Welcome to Quirky Duck Story!

Developmental Edits for the Discerning Scribbler

If you’re looking for high-level developmental edits for a science fiction or fantasy novel at an affordable price, you’ve come to the right place.

Scroll through the page for details, or use the links to jump to whatever you most want to know about!

• Who Am I?

• What I Offer

• How It Works

• How Much Do I Charge?

• Reach Out

• FAQ

• Terms

My name is Ariele Sieling. I’m an indie science fiction and fantasy writer with over 30 books published; I am also a professional editor with experience in editing everything from indie sci-fi and fantasy books to children’s books to project proposals. But editing books in the science fiction and fantasy genre is my true love.

More personally, I am an absurdist who loves philosophy; I play Elder Scrolls Online and Age of Empires; I have two cats and a Great Pyrenees dog; I am married and we live in southern Pennsylvania just over the Maryland line. I have lived in Rochester, NY; Chapel Hill, NC; several towns in NH; Baltimore, MD; and now PA.

And I love everything books, of course!

One of the great things about sci-fi and fantasy books is that you get to build your own logic for the story. You’re not bound by physics, for example, or math. And yes, this is true even in sci-fi, though there are a few more limitations than in fantasy. Instead, you get to make whatever you want happen—the trick is getting your reader to believe in it too.

The challenge, of course, is that stories are slippery little buggers. A perfect twist at the end might open up a wealth of plot holes at the beginning. Have you ever seen the Doctor Who episode where Amy and Rory get stuck in 1938 forever, ending their run as companions? Have you ever wondered why they couldn’t have taken a cab to New Jersey and met the Doctor there? Why he just flew off into the future and left them behind?

That, my friends, is a plot hole.

Now, sometimes, plot holes are okay—but only the writer can make that decision. However, the writer can’t make that decision unless they’re aware the hole is there. That’s where I come in.

Most developmental editors out there offer the whole shebang. They delve into story structure, plot, consistency, pacing, tension, character, even language to a certain extent. But not all writers need or want the whole shebang.

In short: I offer a partial shebang.

My general focus is on story structure, world-building, and plot. I typically look for gaps, opportunities for expansion, things that don’t make sense, and places you can clean up. However, I can also work with you, depending on what you want or need. If you have a specific type of read-through you want done, I’m your person. Want a read-through specifically for character arc? Done. Want a read-through for pacing? I’m in. Want a read-through for [insert your three biggest worries here]? Let’s talk.

I also have a flat rate service, in which you send me the epub file of your book, and I will do a post-read write-up outlining broad improvements, the things I thought were good, and general reader impressions. If you mostly just want encouragement, I can do that too.

I have the most experience with fairy tale retellings, urban fantasy, fae fantasy, and softer science fiction, like steampunk or post-apocalypse.

If you’re interested in my services, you can fill out the form at the bottom of this page or email me at ariele[at]arielesieling[dot]com. We’ll talk timelines, terms, and you can lay out exactly what you’re looking for. If you decide to move forward, I will do a one-chapter sample edit (as long as it’s under 5% of the total wordcount of the project). If you’re happy with that, then I’ll send you a price and a contract. If you sign, then I’ll follow up with a PayPal invoice for 30% due before I begin work on the project (which will be based on our agreed timeline).

I will read your book, leave comments throughout, and write you an essay on my thoughts, feelings, and opinions of your work.

I have two primary beliefs when it comes to editing:

1. You’re the boss.
   This means that any note or suggestion I make is a suggestion. I trust you as the writer to know your audience better than I ever could. If you don’t like a suggestion or a comment and you ignore it, I fully support that. I’m not god, my opinions aren’t “right,” and I think that the ultimate decisions should be yours and yours alone.

2. Strengths before weaknesses.
   As writers, we all have strengths and weaknesses. Sometimes it’s so easy to get caught up in what we’re doing “wrong,” we forget to notice what we’re doing right. I am more likely look for what you do well in your work and figure out areas where you can use that strength to improve the narrative, than to be looking for things you do wrong and telling you exactly how to fix them. If this philosophy sounds terrible, I’m probably not the right editor for you lol.

My number one goal is to help strengthen your manuscript, while helping you identify and address potential problem areas. And if I don’t think there are any problem areas, I’ll tell you that, too. I’m not going to invent problems that don’t exist, just because I can.

If you want, you are welcome to send me additional information as well, such as a description of your target audience, a list of ten questions you want me to answer, information on elements of your story you’re concerned about, or anything you think might be helpful in my quest to help improve your manuscript as much as I can.

