Tradewinds Brief Services
Services for independent authors
Three services with defined scope, fixed or quoted prices, and a person checking every deliverable before it reaches you.
On this page: Start small · Manuscript Integrity Audit · Book Listing Package · Editorial and Series Services · Samples · Terms
Start small
Three affordable services, each useful on its own. Each is fixed-price: order directly with its button, or ask a question first.
Opening-chapter review
Price: $25. Up to 3,000 words: your first chapter, or your prologue and first chapter.
What you receive: written notes on what is working, how well the opening hooks a reader, anything unclear or slowing the pace, and any obvious errors, each with its paragraph number. Ends with your three priorities for improving the opening. One follow-up question by email is included. This is a review, not an edit: we do not rewrite your text.
Turnaround: 3 business days. See a sample.
Up to 3,000 words: your first chapter, or your prologue and first chapter. Written notes and three priorities; not an edit.
Book-description rewrite
Price: $29.
What you receive: one retailer book description of about 2,000 characters, built from your current description or synopsis, your genre and your audience, supplied as plain text and as formatted text for KDP. One revision round. (The full Book Listing Package adds keywords, categories and back-matter copy.)
Turnaround: 3 business days. See a sample.
One description of about 2,000 characters, plain and KDP-formatted, with one revision round.
Short-manuscript audit
Price: $49. Up to 40,000 words: novellas, short novels, children’s and middle-grade books, nonfiction guides.
What you receive: exactly the Manuscript Integrity Audit below, with the same checks, report, appendix and follow-up, for a shorter book. Turnaround: 4 business days. See a sample report.
Manuscripts up to 40,000 words. You receive findings and their locations; corrections are a separate upgrade.
Manuscript Integrity Audit
Price: $99 introductory, for the first ten paid audits. For manuscripts of 40,001–100,000 words; shorter books take the $49 short audit.
Manuscripts of 40,001–100,000 words (shorter books: the $49 audit). You receive findings and their locations; corrections are a separate upgrade.
What it is. A documented mechanical examination of your finished manuscript file. It finds the problems that slip past proofreading because they are about the file, not the sentences: text pasted twice, a chapter number skipped, a placeholder never filled in, a character’s name spelled two ways, a chapter that stops mid-sentence.
What we check. Each item below is run on every audit:
| Check | Reported as |
|---|---|
| Chapter numbering: skipped, repeated or out-of-order chapter numbers. Headings are read as digits (Chapter 12), Roman numerals (Chapter XII) or English number words up to ninety-nine (Chapter Twenty-One). A heading in any other style is listed and left out of the numbering check. | Verified observation |
| Repeated paragraphs and long repeated sentences. Text is compared after ignoring capitalization, quotation-mark style and spacing; the report says “identical” only when the text matches exactly. | Verified observation (a repetition can be intentional; the reviewer marks which) |
| Placeholder strings from the standard list (for example TK, TODO, XXX, [INSERT …], ???) plus any you add | Verified observation |
| Quote style against your chosen rule (curly or straight) | Verified observation with counts and locations |
| Formatting deviations against agreed rules: double spaces, space before punctuation, double hyphens where you use em dashes, three-dot ellipses where you use the single character, adjacent repeated words | Verified observation |
| Near-duplicate paragraphs (similar but not identical) | Finding requiring review |
| Possible name inconsistencies (spellings that differ by a letter or two from a name used often) | Finding requiring review |
| Bracketed notes and other text that looks like a drafting note | Finding requiring review |
| Unusually short chapters that may be truncated | Finding requiring review |
| Unbalanced quotation marks in a paragraph, curly or straight | Finding requiring review (multi-paragraph speech is often correct) |
| Version comparison, when you send two versions: chapters added or removed, changed paragraphs, and unchanged paragraphs left inside a heavily rewritten chapter | Verified observation, plus findings requiring review |
What is examined. The main text of the file, including text inside tables. Text in text boxes, footnotes, endnotes, comments and page headers or footers is not examined; if your file contains any, the report says so.
What you receive. A Manuscript Integrity Report as a Word document, with an appendix:
- the SHA-256 fingerprint of the exact file examined, with word, chapter and paragraph counts;
- every finding with its chapter, paragraph within the chapter, paragraph number in the file and a short excerpt, so you can find it in seconds;
- the appendix lists every location of every finding, however many there are;
- for each finding, the reviewer’s mark: Likely error, Likely intentional or Your call, plus a priority (High, Medium, Low);
- a plain statement of any content not examined and of the checks not performed.
What the fingerprint means. It identifies the exact file we examined, so the report can always be matched to it. It does not certify that the manuscript is correct, establish authorship, or prove how the work was created.
