Overview
I've been editing professionally since receiving my MFA from the Michener Center for Writers in 2003. And in 2013 I completed a year-long fellowship at University of Texas Press. I've worked on over sixty books, doing everything from developmental editing to proofreading and indexing. My portfolio includes books by NYT bestselling author and indie publisher Susan Wittig Albert, award-winning indie Kathryn Lane, distinguished historian John Tutino, and pop culture scholar Omise'eke Natasha Tinsley as well as Louis Black (cofounder of SXSW, among other things) and screenplay expert Jill Chamberlain. I'm fluent (not native) in Spanish and love a good history as well as a puzzling mystery. Send me your best; let's make it better together!
"Sandra has been my copy editor on a dozen novel-length projects. She’s informed, experienced, careful, professional. She goes beyond proofreading to offer suggestions for clarity, flow—and she delivers on time, sometimes sooner. Highly recommended."
—Susan Wittig Albert
"Sandra is a brilliant indexer. I don’t know how she did it, but she found far more terms than I would have thought of, she knew how to nest certain concepts with larger concepts, and she cross-referenced terms that I know from experience other indexers have missed. If I didn’t know better, I would have guessed that she helped write the book! I cannot say enough about Sandra’s quality of work, her punctuality, and her complete professionalism. I felt incredibly lucky to have found her. Quite simply, Sandra has redefined the art of an index."
—Kate Browne
Services
Non-Fiction
Biographies & Memoirs
Cooking, Food, Wine, & Spirits
Entertainment
History
Fiction
Historical Fiction
Mystery & Crime
Short Story
Women's Fiction
Languages
English (US)
Awards
- Michener Fellowship
- University of Texas Press Publishing Fellowship
- R.D. Brown Memorial Scholarship
Certifications
- MFA in Fiction and Screenwriting
Work experience
University of Texas Press
Sep, 2012 —
Aug, 2013
(11 months)
This year-long program is a hands-on apprenticeship in manuscript editing—from cleaning up manuscripts in preparation for copyediting, to copyediting and line editing, to proofreading and indexing. I was project manager for three books and copyedited another three during my fellowship year, and since then I've had regular offers of indexing and copyediting projects. The editors at UT Press also refer authors to me when a book or article manuscript needs developmental editing, or when a fiction title comes their way (they focus on nonfiction). Although I'm not a native Spanish speaker, I can spot missed accents and suggest smoothing an awkward translation, so I'm often asked to work on Latin American history.
Self-employed
Sep, 2008 —
Present
My greatest joy is growing along with an author. I've edited for NYT bestselling author Susan Wittig Albert and historian John Tutino. Among the books I've indexed are a memoir for rocker Kathy Valentine and a how-to by screenplay expert Jill Chamberlain. I'm fluent (not native) in Spanish and love a good history as well as a puzzling mystery. Send me your best; let's make it better together!
***
I've studied with Jeff Abbott, Susan Wittig Albert, Jacqui Banaszynski, Lee Blessing, Jessica Brody, John Coetzee, Lisa Cron, Robert Dugoni, Hallie Ephron, Diana Gabaldon, Anthony Giardina, Michael Hauge, Stephen Harrigan, Elizabeth Harris, Denis Johnson, Margie Lawson, Rosina Lippi-Green (Sara Donati), Penelope Lively, Donald Maas, Robert McKee, Michael Ondaatje, Anne Perry, Dominic Smith, Sherry Thomas, Chuck Wendig, Joy Williams, and others.
