I've had occasion to turn to Helen and Phil for editorial advice on several occasions. Their help has been invaluable; always practical, constructive and sensitively-delivered. They are both highly-skilled writers but because they have different styles, and write in different genres, they're able to see so many angles. Highly recommended.
- Mark Brandon, author of 'The Colossus of the Thames & Other Tales' and 'Inkerman', winner of Leicester Writers short story competition 2023
Want some professional, constructive feedback on your novel or story?
Helen Cooper and Phillip Irving offer structural and sentence-level feedback to help you improve your writing, maximise the potential of your story, and tackle everything from plot holes to pacing issues.
NB for those just looking to check prices, they're at the bottom of the page.
NB for those just looking to check prices, they're at the bottom of the page.
Who are we?
Helen Cooper is the author of three psychological suspense novels, THE DOWNSTAIRS NEIGHBOUR, THE OTHER GUEST, and THE COUPLE IN THE PHOTO. She is published by Hodder & Stoughton in the UK and Putnam & Sons in the US. Her debut novel was a Sunday Times Crime Club pick and one of Woman & Home's 'Best Thrillers of 2021.' Her fourth novel will be published in June 2024.
She has also had short fiction published in Woman, Mslexia, Writers' Forum, the Lincolnshire Echo, and on the Crime Readers' Association website. She was shortlisted for the Bath Short Story Award in 2014 and came third in the Leicester Writes Short Story Prize in 2018.
She is a qualified English teacher with an MA in Creative Writing, and has also co-authored two non-fiction books on Academic Writing for university students. She is currently Vice President of Leicester Writers' Club, where she gives and receives editorial feedback at weekly manuscript meetings.
Phillip Irving specialises in Science Fiction, Fantasy, Speculative Fiction, social commentary and satire. He has been published by Flame Tree Press and Space Cat Press and was featured in the Best of British Science Fiction anthology in both 2021 and 2022. He came third in the Leicester Writers' Club short story competition in 2023.
He is a member of the British Fantasy Society (BFS) and British Science Fiction Society (BSFS) and has been part of the judging panel for the BFS's prestigious novella and short story awards.
He is a qualified teacher with over 18 years' experience of teaching English and Creative Writing; a former President of Leicester Writers' Club (where he is still an active committee member); and a founding member of the Leicester Speculators, where he regularly reviews and discusses other people's writing. He has previously offered professional copy editing services in the financial sector.
She has also had short fiction published in Woman, Mslexia, Writers' Forum, the Lincolnshire Echo, and on the Crime Readers' Association website. She was shortlisted for the Bath Short Story Award in 2014 and came third in the Leicester Writes Short Story Prize in 2018.
She is a qualified English teacher with an MA in Creative Writing, and has also co-authored two non-fiction books on Academic Writing for university students. She is currently Vice President of Leicester Writers' Club, where she gives and receives editorial feedback at weekly manuscript meetings.
Phillip Irving specialises in Science Fiction, Fantasy, Speculative Fiction, social commentary and satire. He has been published by Flame Tree Press and Space Cat Press and was featured in the Best of British Science Fiction anthology in both 2021 and 2022. He came third in the Leicester Writers' Club short story competition in 2023.
He is a member of the British Fantasy Society (BFS) and British Science Fiction Society (BSFS) and has been part of the judging panel for the BFS's prestigious novella and short story awards.
He is a qualified teacher with over 18 years' experience of teaching English and Creative Writing; a former President of Leicester Writers' Club (where he is still an active committee member); and a founding member of the Leicester Speculators, where he regularly reviews and discusses other people's writing. He has previously offered professional copy editing services in the financial sector.
For the last few years, Phil and more recently he and Helen both have made my fiction immeasurably better with their insightful comments and critiques
- Jay Eales, author, anthology editor, and comic book publisher
What do we offer?
Having worked with a range of writers and manuscripts, we know that editing your book isn’t a ‘one size fits all’ process. To keep things as simple as we can, and to ensure our clients get value for money and an experience that meets their specific needs, we offer a three-stage review process.
Stage 1: the first 2000(ish) words
After we’ve reviewed the first 2000 words, or thereabouts, of your manuscript, we’ll let you know our initial impressions through in-document comments and an emailed critique. At this stage we’re really just outlining our impressions of the prose, characters and world, and our expectations of the story based on the opening scene or scenes.
This provides a potential early jumping-off point for either you or us, in case, for any reason, one of us doesn’t see the editing relationship working out. This could be because, having read our feedback, you don’t feel it’s what you are looking for, or that we don’t ‘get’ your story. Or it could be because, having read the early prose, we think we’re likely to end up making similar comments throughout the manuscript, so don’t feel it would be good value for money to do this when you could just put into practice the advice we’ve offered on the first 2000 or so words.
We will arrange an opportunity to talk through any of this early feedback, should you wish to, either to clarify it or to discuss how we've seen the work, and potentially to correct any misapprehensions the work may have led us to.
Stage 2: 10,000-20,000 words
Depending on the overall length of your manuscript, at about 10,000-20,000 words (when we feel we're at the end of the first 'act', or if we feel, having read a more substantial part of the work, that we're starting to repeat lots of stylistic points) we’ll provide the next review. At this point we’re offering in-document comments, chapter-level observations, and an emailed critique detailing our impressions of the story so far, our expectations for what you’ve set up, and our thoughts on the characters, world, pace and drive. We’ll arrange to talk through this when you’ve had time to read the feedback.
