Blog: Copy Editing for Fiction Writers | Freelance Book Editing

Creativity Challenges and Plot Structure Limitations

February 24, 2020February 24, 2020 by Jody CalkinsNo Comments

Creativity Challenges and Plot Structure Limitations Dear Blog, Last Thursday, I was in a pickle. And as of today, the following Monday, I still am. This plan has not been going as, um, planned. I feel like I'm pulling teeth with this story. I finally reached the first major plot point the other day and am happy with the results. I think the major problem was that I had my basic outline already, but up until last night, I hadn't fleshed out anything else. I was also struggling with the fact that the plot structure spread out the few big events throughout the whole book. Well, I switched it up. See, with this story, we go back to training at Faction 73. Back to where Gabe and Emerson started training in Blackout (Book #3 in The Hexon Code series - keep in mind I'm now writing Book #6). I want my readers to be able to connect with Tessa, but I also don't want to bore them...

Big Choice Ahead – Is It Over?

February 20, 2020February 20, 2020 by Jody CalkinsNo Comments

Big Choice Ahead - Is It Over? Dear Blog, Utter failure. That's my progress report for this week. So, I picked back up on my current project on Monday, the 17th. Today is Day 4 of my 14-day plan and I still have yet to meet the word count goal for the first day. Ugh. What the heck went wrong? I have a few thoughts. So, with the first project (which was No Way Out, Book #5), I had been dabbling in it for a couple months. I was lukewarm, but I was able to get it set up on the fast-track (and I loved the results, by the way!). With this new project, I haven't touched it in over a month, so coming back to it has been a struggle. Also, the daily word count requirement is a fair amount higher, so I think there's added pressure. Also, this project takes me back several weeks in the timeline. We're back at Faction 73 to follow Tessa's...

Exciting News – A New Book Release!

February 17, 2020February 17, 2020 by Jody CalkinsNo Comments

Exciting News - A New Book Release! Dear Blog, It's time to celebrate because I have exciting news! After an intense 14-day writing plan and about 10 days of edits, I'm happy to share the release of No Way Out! It is now available on Amazon in ebook, paperback, and Kindle Unlimited! What a wild ride! I started the plan with 20,514 words and estimated I had about 45,000 words to write. Well, I ended up removing about 10,000 of the original words and writing about 10,000 new ones during the editing phase. For a while there I thought I was never going to finish the project since I had so much to replace, but then everything just fell together. I'm super excited and happy with the final book. And I'm looking forward to getting started on my next project. Would I recommend this crazy plan for other authors? The intense writing plan, yes! Because I think we're capable of far more than we give ourselves credit for. The intense...