About Me

How does your writing/publishing process work? What is the timeline?

Story Idea / World Building – 6 months to 1 year

Creating ideas and developing the world for my novels can take anywhere between six months to one year. Sometimes it’s longer, sometimes shorter. I often get my ideas when I listen to music (mainly film and game soundtracks), look at images on Pinterest, or daydream as I go on a run or a walk.

Plotting / Outline – 2 weeks to 1 month

I am a plotter, so I enjoy outlining my story. This can take anywhere from two weeks to a month. I break the scenes down in my book into chapters and use post-it notes on a corkboard to keep myself on track with my writing.

During this time, I decide on:

• The main character’s emotional ARC during the story from chapter to chapter. What they want Vs. what they need.
• The Three act structure (or maybe I should say six) – beginning, inciting incident, midpoint, second inciting incident, climax, ending/cliffhanger.

Draft – 4 to 6 months

I write the first draft of my story in about four to six months. I don’t worry about edits. At this stage, I’m focused on just getting the story out of my head and typing it into a computer.

Self-Editing Round One – 2 to 3 months

Developmental Edit

A few days or a week after completing my draft, I delve into developmental edits. This includes looking at the overall structure of the story.

• Is the story arc logical?
• Are there plot holes?
• Is the viewpoint coherent?
• Is the tense consistent?
• Is the dialogue believable and clear?

Line Edit

After completing the developmental edit, I then focus on a line edit, which involves focusing on the flow, style, and readability of (you guessed it) each line. I also do grammar, spelling, and punctuation checks during this time.

Proofreading

Once the line edit is completed, I delve into proofreading, which involves reading my novel aloud from beginning to end. It’s amazing the mistakes you discover when you do this.

Beta Readers / Critique Partners – 1 month

I contact my team of beta readers first to see if they have the time and ability to read my novel and provide feedback. For those that respond with a yes, I ask them to look at the style of the writing, provide me with their thoughts or critiques, storyline/worldbuilding problems they see, any plot holes or inconsistencies they have found, and whether they feel the story resonates with the genre expectations. I usually give beta readers a month to read the novel and provide feedback.

Self-Editing Round Two – 1 to 2 months

Yes, that’s correct. I incorporate the feedback and do it all over again. Developmental Edits, a thorough line edit, and a final proofread.

Professional edits – 2 weeks to 1 month

This is where a professional editor comes in and completes a line edit and sentence re-writes where necessary, and reviews plot/character elements for consistency.

Formatting / Printing – 1 month

Once the manuscript is completed, it’s time for me to turn it into a correctly formatted e-book and paperback. I do this using Vellum. During this time, the final cover design is uploaded with the final versions of the manuscript to Amazon KDP and IngramSpark. Cover design often occurs during the writing and editing stage of the book.