Testimonials

A Lifesaver

Kelly was a lifesaver. She edited a dense and time-sensitive document superbly. She understood our intent and brought out the main points to make them much more accessible to a multidisciplinary audience. The piece had multiple authors, and she also did an excellent job of polishing the finished product to have a single voice. To make the experience even better, she is extremely easy and pleasant to work with!”

– C. Muller, Professor of Sociology, University of Texas, Austin

I recommend Kelly enthusiastically!

We asked Kelly to edit one section for the new third edition of The Nonprofit Sector, with chapters by economists, sociologists, and a scholar of contemporary religion. Different voices, disciplines, career stages. Good work, but the chapters needed to mesh well, which they did not. She made every chapter much better, more coherent and better integrated. All four chapters were greatly improved. I was so impressed with her editing that I asked her to work on our chapter, an 80-plus page political history of American philanthropy. She strengthened the arguments and tightened the comparisons across the different eras. I recommend her enthusiastically!

– Woody Powell, Stanford University

The Editor You Wish You Had Found Earlier

Kelly is the editor you wish you had found earlier, are delighted to work with in the present, and look forward to working with again in the future. Why? Because she can help you excel in all phases of your project. I have worked with Kelly on two academic monographs. She is an intelligent, careful, and constructively critical reader whom you can ask to point out those parts of your argument that aren’t yet persuasive. You can ask this because you trust her to ask questions and make specific suggestions that help you find your most effective and well-communicated thoughts.

Kelly writes well herself—a skill never to be taken for granted when looking for a professional editor! She returns material on the date she promised. I have learned from Kelly ways to improve my writing and arguments. Academic writing can squeeze the joy out of me when I get bogged down in drafts. I have many times become more curious about my own topic through exchanges with her about how to improve these drafts. And I feel delighted with the final products. Enough said.

– Assistant Professor of Religion

My Writing Hero

Kelly worked with me on an article for publication in a top-tier professional journal. I had worked on the piece over multiple years, and it had grown too long and too complicated for one publication. Kelly read through the whole article, identified five key arguments I could make, and after I decided which direction the piece should take, she did the difficult slash and burn to give the piece structure, coherence, and a clear argument. She was amazing to work with and incredibly speedy. I call her my writing hero.”

– Social science professor at an R1 university

Significantly Improved the Clarity and Readability of My Articles

Kelly’s notes and revision suggestions inspire me to become a better writer and scholar. Her editing has significantly improved the clarity and readability of my articles. I have had the opportunity to work with her on several articles. She helped me drive myself to explore creative techniques to state my theory to a wide range of readers. She has a strong ability to detect weakness in a manuscript and her comments are consistently constructive, detailed, and comprehensive. Most importantly, she pays attention to both language and content and she explicitly provides a sharp viewpoint for generating a compelling proposition. In my humble opinion, she is the best editor you can wish for because she is professional, efficient, and sincere with outstanding work ethics. I am fortunate to know her and I will be honored and delighted to work with her once again because she is brilliant, a real gem, and I fully trust her.

– Assistant Professor of Urban Planning and Studies, United Arab Emirates (UAE)

My Manuscript Flows Like Water

As a non-native speaker, it is really hard to use proper words in some statements and is much harder to grasp nuance in English. Kelly helped me to find out the appropriate words and to express communicable meaning in English writing. With her editing, my manuscript is much smoother, flows like water and most importantly, is understandable.

– Associate Professor of Social Work, Korea

Helped Me Express Ideas Clearly

Kelly is a fabulous editor! She did an excellent job smoothing my writing and helping me express ideas more clearly. She is also very efficient, and the turnaround time is super quick!”

– Assistant Professor of Sociology

Understood My Vision and Gave Me the Feedback to Do It!

Having written a rough draft of my book manuscript, I knew I needed help thinking through its argument and structure. Kelly provided that help. Her feedback was not only speedy (very fast turn around times!), but also insightful in terms of central ideas, organizational possibilities, theoretical framing, and potential resources. Her expertise in these areas has proved invaluable, but what stands out for me is how she “got” the project. Some readers and editors want to make your project into their vision of what it should be, but Kelly identified what I was trying to do—she understood my vision and gave me the feedback to help me do it! Thank you, Kelly!

– Associate Professor of Religion

High Quality, Ahead of Schedule

Kelly has been a great editor for my dissertation. She not only did her work with high quality but also completed it ahead of time. I am hoping to work with her again, and I have already recommended her to other PhD candidates in my program.”

– Tayfun Keskin, Assistant Professor of Business, University of Washington, Bothell

A Magic Touch!

I thoroughly enjoy working with Kelly. I especially appreciate her intelligent and knowledgable comments on my writing, which are on target and help me reflect on my own arguments. Additionally, her thorough and meticulous work on the style guidelines is amazing. My papers always look so much more professional after her magic touch! Thank you, Kelly! I look forward to continuing to work with you!”