Portfolio
Copy Editing
Copy Editing
Developmental Editing
Proofreading
Query Letter Review
Copy Editing
Copy Editing
Indexing
China Bayles and Ruby Wilcox are offering their popular “Not Just Plain Vanilla” workshop when, across town on the campus of Central Texas State University, a botany professor (an expert on th... read more
Copy Editing
Indexing
Indexing
Copy Editing
Developmental Editing
Copy Editing
Developmental Editing
Copy Editing
Developmental Editing
Copy Editing
Copy Editing
Salvador Novo (1904–1974) was a provocative and prolific cultural presence in Mexico City through much of the twentieth century. With his friend and fellow poet Xavier Villaurrutia, he cofound... read more
Indexing
Winner, Arvey Foundation Book Award, Association for Latin American Art, 2019Quito, Ecuador, was one of colonial South America's most important artistic centers. Yet the literature on painting... read more
Copy Editing
In the early 1940s, American designer Emily Wilkens went beyond her previous experience in children's wear to create costumes for two teenage characters in a Broadway play. Recognizing the gro... read more
Copy Editing
“El Eternauta, Daytripper, and Beyond examines the graphic narrative tradition in the two South American countries that have produced the medium’s most significant and copious output. Argentin... read more
Copy Editing
André Bazin is renowned for almost single-handedly establishing the study of film as an accepted intellectual pursuit, as well as for being the spiritual father of the French New Wave. In 1951... read more
Copy Editing
The Cambridge History of Latina/o American Literature emphasizes the importance of understanding Latina/o literature not simply as a US ethnic phenomenon but more broadly as an important eleme... read more
Indexing
The Cambridge Companion to Latina/o American Literature provides a thorough yet accessible overview of a literary phenomenon that has been rapidly globalizing over the past two decades. It tak... read more
Indexing
In this co-edited volume, Gladys L. Mitchell-Walthour and Elizabeth Hordge-Freeman have invited contributors of African descent from the United States and Brazil to reflect on their multidimen... read more
Indexing
The Color Of Love reveals the power of racial hierarchies to infiltrate our most intimate relationships. Delving far deeper than previous sociologists have into the black Brazilian experience,... read more
Indexing
Following the Spanish conquest of Mexico in the early 1500s, Franciscan, Dominican, and Augustinian friars fanned out across the central and southern areas of the country, founding hundreds of... read more
Copy Editing
The rapid growth of organized crime in Mexico and the government's response to it have driven an unprecedented rise in violence and impelled major structural economic changes, including the re... read more
Indexing
Rodrigo Moya is a prominent Mexican documentary photographer who began as a photojournalist in 1955. He covered the convulsive period that shook Latin America during the 1950s and 1960s, inclu... read more
Copy Editing
A history of one of the most influential American companies of the last century.For decades, IBM shaped the way the world did business. IBM products were in every large organization, and IBM c... read more
Indexing
North Africa has been a vital crossroads throughout history, serving as a connection between Africa, Asia, and Europe. Paradoxically, however, the region's historical significance has been chr... read more
Indexing
In this book Zeina G. Halabi examines the figure of the intellectual as prophet, national icon, and exile in contemporary Arabic literature and film. Staging a comparative dialogue with writer... read more
Copy Editing
Indexing
Michael Ray Charles is the most comprehensive presentation yet of the work of an artist who rose to prominence in the 1990s for works that engaged American stereotypes of African Americans. Wi... read more
Copy Editing
Tracing the hundred-year history of aviation in Texas, aviator and historian Barbara Ganson brings to life the colorful personalities that shaped the phenomenally successful development of thi... read more
Copy Editing
Copy Editing
Mexican and Mexican American women have written about Texas and their lives in the state since colonial times. Edited by fellow Tejanas Inés Hernández-Ávila and Norma Elia Cantú, Entre Guadalu... read more
Copy Editing
Standing in the Need presents an intimate account of an African American family’s ordeal after Hurricane Katrina. Before the storm struck, this family of one hundred fifty members lived in the... read more
Indexing
In this expert insider’s account of the savings and loan debacle of the 1980s, William Black lays bare the strategies that corrupt CEOs and CFOs—in collusion with those who have regulatory ove... read more
Proofreading
Mexico and Mexicans have been involved in every aspect of making the United States from colonial times until the present. Yet our shared history is a largely untold story, eclipsed by headline... read more
Copy Editing
Only a few decades after the Spanish conquest of Peru, the third Bishop of Cuzco, Sebastián de Lartaún, called for a report on the religious practices of the Incas. The report was prepared by ... read more
Proofreading
In 1690, a dramatic account of piracy was published in Mexico City. The Misfortunes of Alonso Ramírez described the incredible adventures of a poor Spanish American carpenter who was taken cap... read more
Proofreading
Breeding on remote ocean islands and spending much of its life foraging for food across vast stretches of seemingly empty seas, the albatross remains a legend for most people. And yet, humans ... read more
Proofreading
Modern Texas, like Mexico, traces its beginning to sixteenth-century encounters between Europeans and Indians who contested control over a vast land. Unlike Mexico, however, Texas eventually r... read more
Proofreading
