other topics.
A beta reading or sensitivity reading from SRD Editing Services will also include feedback regarding any content warnings or disclaimers suggested to be added to your book’s copyright page or front matter materials.
Have you written your draft but aren’t sure what else it needs? Maybe you submitted it to beta readers who said certain chapters or sections need “work,” but you need “help.” If you feel like your plot, story, or characters could use an ineffable something, you may be looking for developmental editing.
In a developmental edit, Cortni reads the entire fiction or nonfiction manuscript (twice), and provide you with comments and questions to help you enhance, add, remove, cut, reorganize, and strengthen.
Think of it as an editing service that “professionally workshops” your draft with laser-targeted edits, featuring feedback and suggestions from professional writers that Cortni admires and recommends, all crafted to push you and coach your book into a more solid product.
My goal in developmental editing is to provide you with food for thought, inspiration to spark your imagination and help you enliven your creation. All comments and interactions are oriented toward helping you connect your readers to your vision.
Have you written and workshopped your draft? Do you feel you’ve polished the story and are ready to clean up technical errors?
Once you’ve sent your completed manuscript to beta readers and workshop partners, revised based on feedback, then completed a preliminary self-edit, you’re ready for professional line editing.
SRD Editing Services offers book editing services for fiction and nonfiction manuscripts, as well as line editing services for children’s literature and nonfiction, and poetry and verse.
Editor Cortni Merritt will analyze your manuscript and focus feedback on the line-by-line fundamentals that could take readers out of your story if not addressed. Cortni’s line editing service focuses on common areas of concern in fiction and nonfiction manuscripts: grammar, punctuation, spelling, typos, tense and tone consistency, fact-checking, anachronisms, and other areas of attention as needed. Cortni standardizes manuscript editing services using the Chicago Manual of Style, 18th edition. That includes citations and references, if necessary!
Although the line edit will be as thorough as possible, please perform a final proofreading before publication. Cortni advises writers conduct multiple line edits until the manuscript contains fewer than 40 errors per 1,000 words, at which point, the manuscript may be ready for proofreading.
You’ve put your manuscript to every test, through a gauntlet of beta readers, self-publishing editing services, and revisions. Now, you think you’re (close to) ready to publish. You’re ready for Proofreading.
Per industry standards, SRD Editing Services editor Cortni Merritt advises multiple rounds of line editing on a manuscript until it contains fewer than 40 errors per 1,000 words, which is when it may be ready for proofreading. She offers proofreading for fiction and nonfiction manuscripts, including children’s books and poetry.
In the proofreading services, Cortni will correct minor errors such as punctuation, spacing issues, spelling, typos, and grammar elements, according to the Chicago Manual of Style, 18th edition, standard in the industry for commercial fiction and nonfiction manuscripts.
Proofreading does not include rewriting sentences, changing story elements or structure, or offering feedback.
Instead, the proofreader is the final set of eyes to review each word before the manuscript is declared “final” and “ready” to be displayed to its waiting fans.
Discount Pricing for Serial/Bulk Proofreading Projects
Are you a writer looking for proofreading services for an ongoing series or several books at once? SRD Editing Services extends a 15% discount to repeat clients and writers with a need for ongoing proofreading services.
Most writers today–both of fiction and nonfiction–publish a digital version of their book–an ebook. If you’re self-publishing and want your readers to be able to enjoy all the features of reading your book on their favorite e-reader, then you will need a properly formatted ebook file — an .epub file.
Once you’re ready for publishing, you will need to streamline a summary of the whole book and combine it with some snappy marketing copy to entice a reader to purchase and read your book, within about 175 – 225 words. Online, this can be your book’s summary and teaser copy. In printed form, this can become your back cover copy or jacket copy. It can also be helpful for this back cover copy to include a sentence or two of author biography, so readers can get to know you or learn more about you.
Editor Cortni at SRD Editing Services can work with you to write your back cover copy or book description, or she can write it for you based on best practices for your book’s genre.
Policy for clients who return for multiple editing services
To all clients who return with the same manuscript for additional editing services after the writer’s revision, I offer a 15% discount.
To all clients who return with a new manuscript, I offer a 15% discount on all editing and proofreading services for that manuscript.
