Academic copyediting services for authors
Improve readability and prepare your manuscript for publishers Get startedIdeas on Fire offers interdisciplinary scholars the academic copyediting services and support they need to prepare their books and journal articles for publication.
Our global team of interdisciplinary academic copyeditors can ensure readability and consistency across your entire text and refine your draft to impress publishers and readers alike.
Whether your manuscript needs citation formatting, adherence to a publisher or journal style guide, or an overall polish, we’re here to make your publishing journey easier.
Let us take care of the grammar, syntax, and formatting so your unique ideas can shine.
We specialize in social justice editing, and our copyediting service highlights the politics of language and citation that contribute to a better world.
“I’ve received excellent feedback that I can use to continue to improve my work. Ideas on Fire gets to see a lot of academic writing in the ‘before stages,’ which gives them a wealth of information regarding academics’ writing foibles. They leverage that to help academics not only strengthen their writing but also to approach the writing process with greater confidence and equanimity.”
“I felt like I was just spinning my wheels on an article when I sought Ideas on Fire’s help. Afterwards, I am very excited to get back to work on it. I have a brand new perspective on the piece and very clear suggestions for discrete steps I can take. I recommend IoF to all colleagues, particularly junior colleagues.”
“Ideas on Fire has been a vital partner in launching and sustaining Feminist Anthropology. The thoughtfulness and deep intent that go into the copyediting process are reflected in the content expertise of the team and the clear communication with our editorial team and authors. Transparency has been a steady component of this relationship: journal style is revisited and articulated as necessary, and timelines are always honored. Working with IoF gives us confidence in the quality of our journal.”
Academic copyediting services
Books and book chapters
Academic copyediting is detailed editing of your book’s writing and language, including sentence structure, grammar, punctuation, consistency, spelling, document formatting, and citation formatting.
Our book and chapter copyediting service includes one round of in-text edits using Track Changes in Microsoft Word and a style sheet to ensure internal consistency.
Copyediting takes place after you’ve finished the content and want help polishing the text for publication.
We can copyedit your book or chapter before you’ve secured a book contract—when you’re creating a full draft to submit for peer review.
We can also copyedit your book or chapter after you’ve secured a book contract—when you’re preparing the final manuscript for production and need to make sure it conforms to the publisher’s guidelines.
USD $0.09/word
Book proposals
Academic copyediting is detailed editing of your proposal’s writing and language, including sentence structure, grammar, punctuation, consistency, spelling, document formatting, and citation formatting.
Our book proposal copyediting service includes one round of in-text edits using Track Changes in Microsoft Word and a style sheet to ensure internal consistency.
We can copyedit just your proposal draft or your proposal draft + 1–2 chapters you plan to submit to presses.
USD $0.09/word
Journal articles
Academic copyediting is detailed editing of your article’s writing and language, including sentence structure, grammar, punctuation, consistency, spelling, document formatting, and citation formatting.
Our journal article copyediting service includes one round of in-text edits using Track Changes in Microsoft Word and a style sheet to ensure internal consistency.
We can copyedit your journal article before you’ve secured an acceptance—when you’re creating a full draft to submit for peer review or responding to a revise and resubmit decision.
We can also copyedit your journal article after you’ve secured an acceptance—when you’re preparing the final manuscript for production and need to make sure it conforms to the journal’s guidelines.
USD $0.09/word
Full journal issues
Academic copyediting is detailed editing of each article’s writing and language, including sentence structure, grammar, punctuation, consistency, spelling, document formatting, and citation formatting.
Our journal copyediting service includes for each article one round of in-text edits using Track Changes in Microsoft Word and a style sheet to ensure internal consistency and alignment with journal style.
We offer monthly and per-issue journal editing packages and are experienced working with a wide variety of journal management platforms and production systems.
USD $0.09/word
How academic copyediting works
Send
You send us your manuscript on the contracted start date, along with any style guides, publisher instructions, or specific elements you want us to focus on for your academic copyediting service.
Edit
Your copyeditors dive in: reading through the manuscript multiple times, making in-text edits, adding revision recommendations, and filling in the style sheet.
