Creative writing editing checklist

An editing checklist is a one or two-page document that lists all of the issues to check for, while reviewing a piece. For example, instances of the passive voice, common spelling mistakes and so on. It also provides an overview of tone of voice and house style.

I designed this editing checklist to help you break down the steps of polishing your manuscript mess, or if you wish, to send to beta readers to give them some ideas of what to look out for.

It’s particularly helpful if you keep a running list of words / phrases that you frequently misuse, misspell or repeat, so that you can refer back to them each time you start the final edits of a manuscript. Editing can be a long process… often it takes longer than writing!

Narrative writing Paragraph checklist t-e q Provided a topic sentence that introduces the story. q Used descriptive details. q Used transition words. q Organized to flow smoothly. q Provided a closing sentence to end the story. q Used complete sentences. q Checked for proper capitalization, verb usage, punctuation, and spelling. Narrative writing