Currently, my rates range between $0.003 to $0.015 per word. I will give you a quote after doing a sample edit.

If you just want the generic edit (plot, story structure, and worldbuilding), that will be on the lesser end; if want me to customize my edit to look for specific things, or to send me a messier manuscript (partial manuscripts, for example, or alpha reads), it will be on the higher end. The cleaner and tighter the manuscript, the less I’ll charge. I recommend using an editing software before sending to me for a cheaper price. I don’t mind some errors, but the more difficult it is to read, the longer it’ll take me, and thus, the more I’ll need to charge.

The minimum cost for shorter projects, like short stories, is $50. Note: I am happy to work with authors who use AI as part of their process. For more information, you can click here to read my general terms and conditions.

If you’d like more information or to book my services, please email me at ariele[at]arielesieling[dot]com or fill out the form below. I usually respond to emails (assuming they didn’t go to spam!) within two days.

What does your professional editing experience look like, Ariele?
I started editing in college (not that I was good at it back then, mind you, lol). I mostly edited college papers for my friends, including several papers for students who wrote English as a second language. After college, I edited my brother’s blog. It was an interesting exercise, as he wrote about programming and code. I didn’t understand half of what he said, but I could understand the parts of speech, and would point out anywhere I thought might be confusing, as well as fix commas, capitalization, etc. I graduated during the recession, so when I finally got a full time job, that included editing lesson plans, resources, and video scripts. And the job I had after that included editing web content and social media posts.

When I quit my job to freelance full time, I picked up quite a few editing clients, most of whom wrote fiction: romance, kid’s books, science fiction, and more. And during all of these stages, I took online workshops on editing, read books, and made an effort to improve my skills whenever I could. I have plenty of experience with proofing and copy editing, but developmental editing is my favorite.

Where did you go to school?

I graduated from Monroe Community College in Rochester, NY with an Associates in Liberal Arts, and from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill with a Bachelors’ in Communication Studies. Since then, I’ve worked hard to expand my education on writing, marketing, and publishing, including working on my fake master’s degree, which you can read more about here.

Are you a plotter or a pantser?

I’m 100% pantser! I’m about as pantser as you can get. If writing methods are a spectrum with plotting on one end and pantsing on the other, I’m as far away from plotting as it is physically possible to get. I’ve been leaning into it more and more the last few years, and my writing has improved immensely as a result. I do several passes editing, however; I’m not a “write into the dark” kind of pantser.

Do you ever teach writing stuff?

Yes! I love giving workshops! I’ve spoken at dozens of libraries, conferences, and writer associations, and love doing it via Zoom. If you’d like to have me at your group, let me know! Here is a list of my current workshops, and I also am happy to give new ones, if you have a special request. I also have a series of books for writers called Writer’s Reach.

Why ducks?

Great question. I grew up on a non-working farm, and we had a lot of birds: chickens, pet pigeons, peacocks, pheasants, turkeys, and ducks, to be precise. Now, I have lots of opinions and feelings about all the various bird species, but ducks became important to me when we lived in Baltimore. Our house was located near a large park with a duck pond in the middle, and living in Baltimore was very hard for me. It was loud and busy, and I’m very much a “sit in the grass alone and stare at the trees” kind of person. At any rate, I used to go down and hang out with the ducks, and I would imagine that the stresses of city life were rolling off my back like water off a duck’s feathers. I would think, “I’m a duck, I’m a duck, I’m a duck,” and it would make me feel better.

So yeah. Ducks are super weird birds, and they’re funny and odd. They’re cute and sometimes beautiful, mouthy and opinionated. And I like them.

Indie or trad?

Indie all the way! Aside from the more commonly cited reasons why authors choose indie, like control over the final product, more marketing options, more possible career paths, and rights ownership, I think of indie books like craft beer. With trad, you always know what you’re going to get. But with indie, there is a wealth of ideas and styles and options you’d never find with traditional publishing, and I absolutely love the ability to explore the wide variety of flavors out there. I want to help writers craft the stories they want to tell, rather than forcing them into a format more suitable for the corporate machine.

Hero’s Journey or Heroine’s?

Honestly? Both! I know readers who have a strong preference toward one plot structure or the other, but I enjoy both! I’ve read most of Christopher Vogler’s book as well as Gail Carriger’s book; I’ve read Romancing the Beat, John Truby, Donald Maas, Take Off Your Pants, Save the Cat, and what feels like countless other books on plot structure, outlining, and writing, and I think all the various takes on plot structure have merit. I tend to think that ultimately, it comes down to the implementation of the story more than the foundational structure.

If you have any more questions about me, please don’t hesitate to reach out!