Write In Faith Camp: An Invitation

For nearly a decade, I have enjoyed participating in virtual writing camps. These have been great for helping me keep focused in my writing. They’ve aided me in blocking out specific times of day to dedicate to creating stories that someday will be shared with the world. Beyond that, they’ve helped me find online communities of writers, and I’ve built some beautiful friendships through these writing camps.

At this point in my writing journey, it makes the most sense for me to share my love for writing camps with you by creating a camp of my own.

Write In Faith Camp (WIF Camp), hosted by my publishing company, Writing to Inspire Publications, is a place for Christian writers to come together to write in faith that God will bless our time together and build in us a greater faith and produce through us greater stories than we could possibly have without His guidance.

Read more on my new website.

Dinner Guests {short story}

The table was set for seven, but not a single person had arrived. The round twinkle lights still glowed, but they illuminated only dried-up hopes and empty chairs. The hostess had retreated to the deck, and she’d likely leave the mess until tomorrow. She’d worked so hard to pull this dinner together.

Yet no one came.

Perhaps it wasn’t their fault. Maybe something truly had come up. An emergency, perchance? Something dire that would give solid footing for their excuses?

Or maybe they were just all running late.

Continue the story on AndreaReneeCox.com.

Writing Update + Setting Goals

July was another successful writing camp for me. Since I was (and continue) dealing with post-WuVi symptoms such as short-term memory loss, sudden fatigue, and severe lack of focus, I set a small (for me) goal of 25,000 words for the month.

Last week's article told you about some timely reminders I'd received. Friends, these reminders helped me vastly. I was able to zoom right past my word count goal as well as a secondary goal. I nearly reached my third goal of 50k words, coming just short at 48,101 total words for the month.

While I didn't reach the 50k I'd hoped for, I have exited July with great satisfaction that I was able, by God's sweet grace, to push through the severe lack of focus and short-term memory loss in order to pen a plethora of words. There were many late nights and last-minute pushes to claim those words, but they have been logged in despite the slight sleep deprivation I may have imposed upon myself in order to do so.

August will likely not see me writing quite as much, but I have new goals I'm setting and striving to accomplish.

Timely Reminders

I recently read an article by Jill Kemerer (visit the original article here) that served as a great reminder for me.

A month or so after I got over Wuhan Virus, I started experiencing post-WuVi (my term) symptoms. Some include short-term memory loss, severe lack of focus (way worse than my normal ADD), and quick exhaustion. These symptoms come and go as they feel like it, disrupting my train of thought and ability to accomplish goals.

You might have noticed my blog has been more miss than hit so far this year.

The thing is, I still have goals that I want to accomplish. I'm frustrated that these symptoms are not allowing me to do so.

When I read Mrs. Kemerer's article about writing through one's moods, this hit home for me. Not necessarily about writing through a wide variety of moods, though that's necessary too. But to write through the symptoms I'm continuing to deal with.

It hasn't been easy since I realized that on June 9. My writing has still seemed to only trickle in the following weeks. Not for lack of trying. Not for lack of motivation. Solely because of symptoms I couldn't seem to lick.

Then I received an e-mail encouragement from the hostess of Go Teen Writers' 100-for-100 Writing Challenge that I'm participating in this summer and autumn. In that e-mail, Stephanie Morrill shared the following quote by James Scott Bell:

"Follow by E-mail" Discontinued -- But Stay Tuned!

Blogger is run by Google, and the powers that be at Google have decided to discontinue the "follow by e-mail" widget that allows readers like you to follow bloggers like me. It will be disappearing sometime this summer.

I know, I know. It's horrible. Devastating, even. Now my articles won't go directly to your inbox.

Gasp!

Don't worry; I'm working on a solution. In the meantime, please pause right now to bookmark my blog. That way, you'll be able to navigate back here without the aid of the e-mails that will no longer be coming your way.

Anything - Extra Bits

Friends, how would you like some extra bits from my short story in Anything, which released on April 26, 2021? #AnythingKDWC

There isn't more to the story itself, but there were a couple of things that got left out of the book that I would love to share with you today. (If I ever republish my short story on its own or in a collection of my own shorties, I fully expect to include these bits.)

Anything Release Tour + My Publishing Debut!

Friends, I'm just going to jump right in with the best news.

I'm finally getting published!!!

