You finished your first draft. Congratulations, you’ve reached the part most people never get to! Now comes the question that trips up almost every new author: what kind of editing does this thing need?
My simple advice is, ask an editor. Editors exist for a reason: a good one has the experience and knowledge your manuscript needs to shine. Also, it’s notoriously hard to judge our own work. More often, you need a second pair of eyes to see what turns out to be glaring holes in your work.
Even so, you should never give an editor a first draft. Instead, do a bit of both developmental and line editing first. And if you do these in the wrong order, you will polish sentences that later get cut, or pay an editor to fix commas in a chapter that shouldn’t exist.
The three layers of editing
Editors usually talk about three layers, from biggest to smallest:
- Developmental editing looks at the story as a whole. Does the plot hold together? Are the stakes clear? Does the main character change? Is the middle sagging? Does the ending pay off what the beginning promised?
- Line editing looks at the prose. Is each sentence clear? Is the rhythm right? Are you repeating words, leaning on adverbs, or using five dialogue tags where one would do?
- Copyediting and proofreading look at correctness. Grammar, spelling, punctuation, consistency of style.
The order is not a suggestion. It runs from big to small for a reason. Imagine you spend two weeks perfecting chapter 14. Every sentence sings. Then, a reader points out that chapter 14 repeats what chapter 9 already did, and the book is stronger without it. Two weeks gone.
That is why developmental problems come first. Structure decides which scenes survive. Line editing only makes sense on scenes that are definitely staying.
Signs your draft needs developmental work
The best way to judge your work is to have others look at it. Have your beta readers said they “lost interest around the middle” but cannot say why? Or, perhaps, they complain that a twist came out of nowhere? Likewise, are you unsure what your main character wants, or do their goals change without a reason? Are there any subplots that start strong and then quietly disappear?
Be honest with yourself. If any of these sound familiar, start with structure. Working on line editing will simply mean double work for you.
Signs your draft is ready for line editing
Conversely, you are ready to move down a layer when readers finish the book and can summarise it the way you would. Also, when the structure has survived at least one round of outside feedback, and your remaining notes are mostly about how things are said, not what happens.
Where software fits
Software (yes, that includes AI tools) has become genuinely useful at both layers, but most tools cover only one. For example, Grammarly is great for line editing but not for developmental editing. Such tools will read your prose sentence by sentence and may flag pacing at the sentence and paragraph level, overused dialogue tags, repeated words, and filler. And some will even benchmark your writing against typical books in your genre. In short, they are excellent at what they do.
What they do not do is step back and look at the story. They will tell you a chapter has too many adverbs. They will not tell you the chapter has no reason to exist.
Story-level analysis tools work the other way round. They read the whole manuscript and report on structure, arcs, continuity, setup and payoff, and scene purpose. They will not tighten your sentences, but they will catch the plot hole before a reviewer does.
If you already use a line-level tool and keep hitting its ceiling, this comparison of AutoCrit alternatives for the structural layer explains where each type of tool fits and when to use both.
A sensible revision order
Before you send your manuscript to a professional editor, here is a revision order that saves time and money:
- Let the draft rest for a couple of weeks. Distance is free, and it works. You wouldn’t believe what wonders a few days away from your manuscript can do.
- Run a structural read. Your own, a critique partner’s, a software analysis, or ideally a mix.
- Fix the big things first. Missing setups, broken timelines, scenes without a purpose.
- Get reader feedback on the revised structure.
- Line edit what survived.
- Copyedit and proofread last, ideally with a human.
If you are hiring a professional editor, the same logic applies. Doing your own structural pass first means they spend their time on judgment calls, not on problems you could have caught yourself. Professional developmental edits for a full-length novel commonly run into four figures, and good editors are often booked weeks or months ahead. That is money well spent on a structurally sound book. It is money wasted on a draft with a hole in act two that you could have found yourself.
Doing a thorough self-edit, with or without software, before you hire anyone is the single best way to get value from a paid edit.
Shape first, sentences next
So, to summarize. A manuscript needs both developmental and line editing. Start big to small, story before sentences. Every hour spent polishing prose in a scene you later cut is an hour you will never get back. Settle the book’s shape first, then make every sentence count.
That’s it! I hope you find the tips here useful, and wish you happy writing!
