Where do people find the time?

[StillStunned]

I'm a professional editor. Have been for 20+ years. On average, I can edit about 1000 words an hour. A full day's editing leaves me mentally exhausted.

So I see requests for "please edit my 50k word story" and people volunteering. Don't get me wrong, I admire your selflessness, but I wonder: where do you find the time and energy to put a full week's work for free?

 

[Todger65]

On average I would edit for 90 minutes during my evening when I have to be quiet. the writers I edit for are fully prepared to wait until I have worked my way through and that could be 4 to 5 weeks if it is a long story or a shorter one with frequent errors. I explain my situation first to new writers, and if they want a quick turnaround, they need to go elsewhere. I have been editing here and at a couple of other sites (less frequently) for several years now. I have a regular clientele so must be getting something right.

 

[AchtungNight]

I carefully vet each request to make sure I’m into the story, ask people to please use grammar and spelling correction software first, try to be more of a beta reader than a full on critic. I also clear my schedule to help others as motivation. And if I’m not into the story or can’t do it despite all my efforts I let people know.

 

[visioneer]

I edit on an occasional basis rather than regularly. My preference is to beta read, but I more often than not find myself editing for basic punctuation, grammar, and dialogue attributes to the point that I wonder if writing skills are even taught anymore. To keep things manageable, I impose an upper word count (3000 - 5000) and avoid series, novels, and certain categories. When returning a story, I include an explanation of the changes I made, and, if needed, point out areas for improvement.

 

[Demiurging]

I'll spend a half hour on each project I've got going each day, usually finish 10,000 words a week, but that's not accounting for the quality of the edits ;p

There have been some cases where a <5,000 word story will take a few weeks, but that's usually when working with an ESL author. So, I always have a look at the files before giving out a time estimate.

 

[Jay142]

I give the editors a lot of credit. I offered to help a person once and the writing was so poor, I told him it would take a complete rewrite. I didn't have time to write it for them.

 

[alohadave]

So I see requests for "please edit my 50k word story" and people volunteering. Don't get me wrong, I admire your selflessness, but I wonder: where do you find the time and energy to put a full week's work for free?

When I did volunteer editing, it was line/copy editing only, no structural, and that tended to be fairly repetitive and simple work. It would take me a week or two to do 50k words depending on the story.