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Our Professional Memoir Editing Will Polish Your Manuscript.

Do I really need to have professional editing for my memoir?” you ask.

“Yes,” we answer you, ” if you would you like not only to have your memoir published and in hand but to have a book that you are proud to send out to family and friends or even to the world!”

Memoir editing will make a difference to your memoir and how others receive it. We can help you to write the book you really want to have—and deserve.

Our book editors have helped hundreds thousands of writers to tighten and polish their stories, and we can give your story the boost that will get your memoir from a hopeful, best-try idea to a polished book you will be proud to call your own.

Our memoir editors will make a difference for you if…

..you want to understand what is holding your memoir back from going deeper, from being more insightful and correct that.

You’ve been writing as best you can—for perhaps far too long—and you just don’t know what to do to create a memoir manuscript with more punch. You’ve done all you can, and now it’s time to let someone who is skilled at memoir editing best practices help you. Or…



you are a novice writer and you suspect (perhaps even know) that there are better writing practices than what you are now engaged in—only you don’t know what they are or how to access them. “I need help to edit my memoir!” you moan.

 

A memoir editor will accelerate your learning the best memoir writing practices and help you finish a more interesting and meaningful manuscript in a shorter time. While we firmly believe that writing a quality memoir needs to be a process before it can be a goal, even process-oriented writing need not take forever. Or…

you are ready to assess your manuscript’s quality before investing in printing.

You think your memoir manuscript is ready to be published as the book you have been dreaming of, but is it really? Will it make you “proud?” A professional memoir editor can provide insights that will point you to tighten your prose, deepen your insights and improve the story arc. Or…

you are caught in cycles of tweakings and little changes that don’t address what your manuscript needs. Sometimes, your manuscript calls for re-visioning and re-thinking rather than a change of this word for that one—”house” for “home” and back to “house” again.

Denis Ledoux brought my writing “to life” through his editing skills, patience and insight. I had never authored a book before, and I so appreciated the help. Thank you, Memoir Network and your dedicated staff, for being there to support my books all the way to publication.”

—Dennis Blue, Running the Good Race & Through the Eyes of a Fisherman

 


Do what the big New York publishing houses do: NEVER publish a book manuscript without engaging professional memoir editing.

When you read the memoir (or biography) of a famous writer, you can learn much about what you, too, need to do.

  • Ernest Hemingway worked extensively with Max Scribner who would return voluminous notes on what he felt Hemingway’s manuscript needed. Hemingway listened to his editor.
  • Jack Kerouac had Robert Giroux as editor. Giroux [of Farrar, Straus and Giroux] extensively edited Kerouac’s manuscripts. On occasion, he made textual changes himself and submitted them to Kerouac for approval. Kerouac benefited from following his editor’s lead—and so would you with the lead of your editor.
  • Virginia Woolf always turned her manuscript over to her writer husband, Leonard [whose career as a literary editor was well established]. He provided her with guidance before she sent her books out into the world.

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To order Approaching Neverland, CLICK HERE or on the banner above.

Why even writers of the highest caliber need book-editing services.

As the Hemingways, the Kerouacs, and the Woolfs of the world knew, over the months and years it takes to complete a manuscript, writers—like you perhaps—become prey to:

  • becoming attached to their prose. Often, we are enamored of particular scenes and go from tolerating their extraneous quality to feeling comfortable with the fact that they do not contribute to your memoir. We tell ourselves they are so well written and such good memories! In our self-editing, we become indulgent and leave the “little darlings” in. Many writing workshops justly talk about “killing your little darlings”—that is, editing them out. When you work with The Memoir Network, rest assured your manuscript editor will kindly help you put your “little darlings” to their deserved rest!  🙂
  • being blind to their faults. After all, most of us do not see our faults, and if we do, they do not seem so serious. Writing faults your editor might find include misuse of tense or a lack of transitions or beginning the memoir at a wrong point in the story arc. Your editor will point these problems out and will suggest ways to improve your writing. (Working with a personal-history editor is like going to a chiropractor and getting a therapeutic manipulation.)
  • growing ever more comfortable with words, phrases and concepts that are really not best choices. This is the easy part of editing for a professional, but it can also be, if you do not correct them, a reason your readers will put your story down and not recommend it to their friends—or worse, complain to them on social media.
  • confusing wanting to write about something with writing about it. Familiarity encourages blocks in your story to which you are no longer sensitive. You are telling the whole story in your mind—but the whole of your story is not down on paper. Your memoir editor will pick up on this and guide you to write everything in. After all, the written text is the only glimpse your reader has into your story. If it’s not written into the book, it’s not in the book!

