Help Center
Everything you need to get started with Cherry Edits. Upload a manuscript, configure your edit, and get professional results in minutes.
Getting Started
Three steps to your first AI-powered edit.
Create an account
Click Sign Up in the top-right corner. Enter your name, email, and a password. You'll be logged in immediately—no email verification needed.
Add your API key
Go to Settings (user menu, top-right). Choose Anthropic or OpenRouter as your provider, then paste your API key. Cherry Edits uses your key to call the AI directly—no markup, no middleman.
Create your first project
From the dashboard, click New Project. Choose a scope (Standalone for a single book, or Series for multi-book continuity). Give it a title, pick a genre, and you're off.
Tip: Don't have an API key yet? You can get one from Anthropic (console.anthropic.com) or OpenRouter (openrouter.ai) in minutes. Both offer pay-as-you-go pricing.
Standalone Editing
The full workflow for editing a single manuscript, from upload to download.
1. Upload your manuscript
Drag and drop a .docx, .txt, or .md file. Chapters are detected automatically from headings, "Chapter N" patterns, or common separators. You'll see the detected chapters before anything runs.
2. Configure your edit
Select which editing stages to run (pre-edit, developmental, line, copy). The page shows a cost estimate and time estimate before you start. Toggle beat detection to add story structure analysis. Adjust batch size if you want smaller processing groups.
3. Watch it run
The progress page shows real-time updates as each chapter is processed. You can leave and come back—progress is saved per chapter. If the pipeline stops for any reason, it resumes from where it left off when you re-run.
4. Download results
Download the final edited manuscript, individual per-stage outputs, and the story structure report (if beat detection was enabled). You can re-run the pipeline anytime with different settings.
Chapter formatting tips
- Word (.docx): Use Heading 1 or Heading 2 styles for chapter titles—this gives the most reliable detection.
- Plain text (.txt): Use "Chapter 1", "CHAPTER ONE", or numbered headings like "1." at the start of a line.
- Markdown (.md): Use
# Chapter Titleor## Chapter Titleheadings. - Avoid putting chapter titles in the middle of paragraphs—they should be on their own line.
Series Editing
Edit multiple books with cross-book continuity awareness. The platform tracks characters, timelines, and world-building across your entire series.
Create a series project
Click New Project, choose Edit mode and Series scope. Give the series a title and select the genre.
Upload your books
Add two or more books. For each book, provide a title and upload the manuscript file. The books are listed in order—you can rearrange them to match the series reading order.
Run continuity analysis
The AI reads every book and extracts characters, timelines, world-building details, and plot threads. Then it cross-references everything to find inconsistencies. This produces a series bible and a continuity report with severity-ranked issues.
Review continuity results
Browse the continuity findings by severity (critical, major, minor). Review character profiles, timeline events, and world rules in the series bible. Download the full report for reference.
Resolve issues (optional)
If critical or major inconsistencies are found, a Resolve Issues button appears. This opens a resolution wizard where you review each issue, choose a canonical value (e.g., the correct character name), and approve or skip individual fixes. Approved resolutions are applied to your manuscripts before editing begins—so the editing pipeline works with clean, consistent text. You can skip this step entirely and go straight to editing if you prefer.
Edit books one at a time
Each book gets the full editing pipeline (pre-edit, dev, line, copy) with the series bible injected as context. The AI knows your characters, rules, and timeline as it edits. If you resolved issues in the previous step, the pipeline uses the corrected manuscripts. After one book finishes, click Edit Next to move to the next one.
What continuity analysis checks:
- Character consistency — names, appearances, abilities, relationships, backstory
- Timeline conflicts — events that contradict each other or happen in impossible order
- World-building contradictions — rules, geography, magic systems, technology
- Plot thread continuity — unresolved threads, dropped subplots, inconsistent motivations
How resolution works:
When continuity analysis finds critical or major issues (like a character named "Emma" in Book 1 but "Emily" in Book 3), the resolution wizard lets you fix them before editing starts.