Again, this provides an opportunity to discuss whether reviewing the rest of the manuscript is in your best interests. It may be that you feel you’ve now got enough stylistic feedback that you can develop the manuscript without our going through the rest of it. Similarly, we might have reached a point where we feel that a lot of the comments we’re making are of a very similar nature, and you’d be better off rectifying the issues we’ve identified before we charge you for reading the rest! It may be that we've hit the end of the first act and can see some structural issues we'd like to check with you before we continue that may mean the rest of the manuscript is unlikely to remain as-is, in which case it would not be good value for money for us to continue charging you for us to read it.
As before, we’ll arrange to talk through this when you’ve had time to read our feedback.
Stage 3: Whole-manuscript critique
If, after this review, we’re all happy that reading the rest of the manuscript is going to offer you good value for money, we’ll proceed to the end. We’ll provide comments on specific line-level issues, chapter-by-chapter observations, and any plot-level observations we have. We’ll also provide an emailed critique of the manuscript overall, discussing plot, structure, prose, character development, narrative drive and pacing. We’ll suggest any fundamental changes we think might take the work in interesting directions, and any elements that didn’t quite work for us, with as much detail as we’re able to give about why. Again, we’ll arrange to talk through all of this when you’ve had time to read the feedback.
We believe that the end result of the editing process should be a clearer understanding of the strengths and potential weaknesses of a manuscript, and a concrete sense of what might be done to make it the best it can be.
We are very happy to talk about your needs and what you want to get out of this process, prior to making any commitments. Please contact us using the form below.
Stage 1: the first 2000(ish) words
After we’ve reviewed the first 2000 words, or thereabouts, of your manuscript, we’ll let you know our initial impressions through in-document comments and an emailed critique. At this stage we’re really just outlining our impressions of the prose, characters and world, and our expectations of the story based on the opening scene or scenes.
This provides a potential early jumping-off point for either you or us, in case, for any reason, one of us doesn’t see the editing relationship working out. This could be because, having read our feedback, you don’t feel it’s what you are looking for, or that we don’t ‘get’ your story. Or it could be because, having read the early prose, we think we’re likely to end up making similar comments throughout the manuscript, so don’t feel it would be good value for money to do this when you could just put into practice the advice we’ve offered on the first 2000 or so words.
We will arrange an opportunity to talk through any of this early feedback, should you wish to, either to clarify it or to discuss how we've seen the work, and potentially to correct any misapprehensions the work may have led us to.
Stage 2: 10,000-20,000 words
Depending on the overall length of your manuscript, at about 10,000-20,000 words (when we feel we're at the end of the first 'act', or if we feel, having read a more substantial part of the work, that we're starting to repeat lots of stylistic points) we’ll provide the next review. At this point we’re offering in-document comments, chapter-level observations, and an emailed critique detailing our impressions of the story so far, our expectations for what you’ve set up, and our thoughts on the characters, world, pace and drive. We’ll arrange to talk through this when you’ve had time to read the feedback.
Again, this provides an opportunity to discuss whether reviewing the rest of the manuscript is in your best interests. It may be that you feel you’ve now got enough stylistic feedback that you can develop the manuscript without our going through the rest of it. Similarly, we might have reached a point where we feel that a lot of the comments we’re making are of a very similar nature, and you’d be better off rectifying the issues we’ve identified before we charge you for reading the rest! It may be that we've hit the end of the first act and can see some structural issues we'd like to check with you before we continue that may mean the rest of the manuscript is unlikely to remain as-is, in which case it would not be good value for money for us to continue charging you for us to read it.
As before, we’ll arrange to talk through this when you’ve had time to read our feedback.
Stage 3: Whole-manuscript critique
If, after this review, we’re all happy that reading the rest of the manuscript is going to offer you good value for money, we’ll proceed to the end. We’ll provide comments on specific line-level issues, chapter-by-chapter observations, and any plot-level observations we have. We’ll also provide an emailed critique of the manuscript overall, discussing plot, structure, prose, character development, narrative drive and pacing. We’ll suggest any fundamental changes we think might take the work in interesting directions, and any elements that didn’t quite work for us, with as much detail as we’re able to give about why. Again, we’ll arrange to talk through all of this when you’ve had time to read the feedback.
We believe that the end result of the editing process should be a clearer understanding of the strengths and potential weaknesses of a manuscript, and a concrete sense of what might be done to make it the best it can be.
We are very happy to talk about your needs and what you want to get out of this process, prior to making any commitments. Please contact us using the form below.
How much does it cost?
As outlined above, we look at manuscripts in three stages - the first 2000 words or thereabouts (initial chapter or scene up to a sensible break point), the first 10,000-20,000 words, and the whole thing - with the option to continue or conclude after the first two review points. Broadly in line with CIEP recommendations, and acknowledging that we somewhat blend development and copy editing, we are currently offering an introductory rate of £15 per 1000 words (1.5p per word).
This includes:
Please contact us below if you have any questions. We'd love to hear from you!
This includes:
- Comments throughout the manuscript
- A summary of our overall thoughts on plot, structure, character, etc
- One follow-up conversation at each review point to discuss our feedback and decide on next steps
Please contact us below if you have any questions. We'd love to hear from you!
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