The King's Daughters' Writing Camp (KDWC) is putting out a collection of short stories and poems, and one of my short stories -- which has not yet been posted here on Writing to Inspire -- is going to be in it.

The collection is called Anything, and here's why:

A couple of camp sessions ago, several of the ladies in camp were recommending "anything" by this author or that author, meaning any of their published books. Someone in the group (and I really don't remember who) suggested that we all write Anything stories -- stories called Anything.

So a baker's dozen of us did!

Anything will be published this month -- on April 26, 2021. It will be available on Amazon, Apple Books, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, and in paperback.

I can hardly wait for you to meet Sarah Mae and her rambunctious kids in my story, entitled Any Thing. Yep, my title is slightly different than the other twelve, in that mine is two words instead of one. I can't share the reason without spoiling the story, but let's just say there's a very specific and whimsical reason for the two-word title.

Stay tuned here on Writing to Inspire for future updates -- including some quote graphics! -- on my Any Thing story.

***

Now for the other news. I am pulling together a release tour for Anything, and you're invited! If you have a blog or social media accounts, the team and I would love to have you join us in celebration of KDWC's debut story collection. Just fill out the following form and let us know how you'll be able to help spread the word and get a buzz going for our debut release.

Spring Cleaning + Camp Prep {a personal invitation}

It may not yet be spring, and I may not typically do spring cleaning, but this year feels like I am. In February, my water pipes froze and then burst in the sub-zero temperatures north Texas experienced. I ended up having to use a ton of blankets, comforters, and towels to sop up the water that spilled into my house before my dad got the water turned off. Since I didn't have working water for almost two weeks, I fell behind on washing dishes and other water-related chores.

Now that my pipes have been fixed (thanks, Daddy!), my spring cleaning this year is catching up on laundry and washing dishes.

There's a bit more cleaning going on around here, and some reorganizing too, but the water-based chores are definitely top priorities this season.

In other news, I'm also getting prepared for writing camp. The next session of King's Daughters' Writing Camp (KDWC) -- a writing camp for Christian ladies -- takes place in April. This month I'm outlining, doing a bit of preliminary research, and dipping my toes into several different stories I've got in the works. Since I'm dealing with post-Wuhan Virus short-term memory loss, my creativity is struggling more than I'd like. So I'm trying to figure out how to beat that even as memory issues plague me at the moment. The good news is that I've found pockets of inspiration in the last week or so. The writing sessions of 150; 300; and 500 words (averages) have added up to over 5,000 words already this month. I'm shocked by that number, because it's felt like such a huge fight to get each sentence onto the page. While that number is super low for my normal monthly pace, it's a huge milestone for me with my current memory situation.

I'm celebrating with ice cream tonight, because fighting my way to this milestone has felt like climbing Mount Everest.

Would you like to join me in writing camp next month?

Updates Galore

Hey, friends. How would you like an update on a few things in my life?

Business

Since the recent acquisition of PayPal by China, I have changed the method of payment for my copy editing work. Rather than PayPal, clients now will pay by mailed check. They will still receive a professional invoice, which will be the trigger to stick the check in the mail. The quality of my copy editing work has not changed, so hopefully my clients will continue to be satisfied with my work.

Life

So I caught Covid-19 on Christmas Eve. Yippee. From raging and unpredictable fevers to intense and draining fatigue like I've never before known, this illness wiped me out and stole all my energy to the point where I couldn't even read for about a week and a half. Recovery has been longer than that of most illnesses I've ever had (if not all others), but I have finally, about a month after first acquiring the illness, returned to normal with no remaining shortness of breath (as of Friday last). What remains to be done is rebuild my stamina, which, naturally, took a hit over the past weeks of struggling to survive the ups and downs of Covid-19.

Finding Inspiration

Friends, do you ever struggle to find inspiration?

Whether or not you're a writer, it's important that we feel inspired at times. It might be that you find the perfect recipe to try, and that inspires you to whip up a yummy meal for your family. Maybe you see some wildflowers on a walk and pick a few to put in a vase near where you do your crafting, and that bunch of flowers inspires you to work an extra half hour on whichever craft is in the works.

For me, nearly anything can be inspirational depending on the moment.