Is your sister-in-law who teaches English at the high school and is “real good with words” a good choice to edit your memoir manuscript in her spare time?

Memoir Network editors commit totally to your manuscript. There is no spare-time attention with us! We ask you for your publishing timeline (if one is relevant) and we do everything in our power to help you meet it. In addition, we have all written and/or edited many books. Writing and editing are commitments we’re good at and enjoy. So… you can expect us to edit fast and with insight. Can the same be said for a relative who will “get to your memoir when I have the time?”

Just as a New York publisher will always make use of professional editors to help bring a manuscript to its full potential, you, too, need to structure—and to schedule—the editing function into your memoir-writing project.

I want to express my deep appreciation for your thorough and comprehensive editorial comments and for your insight on needed corrections for my manuscript.

—Shelbert Smith, Editing Client for a family memoir


Get a specialist on your memoir-writing team.

Our editing service provides essential help to bring professional skills and sensitivity both to the writing and to the rewriting process. An editor who specializes in memoir writing will make your manuscript stop mumbling and start singing!

Meet our experienced memoir editors: Click here.

I had never received memoir editing the way you folks at The Memoir Network do it. When my editor, Chris, pointed out how my character’s dialog in the middle of the book contradicted what I had her say at the beginning, I knew I had a serious developmental reader who was going to help me shape my story. You folks take editing as seriously as I take telling my story. It’s been a good fit.

—Sandra Swain


Whether you are a first-time, a one-time, or a many-time writer, memoir editing can help you to upgrade your book to be the best it can be.

Our promise to you!

When you procure our help to edit your memoir, our editors will be the catalyst that will prepare your manuscript for publication—in the way it deserves to be finished and in record time.

You will have your book of memoirs in hand—a book that is interesting and well written—sooner than you think.

Do not delay in getting the help you need.

Questions about memoir editing?

Our work is done at $95/hour. If this is within your budget, give us a ring at 207-353-5454, M-F, 9-5 ET or email us to set up an appointment to answer your questions and discuss your project. Suggest three dates and times that work for you and we will confirm one.

Take the next step & call us today!

Memoir editing beyond your budget?

Try our great self-paced program: The Memorable Story: Write Your First Memoir Draft. Or go to our bookstore to choose among our many memoir-writing products.

In addition, check out our overview of services and programs page. You are sure to find something—often for free—that will help you to get your memoir unstuck and get it written—by next year at this time.

Lastly, our Memoir Writer’s Blog offers you over 500 posts. It’s a free on-line university training—yours for free.

Then when you are ready, sign up for work with one of our editors. That’s where you’ll find the best top of the line help to get your memoir ready for publication. So. . .

Are you ready to bring your manuscript to its next level?

We offer an introductory package—try us for a three-hour commitment at $285. That’s it: three hours!

If we’re a fit, you come on board and we collaborate to polish and deepen your manuscript.

If we’re not a fit, we wish each other good luck and go our separate ways.

The Memoir Network
Memoir Editing
3-hour Trial

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Next Step

After all your hard work with an editor, the next step is Book Production. Click here to read How to Submit Your Manuscript for Book Production.

 

 

 

 

Editing not right for you? Perhaps you’d prefer to work with one of our ghostwriters to tell your story? CLICK HERE to learn more about ghostwriting.