I pulled the trigger.
I finished removing passive voice from my story and have inquired 7 editors for quotes.
I got 5 of them back.
Now I am sad. One of the problems with starting out on a venture is you have no idea what a good ballpark figure for expenses is.
I was told by some that they have good editors who will look at work for $200. The last time I got a quote from an editor (nearly 10 years ago), it was around $500. These professional editors, however, are looking more like $1,500 - $2,000 for my 100k novel.
This starts to become an issue in terms of pricing. I do not want to take a massive loss on my first book (well, more than I have already but I will explain later). I have a publisher lined up who will charge $7 per copy, pretty much wholesale.
Let's assume I sell this book at $15.
I have to include any money I spend on advertising and other costs. So let's say in the end I have about $5 profit.
I will need to sell 300-400 copies of my book to break even from the editing alone.
Ouch. For a first book from an unknown author, that is ouch.
On top of that, there's the cost I haven't included...
my own worth.
I have to take into consideration what my time is worth and how long it took to write the book. It's a $/hr thing.
Granted, my first book took a while, but my second took much, much less time. As I continue down this road, the time will likely decrease which will increase my $/hr.
I eagerly await the estimates of the final two editors, and I will continue my search. There may yet be a decent editor out there who will charge a lot less.
But at least one good thing came out of it. One of the editors, whose specialty is my genre, said the sample I gave her was entertaining. That's got to count for something.
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