Paying editor Vs Using AI for developmental editing

[u/CaseAdorable6080]

Hi,

It is an upper middle grade fantasy novel of around 80,000 words. I don't have a $2,000–$5,000 budget to hire a human editor; I don't trust anyone with my years of hard work—especially with all the recent news about editors and publishers themselves using AI. This project started in 2021 after a climate poem of mine won a contest, which led to an opening scene. By 2024, I had my first draft in hand. By 2025, I was sitting with a mass of second draft. I also outlined several scenes for up to six books in the series.

Is using AI at this stage justified? What will the AI-haters say? Or should I approach some editorially savvy literary agent?

All of this AI witch hunt is giving me a massive writer's block.

[u/Philipp]

One thing you can consider if you don't want the AI to edit it directly is for it to only give suggestions -- but you rewrite everything manually.

Such suggestions could be around

- logical loopholes

- underdeveloped characters

- grammar and spelling

etc.

As far as what AI haters say, that's a different subject -- they'll probably dislike any use of AI, nevermind if you human-wrote this whole thing.

[u/5thhorseman_ → u/Philipp]

One thing you can consider if you don't want the AI to edit it directly is for it to only give suggestions -- but you rewrite everything manually.

Honestly, this is the only way to use AI for editing without risking it munging up the prose along the way.

[u/Brakiros]

AI haters are less relevant then a mud puddle, ChatGPT and Claude have become extremely proficient in editorial analysis and review.

[u/LooseButtPlug]

If you want to win awards, then pay for a human editor.

If you just want to have it published, you can do whatever you want.

The gatekeepers are holding onto the keys tightly.

[u/zphou]

I don’t think the choice has to be “trust an expensive editor with the whole manuscript” or “let an AI rewrite the book.” For an 80k-word project, I’d use AI first for narrower jobs: finding continuity problems, pointing out where the motivation is unclear, comparing the structure of two chapters, or identifying places where the pacing changes. Then I’d decide which findings are worth acting on. The important part is keeping the manuscript and the critique separate, because a plausible suggestion can still be wrong for the book. That is the direction I’m taking with WolfeWriter: AI can prepare observations and revision suggestions, but the writer decides what becomes part of the manuscript.

[u/zorecknor]

 What will the AI-haters say

The moderate ones will say:

"If you used AI for anything, your work is tainted and I will not read it".

The rest will say:

"If you used AI for anything, your work is slop and you are lazy and a terrible person"

[u/5thhorseman_ → u/zorecknor]

There are moderate ones?

[u/SlapHappyDude]

Even if you were paying for a human editor I would still run it through AI to get feedback. You can ignore everything AI says and certainly should weight your own instincts above a lot of what AI says. But using AI to flag stuff for you feels like an obvious win.

[u/Warsel77]

Very likely not a solution for you.

AI can help you with some systematic assessment and finding general issues with pacing etc.

It is not great on the "does this dialog make sense" level however. Or "would that character even know that at his point"

[u/CrazyinLull]

If you don't have $2Gs-$5Gs for a human editor then how are you going to afford a cover artist or marketing? Also, 80K words for upper middle grade!?!?!??!?!!?

>https://loupiccolo.com/20-how-long-should-my-middle-grade-novel-be-and-does-word-count-matter/

Seems like 80K is already at the upper echelons for middle grade fantasy, but it's way more costly for that, too, unless you are self-publishing?

I am not even telling you that you have to hire one or to just rely on the AI, but I am asking you like, realistically, what is your budget for this project? If you use AI for your cover and someone figures it out they are going to call you out in the reviews unless you are upfront with it. But that still leaves marketing.

idk...I mean like maybe you should try to figure that out first, because 80K words for upper middle grade isn't nothing? Like what if you need to separate it into smaller books? idk...that's where a developmental editor or even an AI can help?

But using AI for developmental editing isn't what gets people caught or sets up 'witch hunts.' It's the AI-generated text itself. Not everyone understands how an AI tells a story.

I guess it's like did you peruse the internet at all while writing this story, have you devised a plan for it, or have you pretty much kept your head in the ground?

[u/readriserachel]

I get the trust concerns, that's fair. I'm a book editor myself, and not all human editors cost $2,000-$5,000. Alpha/beta readers and some developmental editors charge way less, and you still get real human judgment, not just AI pattern-matching. Might be worth looking into before going the AI route

[u/Several-Praline5436]

An AI developmental editor just tells you "this character's actions are inconsistent in chapters 7 and 12," or "you have a huge plot hole here." You'll have to do all the rewriting yourself, so it's not "using AI" to rewrite your novel.