SRD Editing Services FAQs
The SRD Editing Services standard practice is to edit in MS Word, using Tracked Changes and margin comments. Before any editing service begins, the editor will format all documents to a standard font and font size, with standard indentation, and with 1.5 spacing. Your editor will add page breaks, fleuron breaks, and line breaks as needed and will create a table of contents based on the formatted Style elements in Word. I remove any extra spacing and standardize your document margins, as well.
I offer regular work-in-progress updates to every client. Throughout the time your manuscript is with SRD Editing Services, you can expect that Cortni will reach out with questions, and you can expect an answer to your questions within 24 hours. For writers located in or near Orlando, Florida–where SRD Editing Services is located–some meetings can be arranged in person.
SRD Editing Services’ book editing services prices and packages are transparent and competitive. You’ll find Cortni’s rates and what’s included in our services on the individual website page for each service. Most rates are on a per-word scale and easy to calculate once you know the final word count of your manuscript; some services are flat-rate, but rates may vary depending on the manuscript word count, timeline, and estimated scope of work.
Cortni is also available for à la carte publishing consulting services at an hourly rate of $60.
SRD Editing Services is a member of the Editorial Freelancers Association, which offers a description of members’ average rates on this page of its website. Reedsy also offers a rate guide and calculator for self-publishing writers in this blog article.
The Chicago Manual of Style, 18th edition, is considered the standard for most major publishing houses and is what SRD Editing Services uses for fiction and nonfiction manuscripts.
SRD Editing Services editor Cortni also has experience working with in-house style guidelines and building Style Sheets, which is a standard part of many of Cortni’s editing services.
No. In the interest of confidentiality and protection of private intellectual property, it is the SRD Editing Services policy never to show the unfinished work (with or without edits) of one writer to another writer, without express written permission.
Rather than provide you a sample edit of someone else’s work, our policy is to offer a free sample edit of your own work, in order to quote you a fair rate and timeline for the editing services you need.
I also have a sample line edit and Style Sheet based on a few pages from a popular public domain text available by request.
See the page with details about our Contract, Privacy, and Refund policies for more about the SRD Editing Services confidentiality policies.
While good editing and coaching will give you a greater chance of success with your publication, purchasing a service through SRD Editing Services is NOT a guarantee of publication, representation, favorable reviews, website traffic, manuscript requests, or book sales.
Any refunds given for services from SRD Editing Services will be prorated based on the work completed.
While the goal is to provide a satisfactory service for all clients, some errors may remain in a manuscript after a developmental edit or line edit. The goal is that fewer than 40 errors per 1,000 words will remain after a line edit. Minimal errors may remain after a proofread, and Cortni’s aim is fewer than 1 error per 1,000 words after a proofread.
In the case that a client is dissatisfied with the performance executed in a developmental edit, line edit, or proofreading, SRD Editing Services would love the opportunity to work with the client, including issuing a partial refund, when issues are brought to the editor’s attention within 30 days of the author’s receipt of the final manuscript and/or submission of invoice payment.
See the page with details on our Contract, Privacy, and Refund policies for more.
Commitment to Human-Only Editing (No AI Use, Ever)
As a professional and trained book editor, Cortni believes in the importance of human-authored text, including all steps in the editing process.
If you have used AI in the creation of your text, no problem. During editing services, Cortni is committed to human-only editing in every step of her process. No AI use at SRD Editing Services, and it’s in the contract.
Cortni has been a writer and editor all her life. She holds a BS in psychology from Colorado State University, a BA in English from the University of Central Florida, and an MA in English literature from Florida State University, as well as a graduate certificate in publishing and editing from FSU. She has been a freelance editor and writer since 2010, and has worked in a variety of academic settings, manuscript genres, and professional niches. Visit the About Me page to learn more about Cortni’s experience and background.
Cortni is a published poet in numerous online (and a few printed) publications. Always growing as a poetry editor, Cortni maintains an interest in a wide variety of poetry types. Visit the Published Poetry page for links to Cortni’s featured poems around the internet.
Cortni self-published her collection of haiku poems in an ebook titled Slices of Silence, in 2019. The collection features Cortni’s haiku poetry and amateur photography and is available on Amazon for $0.99.
Timely. Thorough. Professional Editing Services.
Founded in 2018, in Orlando, Florida, SRD Editing Services provides fiction and nonfiction manuscript editing services to traditionally published and self-published authors in a range of genres, along with academic editing for graduate students and professionals writing in APA style.