Not part of the audit. The audit is a mechanical examination of the file. These are outside it; most are available as upgrades:
- story continuity (timeline, physical descriptions, who knows what), upgrade available;
- spelling and grammar, upgrade available;
- style, pacing, structure or market fit, upgrade available;
- fact-checking, upgrade available;
- print or ebook layout, upgrade available;
- plagiarism or AI detection, not offered.
What you provide.
- One finished manuscript as a .docx file (a .txt file is also accepted).
- How your chapters are headed (for example “Chapter 1” or “Chapter One”).
- Your quote style (curly or straight) and dash style.
- Any repetitions you know are intentional, such as a refrain or an epigraph.
- Optional: an earlier version, for the version comparison.
Over 100,000 words. Quoted before payment.
Turnaround. 5 business days.
Follow-up included.
- Answers to your questions about the report by email for 14 days.
- One re-check of your corrected file within 30 days, delivered as a short note listing which findings are resolved. The re-check covers only the original findings, not new material.
Not included in the audit price. Correcting the manuscript, and any editorial read or developmental, line or copy editing. All of these are available as upgrades.
Upgrades: choose what you need
Your $99 audit finds and explains the problems. If you want us to go further, pick any of these, on their own or together:
- Apply the corrections from your report, returned with tracked changes so you approve every one
- Proofreading for spelling, grammar and punctuation
- Copy or line editing for clarity, consistency and flow
- Story continuity across the book or the series
- Editorial assessment of pacing, structure and market fit
- Fact-checking of names, dates, places and references
- Ebook and print formatting ready for upload
Tell us what you want on the form. We look at your manuscript and send one total price before you pay anything.
Tell us about the book. We reply with scope, price and delivery date; nothing is charged until you accept.
Book Listing Package
Price: $99.
Description, seven keywords, three category placements and back-matter copy, with one revision round.
What it is. The retailer-page copy that turns a browser into a reader, written for Amazon KDP and usable on other retailers.
What you receive.
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| Book description | About 2,000 characters (KDP allows 4,000). Hook first, stakes and tone clear. Heat or content level stated in plain words where it fits the book, never as a numeric rating. Supplied as plain text and as KDP-ready formatted text. |
| Keywords | Seven keyword phrases, one per KDP keyword box, checked against the live KDP form’s limits at delivery. |
| Categories | Recommended category placements written as the exact KDP picker path (Category › Subcategory › Placement). KDP currently allows three placements per title; checked at delivery. |
| Back-matter copy | An “Also by” or series list, a next-book teaser and a newsletter or call-to-action line. Planned titles are clearly marked as coming soon, never presented as published. |
Revision. One consolidated revision round. Send all your changes together within 14 days of delivery.
What you provide.
- The finished manuscript, or a synopsis plus the first three chapters.
- Genre and audience.
- Heat or content level.
- Series information: published and planned titles.
- Optional: two or three comparable titles.
Turnaround. 5 business days.
Not included.
- Uploading or editing your retailer listing; we never log into your account.
- Advertising.
- Cover design.
- Author biography, unless requested at quote.
- Any promise of rank or sales.
Editorial and Series Services
How it works.
- You send the intake form.
- You receive a written quote within 2 business days, with scope, price and delivery date.
- You accept and pay.
- We deliver on the quoted date.
| Service | From | Scope boundary |
|---|---|---|
| Series-bible creation | $199 | Built from your manuscript(s): cast list with stated traits, places, timeline, objects, rules of the world, open threads. The starting price covers up to 60,000 source words; above that, the quote reflects word count, number of books, complexity and detail required. |
| Focused Continuity Assessment | $225 per manuscript | A bounded ledger. Before work starts we agree a list of what is tracked: named characters, places, objects, timeline and stated facts. We record every appearance and report contradictions with locations. This is not a full editorial read; anything that needs one is quoted as an Extensive Editorial Assessment. Reference books from earlier in a series are included in the quote. |
| Extensive Editorial Assessment | $450 or more | A full read with editorial judgment: scene-partner correctness, doubled beats, pacing and structure, with an editorial letter. Priced against the actual work. |
Revision. One round of clarification questions is included; further rounds are quoted.
Tell us about the book. We reply with scope, price and delivery date; nothing is charged until you accept.
Not included. Rewriting, unless quoted separately.
Also available
- Sponsored placement on Tradewinds Brief. See Partnerships. Labelled “Sponsored,” with the payer named before the reader clicks through. All paid links carry
rel="sponsored". No ranking benefit is sold. Material must be relevant and informative. - IP pitch packaging. Offered on the Hatchling Media services page.
The terms that apply to every service, including how your files are handled, are on their own page.