- Smart defaults — the most frequent variant is suggested as the canonical name
- Per-issue control — approve, skip, or change the resolution for each issue
- Manuscript-level fixes — approved changes are applied across all affected books and chapters
- Non-destructive — original files are preserved; resolved copies are used for editing
The Four Editing Stages
Each stage focuses on a different layer of your writing. Run all four for a comprehensive edit, or pick just the ones you need.
1. Pre-Edit Assessment
Sonnet 4.5 · Report onlyA read-through that produces a detailed quality report without changing your manuscript. Think of it as your editor's first-read notes.
What it does:
- Scores each chapter on pacing, dialogue quality, tension, prose style, and character development
- Identifies structural issues—sagging middles, rushed endings, unearned climaxes
- Flags areas that need the most attention in subsequent stages
Output: Detailed assessment report with per-chapter scores and recommendations. No rewrites.
2. Developmental Edit
Opus 4.6 · Full rewriteThe big-picture edit. This is where the heavy lifting happens—structural changes, expanded scenes, tightened pacing.
What it does:
- Rewrites for structure, pacing, and narrative arc
- Deepens character development and strengthens motivations
- Expands underdeveloped scenes, cuts redundant ones
- Fixes plot holes and improves cause-and-effect chains
- Processes chapters in batches to maintain continuity across scenes
Output: Rewritten manuscript with structural improvements. Your story, told better.
3. Line Edit
Opus 4.6 · Sentence-level polishSentence-by-sentence refinement. This stage makes your prose sound human, not generated.
What it does:
- Sharpens voice and tightens prose rhythm
- Fixes dialogue that sounds stiff or expository
- Eliminates AI-tells: overused transitions, generic metaphors, purple prose, "telling" instead of "showing"
- Applies custom anti-AI rules to catch patterns that make assisted writing obvious
- Preserves your authorial voice while removing rough edges
Output: Polished manuscript. Reads like a skilled human editor went through it.
4. Copy Edit
Sonnet 4.5 · Light-touch cleanupThe final polish. Catches the small stuff without changing your voice or style.
What it does:
- Fixes grammar, spelling, and punctuation errors
- Ensures consistency of character names, places, and details across chapters
- Normalizes formatting (em dashes, quotation marks, spacing)
- Catches homophone errors and commonly confused words
Output: Clean, publication-ready manuscript.
Story Structure & Beat Detection
Understand how your story maps to proven narrative frameworks, and optionally use that analysis to guide your developmental edit.
What it is
Beat detection maps your chapters to established story structure frameworks—Save the Cat, the Hero's Journey, Three-Act Structure, and others. Each major story "beat" (inciting incident, midpoint reversal, dark moment, climax, etc.) is located in your manuscript and scored for how effectively it lands.
How it works
- The AI reads your entire manuscript and identifies which framework fits best (or you can choose one manually on the configure page)
- Each chapter is tagged with its structural role—setup, rising action, climax, resolution, etc.
- Beats are scored on presence, timing, and impact
- Weak or missing beats are flagged with specific improvement suggestions
The structure report
You get a visual beat map showing where each beat falls in your manuscript, per-beat scores, and a breakdown of structural weaknesses. This report is available on the results page alongside your edited manuscript.
Beat-guided editing
When beat detection is enabled alongside the developmental edit, the AI actively strengthens weak beats during the rewrite. A flat midpoint reversal gets more tension. A missing "dark moment" gets one built in. The structure analysis feeds directly into the editing process.
Tip: Even if you don't run a developmental edit, beat detection on its own produces a useful diagnostic. Toggle it on during configuration to get the structure report without any rewrites.
Settings & API Keys
Cherry Edits uses a Bring Your Own Key (BYOK) model. Your API key, your provider account, your data. No markup.
Anthropic (Direct)
Connect directly to Anthropic's API. Model routing is automatic—Opus 4.6 for creative work (dev edit, line edit), Sonnet 4.5 for analytical tasks (pre-edit, copy edit).