Review
The copyedited manuscript and style sheet are thoroughly reviewed by two members of our senior editorial team. If additional work is needed to ensure the edit meets our high IoF standards, our team dives back in until the text truly shines.
Return
We return the copyedited manuscript and style sheet to you. You then incorporate the edits and revisions you choose and go forward with your publication plans, confident you have a fantastic manuscript!
Recent academic copyediting projects
“Ideas on Fire has always provided timely copyediting for our journal’s manuscripts, saving us precious time for editorial work. I highly recommend their services!”
“Working with IoF helped to revise my work substantively. The IoF team’s deep developmental work in the first phase and then careful copyediting in the next helped immensely to sharpen and clarify my writing. I recommend them to any academic looking to bring clarity and shine to their written work.”
“Ideas on Fire has a superb team of editors who handle interdisciplinary scholarship with rigor and care. It was a pleasure working with them on a special issue on visual evidence for First Monday. The scope of the issue was ambitious. Ideas on Fire helped me bring this ambitious vision to fruition, copyediting articles from psychology to journalism studies.”
Frequently asked academic copyediting services questions
How do I know which type of editing I need?
Developmental editing, copyediting, and proofreading are the stages a manuscript progresses through as it moves toward publication. All manuscripts will need all three types of editing, whether you do them yourself or hire a professional.
Manuscript reviews and developmental editing address content. If you are still hammering out your ideas and want feedback on what makes sense, how your argument lands, how to organize your chapters/sections, or what needs to be cut or added, you are at the manuscript review or developmental editing services stage—the difference between these is determined by whether you already have a book contract.
Copyediting addresses writing. If your content is all set but you need help fixing the sentence structure, grammar, punctuation, and citation formatting, you are at the academic copyediting services stage.
Proofreading addresses lingering errors in the typeset page proofs issued by a publisher. It is a last-chance review of your proofs for typos, formatting inconsistencies, citations, and inaccuracies before the manuscript gets sent to the printer. If you are expecting typeset page proofs from your publisher, you are at the proofreading services stage.
For more info, check out our article When to Hire an Academic Editor or Indexer.
Can you format my citations in Chicago, APA, MLA, or another format?
Yes. Our academic copyediting service includes citation formatting for in-text parenthetical citations, endnotes/footnotes, and bibliographies.
Our copyeditors are well versed in the latest formatting styles used in the interdisciplines, humanities, and social sciences, including those set by the Chicago Manual of Style (CMOS), American Psychological Association (APA), Modern Language Association (MLA), Harvard, and others.
If your publisher or journal uses a unique citation style, we can also format the manuscript in accordance with that.
What kind of manuscripts do you copyedit?
We offer academic copyediting services for academic books, book proposals, and book chapters aimed at scholarly presses.
We also do a lot of scholarly journal editing: full journals, individual articles, and special issues.
We specialize in academic copyediting services for the interdisciplinary humanities and social sciences. See our full list of fields here.
We do not edit manuscripts in STEM fields, business, or marketing.
For more examples of our editing work, see our portfolio page.
Which copyeditor will work on my manuscript?
We match your manuscript with the Ideas on Fire editors whose editorial specializations, experience, availability, and expertise best align with your project.
You can read more about our copyeditors on our about us page.
Every manuscript (and every copyedit!) receives a thorough review by two members of our senior editorial team before it is returned.
What happens if I need to reschedule my copyediting service?
No problem.
If you need to reschedule your project, we are happy to do so. We ask you to get in touch with us as soon as possible to set a new start date.
How does payment work? Are you already a registered vendor with my university?
We are a registered vendor with hundreds of universities, publishers, and scholarly associations, so the process is streamlined for payment. If we are not already on your institution’s vendor list, we will register to enable direct payment.
We will send you an invoice with the edited manuscript; payment is due 30 days later.
We accept payment by credit/debit card and bank transfer only. We do not accept paper checks.
Will you ghostwrite my manuscript?
NO.
We have a strong ethical and political commitment to academic integrity. For scholarship to have credibility, it needs to be researched and written by the person whose name is on it.
Academic copyediting should never include ghostwriting or producing original content for an author.
Further, we will not edit any manuscript that contains plagiarized material.
Do you have any additional resources on scholarly publishing?
Tons! Check out our resource library on scholarly publishing.