Biographies & Autobiographies Editing and Proofreading

Memoir

A memoir is autobiographical in nature, but is not as comprehensive as an autobiography. In a memoir, you will likely be focusing on a particular incident or incidents from your life, with your thoughts about how the incident came about and how you have learned from it.

A memoir requires a delicate balance of truth, memory, and literary devices to form an evocative reading experience. Your WordsRU editor will help you to keep the story from drifting, making suggestions to help you describe the important moments and events in your life with clarity and passion.

Autobiography

An autobiography is a highly detailed account of your life. The juxtaposing of self with other people, experiences, times, and places is at the heart of autobiographical writing. Some of the most successful autobiographies have been written by people who were completely unknown when they decided to write their story.

Although an autobiography is a comprehensive and detailed work, your WordsRU editor will help you to find the strong threads in the story of your life, and will give you advice on how to make your personal story come alive.

Biography

A biography is a written account of a series of events in the life of a person. Putting together a biography is a bit like playing detective! Readers always want to know more about other people, particularly famous and historical figures, and biographies are a wonderful way to share the detailed knowledge of your research with the world in a way that is both informative and engaging.

From the writer's point of view, it sounds relatively simple: do the research, write about it, and presto—a biography! However, capturing the events and the true spirit and character of an individual's life and times can be a daunting challenge for even the most experienced of writers. There is a fine line between a biography of dry facts and one with too much speculation, and either extreme can mean a loss of professional integrity or prospective audience. WordsRU's talented editors can help you walk that line with finesse, and bring out the vital elements of your biographical figure's life while maintaining strict historical accuracy.

WordsRU's professional editors are well-versed in many genres and can help make the most of your manuscript. Above and beyond that, we will:

• Edit your memoir, autobiography, or biography for grammatical, spelling, punctuation, tense, and typographical errors
• Review word choice and sentence structure to ensure that your language flows logically, using appropriate tone and style, to achieve a presentation that is clear, concise, and consistent
• Take great care to preserve your voice and meaning
• Provide comments to bring your attention to any issues with the storyline
• Address any particular areas of concern that you may have.

Upon completion of the editing, your editor will return:

• A marked copy, showing all corrections and comments*
• A revised copy, with corrections accepted and comments removed*
• A document with additional comments, recommendations, and suggestions that supplement the comments in the manuscript, if such exposition is necessary.

*Because PDFs are only a depiction of text that cannot be altered, the editor will return only one copy, with marks that show where and what changes are required. If you have us edit a PDF, you will have to go back to the original file and insert the changes yourself.

We are aware that you will likely require assistance after you have reviewed the edited work, and WordsRU will not close the door on your manuscript until you indicate that you are ready for us to do so. Once the edit is returned to you, your editor will:

• Answer your questions
• Explain any comments and recommendations provided in the edited document
• Review specific, short passages of text that you have revised or rewritten per the comments.

Finally, every editing project is overseen from start to finish by the chief editor, who will monitor the progress of your project and provide assistance to you if necessary. While communication with your editor occurs through our secure messaging system, your chief editor is available to you if you need to speak to someone "live."