The number of women in positions of power and authority in Japanese companies has remained small despite the increase in the number of educated women and the passage of legislation on gender e... read more
Developmental Editing
Indexing
In The Heart of the Mission, Cary Cordova combines urban, political, and art history to examine how the Mission District, a longtime bohemian enclave in San Francisco, has served as an importa... read more
Developmental Editing
Radium Halos is historical fiction based on the true events of the Radium Girls: a group of female factory workers who, in the early 1920s, contracted radiation poisoning from painting luminou... read more
Developmental Editing
Copy Editing
Migration from the Middle East brought hundreds of thousands of people to the Americas in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. By the time the Ottoman political system collapsed ... read more
Copy Editing
Indexing
More than eleven hundred women pilots flew military aircraft for the United States Army Air Forces during World War II. These pioneering female aviators were known first as WAFS (Women's Auxil... read more
Copy Editing
It’s Christmas, 1934, and the citizens of Darling, Alabama, are unwrapping a big package of Christmas puzzles. Mildred and Earlynne, members of the Dahlias Garden Club, are planning to open a ... read more
Copy Editing
Austin’s thriving film culture, renowned for international events such as SXSW and the Austin Film Festival, extends back to the early 1970s when students in the Department of Radio-Television... read more
Indexing
From the boundary surveys of the 1850s to the ever-expanding fences and highway networks of the twenty-first century, Border Land, Border Water examines the history of the construction project... read more
Indexing
It is 1934. FDR is in the White House, the New Deal is in full swing, and Prohibition has finally been repealed. Bestselling author Susan Wittig Albert returns to Darling, Alabama, where the l... read more
Copy Editing
A lush green lawn is one of the great pleasures of the natural world, whether it's right outside your front door or on a majestic fairway at a legendary golf course. But anyone who has tried t... read more
Indexing
In the decades following World War II, the creation and expansion of massive domestic markets and relatively stable economies allowed for mass consumption on an unprecedented scale, giving ris... read more
Copy Editing
Indexing
Rooted in tradición mexicana and infused with Texas food culture, tacos are some of Texans’ all-time favorite foods. In The Tacos of Texas, the taco journalists Mando Rayo and Jarod Neece take... read more
Proofreading
A compelling story of love, betrayal, and ambition by New York Times bestselling author Susan Wittig Albert, The General’s Women tells the story of two women--Kay Summersby and Mamie Eisenhowe... read more
Copy Editing
When Stoner was published in 1965, the novel sold only a couple of thousand copies before disappearing with hardly a trace. Yet John Williams’s quietly powerful tale of a Midwestern college pr... read more
Proofreading
Fish & Game restaurant in Hudson, New York, is a leader in the local foods movement. Its core approach—engaging intimately with nature both wild and domestic, building relationships with farme... read more
Proofreading
Bestselling author Susan Wittig Albert returns with the third novella in her bewitching Crystal Cave series. Ruby Wilcox has a rare gift for seeing things that others can’t . . .It’s Halloween... read more
Copy Editing
We are living in a time of mounting political segregation that threatens to tear us apart as a unified society. The result is that we are becoming increasingly tribal, and the narratives of li... read more
Indexing
What would Thanksgiving be without pecan pie? New Orleans without pecan pralines? Southern cooks would have to hang up their aprons without America’s native nut, whose popularity has spread fa... read more
Indexing
In this gripping second novella in the Crystal Cave series, bestselling author Susan Wittig Albert tells an intriguing tale of murder in the Texas Hill Country.Ruby has a rare gift for seeing things that others can’t . . .Ruby Wilcox (owner of the Crystal Cave... read more
In 1800 Mexico City was the largest, richest, most powerful city in the Americas, its vibrant silver economy an engine of world trade. Then Napoleon invaded Spain in 1808, desperate to gain Ne... read more
Copy Editing
Amy Schumer, Samantha Bee, Mindy Kaling, Melissa McCarthy, Tig Notaro, Leslie Jones, and a host of hilarious peers are killing it nightly on American stages and screens large and small, smashi... read more
Indexing
The apocalypse happened 4000 years ago. A forest now covers the world. In its shadow, Albert, an immigrant military prodigy, falls in love with Thomas, a boy he can never marry. Their island n... read more
Developmental Editing
Copy Editing
In the immediate aftermath of the Civil War, federal officials captured, imprisoned, and indicted Jefferson Davis for treason. If found guilty, the former Confederate president faced execution... read more
Developmental Editing
Indexing
"The Nutshell Technique cracks the code behind why we love the movies that we love. It guides you to organically write the story you want to tell."― Callum Greene, ProducerStar Wars Episode IX... read more
Indexing
From NYT bestselling author Susan Wittig Albert comes the first novella in the mesmerizing Crystal Cave series.Ruby has a rare gift for seeing things that others can’t . . .Ruby Wilcox (owner ... read more
Copy Editing
Making headlines when it was launched in 2015, Omise’eke Tinsley’s undergraduate course “Beyoncé Feminism, Rihanna Womanism” has inspired students from all walks of life. In Beyoncé in Formati... read more
Copy Editing
In 1906 George Shiras III (1859-1942) published a series of remarkable nighttime photographs in National Geographic. Taken with crude equipment, the black-and-white photographs featured leapin... read more
Copy Editing
Indexing
Sandra has 1 review
Professionalism
Quality
Value
Responsiveness
Travis B.
Jun, 2021
Pinned