- Key prefix:
sk-ant- - Estimated cost: ~$12.60 for a full 80K-word edit (all 4 stages)
- Prompt caching can reduce actual costs significantly on re-runs
OpenRouter
Access 10+ models through a single API. Choose separate models for creative and analytical tasks. Cost varies by model selection.
- Key prefix:
sk-or- - Separate model selection for creative (dev/line) and analytical (pre-edit/copy) stages
- Mix and match providers—use Claude for dev edit, GPT for copy edit, etc.
Managed Mode
Coming soonA managed option where we handle the AI provider billing is in development. For now, all users bring their own API key (BYOK) via the Craft plan.
| Manuscript Size | Time (all 4 stages) | Est. Cost (Anthropic) |
|---|---|---|
| Short novel (30K words) | ~8 min | ~$5 |
| Standard novel (50K words) | ~14 min | ~$8 |
| Full novel (80K words) | ~22 min | ~$13 |
| Epic (120K+ words) | ~35 min | ~$19 |
Costs shown are for Anthropic direct pricing (BYOK). OpenRouter pricing varies by model. Prompt caching can reduce actual costs on subsequent runs.
Troubleshooting
My pipeline failed mid-run. Did I lose progress?
The wrong number of chapters was detected.
# or ## headings. You can re-upload the file after adjusting formatting.
My API key isn't working.
- Check the key prefix: Anthropic keys start with
sk-ant-, OpenRouter keys start withsk-or- - Make sure you selected the correct provider in Settings before pasting the key
- Verify your API account has available credits or a payment method on file
- If you just created the key, wait a moment—some providers have a brief activation delay
The pipeline seems stuck.
The cost was higher/lower than the estimate.
Can I re-run a project after downloading results?
Can I run just one editing stage?
What's a "story bible"?
What file formats are supported?
Glossary
| BYOK | Bring Your Own Key. You provide your own API key from Anthropic or OpenRouter. Your manuscript goes directly to your provider account—Cherry Edits doesn't proxy or mark up API costs. |
| Continuity Analysis | A series-only feature that reads all books and cross-references characters, timelines, world-building, and plot threads to find inconsistencies. |
| Continuity Resolution | An optional step after continuity analysis. Fixes naming inconsistencies and other cross-book issues by applying find-and-replace or AI-powered rewrites to the manuscripts before editing begins. Original files are preserved. |
| Story Bible | A comprehensive reference document generated from continuity analysis. Contains character profiles, timeline, world rules, and plot threads for the entire series. |
| Beat Detection | Maps your chapters to story structure beats (inciting incident, midpoint, climax, etc.) from established frameworks like Save the Cat or the Hero's Journey. |
| Beat-Guided Editing | When enabled, the developmental edit uses beat detection results to actively strengthen weak structural beats during the rewrite. |
| Pre-Edit Assessment | A diagnostic-only stage that scores chapters and identifies issues without making changes. Produces a detailed quality report. |
| Developmental Edit | Big-picture editing: rewrites for structure, pacing, character arcs, and plot consistency. The most transformative stage. |
| Line Edit | Sentence-level polish: voice, rhythm, dialogue, anti-AI pattern removal. Makes prose read naturally. |
| Copy Edit | Final cleanup: grammar, spelling, punctuation, and consistency across the manuscript. |
| Batch Size | The number of chapters processed together in a single AI call. Larger batches give better cross-chapter context but use more tokens. The default works well for most manuscripts. |
| Pipeline | The full sequence of editing stages that runs on your manuscript. Progress is saved per chapter, so a pipeline can be paused and resumed. |
| Prompt Caching | An AI provider feature that reduces costs when the same context is sent in multiple calls. Re-running a pipeline is often cheaper than the first run because of caching. |
| OpenRouter | An API gateway that provides access to multiple AI models from different providers through a single API key. |
| Creative Model | The AI model used for stages that rewrite text (developmental edit, line edit). Defaults to Opus 4.6 for Anthropic users. |
| Analytical Model | The AI model used for stages that analyze without rewriting (pre-edit assessment, copy edit). Defaults to Sonnet 4.5 for Anthropic users. |
Questions? Check Troubleshooting above or reach out on our community page.