Project Type: copyediting

Promise the Sky – Heavy and Light Copyedits – YA Sci-Fi

Another upcoming Ooligan Press book that I can’t wait for everyone to read is Promise the Sky by Katrina Spillman, which we’re publishing in partnership with Multnomah County Library Writers Project. It’s a YA sci-fi space opera, and it’s awesome. Promise the Sky will release in spring 2027.

I’ve been a little more hands-on with this book than some others because we’re also going to be recording the audiobook, which falls under my department. More on that to come.

For this book, I participated in both the first-round copyedit (heavy/medium) and the second-round copyedit (medium/light), so I’m sharing samples of both.

Here’s a sample from the first, heavy/medium copyedit, which involved a lot of standardizing ellipses and capitalizations of names and terms within the world of the book (style sheets are our friends):

PTS – Heavy:Medium CEDownload

Here is a sample from the second, medium/light copyedit:

PTS – Light:Medium CEDownload

We don’t have a cover yet for Promise the Sky, so I’ll come back and update when we do!

A Freelance Editor’s Guide to Ethics and Entrepreneurship – Light Copyedit – Nonfiction

This forthcoming book from Ooligan Press, a collection of essays on editing written originally by and for the Editorial Freelancers Association won’t be out until February 2027, and right now it just went through the light copyediting phase of book production.

Here’s a small sampling of my light copyedit for this book:

Pages from EFA_Light-Medium CE – BuckleyDownload

Once the cover is finalized, I’ll come back and add it in for some visual appeal.

The Neighborhood Dames – Light Copyedit – Literary Fiction

In my work at Ooligan Press, I get to work on so many books I’m so excited about, and this sample is from one of them.

The Neighborhood Dames by Portland author and publisher Laura Stanfill (Forest Avenue Press) is a historical literary fiction novel that takes place in the Prohibition era. There are so many layers to this book—illicit cider, Tin Pan Alley, a friendship shaped by the times, neurodivergence, and literal dismantling of the patriarchy—and it’s written so well. When we were reading it for a pitch last academic year, I couldn’t put it down.

The Neighborhood Dames comes out November 10, 2026.

The copyedit of this book was one of the smoothest I ever took part in. I mostly just played hyphenation police and suggested a few word changes. It was a joy to work on such polished prose.

Here’s a PDF of a sampling of my edits:

TND CE SamplesDownload

Here’s the cover, designed by my Ooligan Press colleague Kaitlyne Bozzone (@residentsapphic on IG), the manager of our Design department, who is always awesome to work with. Again, I did NOT design this, but wanted to include it for the visual element of the cover, as well as to plug Kaitlyne’s work!

Echoes of the Lost – Heavy and Light Copyedits – Mystery

Echoes of the Lost (publishing May 12, 2026) is one of the Ooligan Press books I’ve gotten to work on the most. In other parts of this portfolio, I did a Readers Report on Echoes, and then a Developmental Edit focused on character development for Echoes. It’s a testament to the story and the writing that I still can’t wait to read it in its final printed form when the book is released!

Then it was time for the copyedit, and I got my hands on both the heavy/medium round and then later the medium/light round, so I’m including samples of both.

Here’s a sampling of the heavier round of copyediting:

EOTL CE HeavyDownload

And here’s a sampling from the second, lighter round:

EOTL CE LightDownload

As you might notice, I like to point out when things are done well, and I make use of the comments even in a light CE, and I’m always tracking plot and continuity (see the comment on the last page in the light CE sample above).

Here’s the cover, designed by my Ooligan Press colleague who taught me everything I know about ebooks, Madelynn Sare. Again, I did NOT design this, but wanted to include it for the visual element of the cover, as well as to plug Madelynn’s work!

cover of Echoes of the Lost: A Mystery by Cindy Brown, with red lettering against a backdrop of a Portland bridge in the rain

Copyedit – YA Fantasy

This, like the developmental editing letter for the same manuscript, RIVERS RUN RED, was part of my Book Editing class. This portfolio piece is a short sample, starting about fifty pages into the text.

Rivers Run Red CE SampleDownload