Savannah Lee
1/5
I was really frustrated with my experience with Indie Editorial. I don't want to be that person, but when entrusting an outside party with a book that I worked so hard to create and is supposed to have my back, I really felt let down by my experience here. I initially loved how prompt and communicative everything was. The contract was thorough, the payment plan was flexible, and their prices were excellent. This is about all the positives I have to say.
It all started going downhill when we approached the first deadline. I hadn't received my manuscript back on time, so I sent an email to check in as the contract turnaround time is incredibly tight, which was four days on my side. Two days go by before I hear back, and when I do its cited that there was a technical issue and that my edits had been finished for a week already but google docs had deleted everything so they had to manually get put back in. I get it, but the lack of communication was frustrating for me. It also made me question why the edits weren't sent back when they were finished initially, and why I had to be the one to email first. When I did get them back, late, only a few of the comments were from an earlier date, the rest of them had been inputted that day. I will say, I never felt pressured to return my own edits due to the manuscript being late, and I did appreciate that because I needed extra time.
The copy I did finally receive only corrected copy edit issues, even though it should have been a copy and line edit package. According to their website, line edits should include a line-by-line look at the flow and tone of the manuscript, and yet what I received only corrected my punctuation, spelling, etc. There were many instances of repeated words, clunky sentences, etc. that I feel a good editor would have caught.
I questioned this, and the reply I received was that there were a few words she would be reviewing before she sends to the proofreader. These words were 'could', 'knew/know', 'look', and 'the room', and she made sure to include how many times I used them (which felt petty to me, but I'm not going to assume someone's tone through email.) When I received the final edited and proofread copy, this was all that had been fixed. It felt like she just ran a report in Grammarly and then quoted it back to me.
Now my biggest issue. I am not sure at which stage of the editing process this happened, because even though I sent word files I kept receiving google docs back which is a really buggy tool to use, but there is an entire section of chapter 1 missing in which an important character introduction takes place. I unfortunately did not catch this myself, so there is a giant chuck of the first chapter missing in all the ARCs I sent out (around 400). Upon very closely reading through this final draft that was sent back to me, it was obvious to me that it was STILL missing and should have been obvious to my editor who said she had 'proofread' the manuscript...
And the errors still. I received ARC reader notes about wrong words being used, letters missing, punctuation issues, names misspelled, etc. It goes on and on and on. I checked these against the 'final' edit and proofread version that was sent to me, and they are all still in there. I've gotten almost 100 of these sent to me, and it doesn't count the ones I'm finding myself as I now re-edit the book. I'd be incredibly embarrassed to let this version publish. I expect this to be well into the hundreds territory by the time I'm done. Errors are normal, I understand that, but this feels excessive.
Lastly, not once did I feel like IE championed my manuscript. There was not a single time where there was a comment or reaction about the book. I know that's not required of an edit, but imagine putting your heart and soul into something and your editor doesn't tell you a single thing that they liked about your book, on top of everything else. Just silence and a list of what you did wrong. It felt like she didn't care.
I will not be returning for the sequel.
