Self published authors are often short on cash when they start out and hiring an editor is very expensive. I have a friend who hired an editor a couple of years ago and it cost her $300 per chapter. So if you can’t afford an editor then we suggest that you ask a friend or relative (who has good literacy skills) to proofread your book for you. They may also point out any story lines or concepts that are not clear to them.
We receive many documents to format that have not been edited sufficiently. Even a basic edit using the Word Tool for Spelling and Grammar will pick up mistakes that your eyes may have missed. When you use this tool, go through the suggestions one by one and be careful, as some suggestions will be wrong. There is a link to a youtube video below that will help you if you don’t know how to use this tool.
Authors can’t proofread their own books, we’ve seen it time and time again, even with our own work. Often friends or readers will contact us to tell about mistakes they have spotted in our own books. You just don’t see your own mistakes.
Extra spaces are easy to correct with the Word tool. You can also turn on the formatting tool on word to show you spacing. A big mistakes self published authors make is putting two spaces after a fullstop, there is only one.
Spend a little time going over your document, read it aloud and definitely give it to someone else to check.
We hope this video helps you.
Karen and Katrina
Speak Your Mind