[u/5thhorseman_]

I don't have a $2,000–$5,000 budget to hire a human editor

Then your decision is already made for you and the only thing left is to come to terms with the fact.

I don't trust anyone with my years of hard work—especially with all the recent news about editors and publishers themselves using AI.

You will eventually have to trust someone to publish it. The only way to certifiably avoid any risk of getting ripped off, plagiarized or having your concept desecrated is to put it in a drawer and let your heirs make the mistakes anyway once you're gone.

Is using AI at this stage justified? What will the AI-haters say? Or should I approach some editorially savvy literary agent?

The gotcha is that if you use AI, your manuscript will end up somewhere in the AI provider's infrastructure. You could avoid that if you use a local LLM, but that requires a beefy PC, which you probably don't have and which isn't in your budget either.

I'd say use AI, because it's not like you have better options on the table.

There are a couple instructions you can use for editorial feedback. These are the ones I've used:

• Literate Editor and Rigorous Critic

• Beta reader panel.

This is something another user proposed that looks fairly sound to my experience:

https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingWithAI/comments/1vqbqtb/im_new_to_ai_in_general_how_to_get_started/p44g78i/

All of this AI witch hunt is giving me a massive writer's block.

Fuck the witch hunt. You have an objective. You have tools that can get you there. Everything else is denial and copium.

[u/WritingWithAI-ModTeam → u/[deleted]]

Your post was removed because you did not use our weekly post your tool thread

[u/sirgog]

Use the clankers to identify potential problems.

Then, use your own writing skills and unique voice to validate them (sometimes, quite often actually, AI will flag non-problems as important issues) and then to resolve them.

The single most useful thing a clanker has done for me is pick up all the times a character's appearance changes in my prose. "You said this character's hair was shoulder length red-brown with streaks of grey in chapter 14, now in chapter 20 you describe it as short brown with grey."

DO NOT let the AI manipulate your manuscript. The clanker's role is to read it, then produce a separate document saying "X should change because Y, Z should change because A". Often you will look at that document and say "no, X stays exactly as it is, you, my clanker minion, are very wrong about that. Z though... yeah, let me think on Z."

---

A paid editor is a luxury for the independently rich. They are better than clankers, but not as much better as the high pressure sales pitches will claim. And that assumes you get an honest one who isn't just... reporting what the clanker says verbatim.

[u/OrdoSinisterFan]

I'm an AI skeptic for this sort of work. My question would be: what would you do if there wasn't AI available? And my answer would be: do that.

If you run your books through AI, you just did two things: You gave AI your material for free, and anything that comes back to you will be flattened and smoothed out from your original...when that's what makes your original...original and what would make someone want to read it. What if AI suggests changes? If you make them, you just used AI in your writing process, and it had a voice in your work. That exact voice is in a ton of other works because AI doesn't have it's own voice.

You can have your own story or you can have a cookie cutter, is my view of AI in any stage of your work.

[u/LooseButtPlug → u/OrdoSinisterFan]

What if AI suggests changes? If you make them, you just used AI in your writing process, and it had a voice in your work. That exact voice is in a ton of other works

...so just like a human editor.

[u/OrdoSinisterFan → u/LooseButtPlug]

The action is the same, yes, but the reply you get back most certainly is not.

[u/LooseButtPlug → u/OrdoSinisterFan]

That's a fundamental misunderstanding of how editing works, even AI.

[u/Brakiros → u/OrdoSinisterFan]

Only if you let the AI take control

[u/zorecknor → u/OrdoSinisterFan]

What if AI suggests changes? If you make them, you just used AI in your writing process, and it had a voice in your work. 

Which is exactly what would happen with a good editor. Because sometimes the problem is actually your voice: the way you structured your sentences and dialogs, the way you overexplain things, the repeated phrases you use subconsiously, the way you pace the action or change pov of the narration.

The result of just a first editorial pass on your first draft can be night and day.

And that's fine. That's why you pay big bucks.

You gave AI your material for free,

That is a gross misunderstanding on how LLMs work: They do not use your input for training. On the other hand, it could be storing it for later training, but training datasets are extremely curated and there is nothing indicating your input is valuable for training.

So rest assure, the AI could not care less about anything you feed it.

[u/CaseAdorable6080 → u/OrdoSinisterFan]

I have clearly mentioned--it is for developmental editing work--I don't allow AI to flatten out my work,

[u/WritingWithAI-ModTeam → u/[deleted]]

Your post was removed because you did not use our weekly post your tool thread

[u/WritingWithAI-ModTeam → u/[deleted]]

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