I specialise in the copy-editing of academic texts, working both with publishers and book packagers and directly with academics. In addition, I offer a proofreading service to PhD and Master’s students, and on occasion to undergraduates. I also index academic and other books, working either from PDF files to compile the index or producing embedded indexes directly in Microsoft Word.
My delight in the intricacies of English grammar and spelling (UK and US) and my obsession with achieving consistency in whatever referencing system is being used are complemented by a life-time of wide reading (in English, French and Russian) which has often enabled me to pick up potential errors that authors may have missed. While I do not pretend to know as much about any subject as the specialist authors I work with, I generally know enough to know what to query, what to check, and what to leave alone.
My expertise as a proofreader and editor was also enhanced by experience gained both as a Royal Literary Fund Fellow at the Courtauld Institute of Art (2008–11) where I worked with students at all levels on a wide variety of art-historical topics, and as a local councillor in the City of London (2011–17) where I developed particular knowledge of urban design, open-space management and local government reporting.
I have combined my work as a freelance editor/proofreader/indexer of other writers’ texts with my own work as an author, my most recent published work being The Burning Time: Henry VIII, Bloody Mary, and the Protestant Martyrs of London (St Martin’s Press/Macmillan, 2017) and previous works having focused on Russian and French history, including biographies of Catherine the Great and Tsar Nicholas II. This has given me useful insight into the requirements and experiences of writers within the publishing industry.
I received a first-class degree in Russian Language and Literature from the School of Slavonic and East European Studies, University of London, and have undertaken courses in editing with the Chartered Institute of Editing and Proofreading (CIEP), which I joined as an Intermediate Member in 2014, being upgraded to Professional Member in 2020.
Virginia Rounding: Author, editor, proofreader, indexer 