Is your manuscript ready for editing, formatting, or publishing?
Upload, reveal, decide — in that order
Authors waste money when they pick the wrong service. Pay for formatting on a draft that still needs editing, or hire a copy editor when the structure isn’t right yet — both common, both avoidable. Upload your manuscript and get an objective verdict in under a minute, free with email, with a detailed AI-augmented report available for £4.99.
Deterministic checks run instantly on every upload — typo density, sentence variance, structure, name consistency, unfinished markers, paragraph flow, dialect mixing. The £4.99 tier layers an AI-powered developmental read on top: a senior-editor second opinion with verbatim examples from your manuscript and a downloadable PDF. Your file is stored privately for 30 days and is never used for model training.
- Freeverdict + category signals
- £4.99AI-augmented detailed report
- 30 daysreport lookup window
- DOCXmanuscripts up to 50MB
How it works
The flow should be simple enough to use quickly and structured enough to produce a useful publishing decision.
Upload your manuscript
A .docx export works best — the analyzer uses heading styles to detect chapter structure. Direct-to-storage upload handles even very large illustrated manuscripts.
We run the readiness checks
Seven deterministic signals score the manuscript on the things that decide which step is next: typo density, sentence variance, structural cues, name consistency, unfinished markers, paragraph flow, dialect mixing — all server-side, under a minute.
See your verdict instantly — no email needed
Get the overall score, verdict band, and category headlines straight away. Want a copy in your inbox? Optional — just click ‘Email me a copy’ on the preview screen.
Unlock the detailed report — £4.99
An AI-augmented developmental read decides which editing tier (developmental, line, or copy) is next — or confirms you're ready for formatting. Chapter-by-chapter notes with verbatim quotes from your manuscript, a recommended publishing plan with specific HMD services and prices, and a downloadable PDF. Valid for 30 days.
Verdict bands
How do I know if my book is ready to publish? Here’s the framework
The tool answers the question authors get wrong most often: which step is next? Editing? Formatting? Publishing? Each verdict band below maps to a specific decision — what your manuscript still needs and which service fits.
Your verdict tells you which editing tier (if any) your manuscript needs before formatting. Picking the wrong tier costs money — copy editing won't fix structural problems, and developmental editing on a polished manuscript is overkill. The bands below are how the tool decides.
Mechanically clean and structurally sound. The remaining steps to publishing are interior typesetting and retailer-ready file generation — not more editing. The readiness verdict means your draft has cleared the editorial sequence; formatting is what turns it into a book retailers can actually sell.
When to choose: if you've already worked with an editor and copy editor, or you're a confident self-editor revisiting a polished draft.
Book formatting →
Structure and pacing look healthy, but mechanical issues remain — typos, consistency, grammar, dialect mixing. These would show in print.
When to choose: if your manuscript reads well to you but you haven't had a fresh pair of eyes on the surface-level errors.
Start with copy editing →
The story or argument is there, but the prose needs tightening — sentence rhythm, paragraph flow, word choice. Line editing is the biggest reader-facing improvement at this tier.
When to choose: if readers tell you the writing 'feels off' or paragraphs feel longer than they should.
Start with line editing →
Structural signals suggest the manuscript isn't draft-complete or has pacing/structure problems. A developmental edit addresses the biggest issues before any detail-level edit — skipping this stage means polishing text that may get cut or rewritten.
When to choose: if you're not sure the book 'works' yet, or you've never had any editorial feedback. Every published book has been through this stage.
Book a free consultation →
One override: if the manuscript still contains unfinished markers (TODO / FIXME / bracketed placeholders) or has no detectable chapter structure, the verdict is forced to Needs developmental editingregardless of score band — those are bigger issues than line-level polish, and detail-level work would be wasted until they’re resolved. The detailed report explains when and why this fires.
How do I know if my book is ready to publish?
The honest answer: there is no single feeling that means a manuscript is finished. There’s an editorial sequence — developmental, line, copy, proofread, format — and the question is which step is actually next for your draft. The readiness check looks at measurable signals (typo density, sentence variance, structural cues, unfinished markers, dialect mixing) and maps them to that sequence so you stop guessing.
Signs your manuscript needs editing
Three patterns come up again and again. Inconsistency: a character’s name spelled three ways, British and American spellings interleaved, hyphenation that drifts. Unfinished markers: bracketed placeholders, TODO/FIXME notes, or stretches of bullet points where a paragraph should be. And structural drift: chapters that vary wildly in length, scenes that hand off oddly, sections without headings. The tool flags all three. If any one of them is dense, the verdict will recommend editing before formatting — because a typesetter can’t fix what an editor needs to.
Do I need a developmental editor, line editor, or copy editor?
A developmental editor works on structure, pacing, character arcs, argument coherence — the big shape of the book. A line editor works at the paragraph and sentence level: rhythm, voice, word choice. A copy editor catches mechanical errors: typos, grammar, consistency, dialect. The verdict band guides you to the right tier so you don’t pay for line-level polish on a draft that still needs structural work — that’s the most common, and most expensive, mistake authors make. If your verdict is developmental edit first, every published book has been through that stage; it isn’t a failure signal, it’s a sequencing one.
Can I self-edit my book first?
Yes — and most authors should, before paying anyone. A serious self-edit pass typically catches 60–80% of the surface errors a copy editor would charge for. The readiness checker is designed to run before and after self-editing: before, to find out if you have structural work left; after, to confirm you’ve brought the manuscript to the level where professional editing (or formatting) is the right next investment.
What should I do before sending my manuscript to an editor?
Three quick wins. First, run a readiness check — if the verdict is higher than the editor tier you were going to book, you can save money or get more value at a lower tier. Second, finish a full self-edit pass: read aloud, hunt placeholders, normalise spellings, fix obvious typos. Third, format your file the way an editor expects — single Word document, heading styles for chapter breaks, consistent indentation. That last bit is what makes structural detection work in the readiness check too, so doing it before you upload gives you a sharper verdict.
When does “ready for formatting” actually mean ready to publish?
When the verdict says ready for formatting, the manuscript has cleared the editorial sequence on the signals the tool can measure. The next investment is interior typesetting and retailer-ready file generation — that’s where book formatting comes in. A pristine manuscript still needs a typeset interior and a generated EPUB/PDF before it’s actually a book a retailer can sell. If you want to validate the EPUB once it exists, our EPUB validator is the next QA step in that chain.
FAQ
Common questions: editing, formatting, and getting your manuscript ready
Next step
Once you know what your manuscript actually needs, you book the right service — not the wrong one.
If you’re ready, book formatting. If you need a developmental, line, or copy edit first, start there. Either way, the back-and-forth disappears.