– Assistant Professor of Communication, Denmark

A Consummate Professional

Kelly is a consummate professional. An expert editor, she made the process of writing my doctoral dissertation much less stressful. Her timely and succinct editing allowed me to focus on bringing together my data and findings in a coherent manner. I recommend her without reservation, and she will be the one I turn to in the future for editing.”

– Fred Beach, PhD, Energy Policy Expert at the Center for International Energy & Environmental Policy, University of Texas at Austin

Made My Writing Much More Readable and Coherent

Kelly was a pleasure to work with. I sent her a paper that I’ve been working on for a long time and was in the final stages of preparing it for submission to a journal. In the past few months, I had incorporated several people’s feedback and was concerned that the voice of my writing had gotten muddied during the revision process. Her careful edits really helped to make my writing much more readable and coherent. I particularly appreciated that she included a memo highlighting the changes she made and how I could incorporate these ideas into my own writing in the future.”

– Postdoctoral fellow in sociology, Harvard University

Improves my Knowledge about Writing

Once I have Kelly working on my project, I feel no need to find any other editors at all. Kelly did a great job editing my paper and improving my writing. She is efficient, careful and very easy to work with. The edits she made and the suggestions she gave were exactly what I wanted. More importantly, I believe that her edits and suggestions will also help me improve my writing in the future. Working with Kelly not only improves my paper, but also improves my knowledge and skill about writing in general. I highly recommend Kelly and I will continue to work with her on my future projects.

– Assistant Professor, Rutgers University

An Overwhelmingly Positive Experience

Working with Kelly was an overwhelmingly positive experience for me. Her editing provided essential guidance at all stages of the writing process and markedly improved the quality of my finished work. She has strengthened my readings of texts by helping me streamline my style and clarify my ideas. Her changes to my sentence constructions smoothed things out considerably, and her comments were especially helpful. She pointed out places I could develop my argument and link my ideas together. Perhaps the main thing, though, was just having someone else involved in the writing process (which, for me, has always seem to be ‘the essential solitude.’)”

– graduate student in comparative literature

Easy to Work With

Kelly’s suggestions and editing were very helpful in making sure I expressed my ideas clearly and concisely. She was prompt and easy to work with. She delivers high-quality work.”

– PhD in sociology

Finally…

Finally, after feeling lost with other editors, I found Kelly. She has been EXACTLY what I needed in my dissertation process. She’s helped me progress through multiple drafts of multiple chapters, and all while helping me make my writing more of what my department and my chair want from me. Not only has her editing been fast and seemingly perfect, her feedback has been concise, motivating, and surprisingly effective. She’s even tailored her feedback style to suit my sometimes neurotic needs. She’s really great.”

– marriage counselor, Austin, TX

A Wonderful Experience

I have had a really wonderful experience with Kelly editing my PhD dissertation. I am really satisfied with the quality, style, and clarity of the edited chapters, and, most importantly, I really appreciate working with an editor who understands sociological concepts.”

– PhD student in sociology

Write about Complex Phenomena in a Reader-Friendly Way

To write about complex phenomena in a reader-friendly way is one of the most difficult tasks for a PhD student. Kelly Besecke has not only helped me clarify my arguments and correct my grammar; she has also helped me understand that writing in English is about style.”

– PhD student in sociology

Insightful Comments

Kelly’s work exceeded my expectations. I needed someone who could read my proposal and edit it carefully. Kelly provided beyond simple editing with her professional experiences. She not only did a great mechanical editing, but also provided me with insightful comments to clarify concepts and develop my ideas. Her work overall was fast, outstanding, and exceptionally professional.”

– PhD student in education

Highly Recommend!

I highly recommend Kelly! Kelly is prompt responsive, easy to work with, and will provide realistic deadlines for the editing jobs. Her questions on projects are stimulating and prompt more thorough thinking. My writing becomes more clear, too. Deadlines have been met. My proposal passed the first time with very few editorial additions. The resources provided are exactly what is needed. Kelly is conscientious about the program guidelines and will refer to them frequently to ensure that they are being followed. I am excited about the final product!”

– Irene, LCSW and PhD candidate, Psychoanalytic Child Clinical Psychology Program

Excellent Final Product

Our book editing project was primarily focused on the modernization of the language and flow of ideas of the 400+ pages of a nonfiction, religious philosophy book, originally translated from the French. The project extended over four months with several back and forth levels of editorial conversation. Throughout, Dr. Besecke was very professional, thoughtful in her comments and suggestions, and delivered an excellent final product. We are very satisfied with this experience and will definitely consider her for our next project.

– John M. Zerio, PhD, Spiritist Educational Society