Lately, I've been binge watching a couple of seasons of the TV show House, about a team of doctors who specialize in diagnostics. While there are some aspects of the show I don't particularly like, there are many that I enjoy. I like the quirky, damaged, manipulative Dr. Gregory House, because he cherishes figuring out the puzzles that are his patients and his coworkers. I like the cases the team tries to solve, because they're often more complex than they first appear, and there's usually some big twist I never saw coming. I like the fact that story is a huge part of every episode and that there are usually two or three threads that get woven together each time.

While I've been enjoying the show, I've also been analyzing it from a storyteller's perspective. What works? What doesn't? Which twists did I see coming? Which blindsided me? How were props used? How was House's sarcastic sense of humor used well, and when did it come off as completely rude, and how did the writers and actor find the right balance between the two?

These, and many more, are all things a writer watches for in shows, movies, books, and real life as they're contemplating the stories in their own minds that they're trying to put down on paper (or in a computer document).

These, and many more, are the things that have inspired me the past couple of weeks.

Surprise, Surprise

Hello, friends.

Some surprises are good, such as finding a new top-three favorite book of the year this past weekend: The Librarian of Boone's Hollow by Kim Vogel Sawyer. (Be on the lookout next week for my review of this book.)

Other surprises are not so good, such as having to ship my laptop in to get fixed because a hinge broke only ten months after I bought the thing (and I'm always gentle and respectful of my electronic devices).

One good thing about the negative surprise was that I was not on an editing or writing deadline at the time. Whew! That would have definitely have been a problem.

Another good thing about this is that I can take some time, while without a computer, to relook at my schedule and figure out what windows of time will work best for set-aside writing times for me during this season of life. I'm always experimenting with my schedule, because life shifts things around so often in one way or another.

While I'm awaiting the return of my laptop, I'll be pulling out a story to edit on paper. I had started editing it early this year, but I set it aside when two or three other stories leaped to the forefront of my mind to be first-drafted. It will be fun getting back to the young adult story that features skateboarders with funky nicknames, familial miscommunication, and a weighty bout of grief.

What has surprised you lately (good or bad)?

What silver linings are you finding in the midst of it?

Color-Coded Editing {with Guest Victoria Minks}

Friends, the article you've been eagerly awaiting (I hope) is finally here. Please welcome our guest, Victoria Minks. I enjoyed her book Jonas & Olivia, and I've enjoyed her color-coded editing process, which she's sharing with us today.

We're going to be diving into Color-Coded Editing today!

This is a process I use during the revision stages of editing, all the way through the first phase of line-by-line editing.

For some background, my basic routine usually goes something like this: 

1. Plan my basic novel outline, theme, mood, etc. Some novels require more planning, some I just jump right in!
2. Write the rough draft. The "just get it on paper" draft. 
3. Now is the time for 2nd drafts, rewrites, 3rd drafts, or what have you. This is when I really get the book nailed down. Sometimes a novel is pretty good to go and doesn't need this stage, but let's be honest-- most of them do!
4. Once I have the main substance there, it's on to Color-Coded Editing! (Explained further in this post, with all the how-to in applying it to your methods!)
5. After going through that Color-Coded Editing Process, it's on to basic line-by-line editing.
6. Then it's proofreading. Multiple times. 
7. Then on to Alpha and Beta Readers, and then you move into the stages of publishing!

To preface: I first read something similar to this in the "Now What?" stages of the National Novel Writing Month blog years ago. However, I've tweaked it a lot and so it's quite different from what first gave me the idea. I'm not a huge fan of editing--but this method makes me actually look forward to it.

It's broken up into simple steps with different colors for each one. I use colored pens and underline or circle sections, using a pencil or a regular black pen to write notes in the margins or on sticky notes that I attach to the paper. But if you're a highlighter kind of person, you could definitely use that instead, and of course, feel free to switch up the colors. I just use what I have on hand, and have a personal system for what color goes to what editing step, but you can, of course, adapt it.

Step One: 

1. If you've just finished your book, set it aside for at least a week. I like to go for about a month. This allows you to look at your novel with fresh eyes. If you haven't written in it for a while, you're going to print out your book (I do it on a single side of the paper to offer more space to write notes on the backs). I can hear some people saying: "But, why can't I use my super amazing high-technology for this technique?". It's true, even my laptop+ stylus pen is capable of doing this process all digitally, and if you REALLY want to, go for it. Here's why I think it's important to do it on paper though:
   1. Having a different format allows you to look at it from a different perspective. Fresh eyes mean you'll see things you didn't see before. 
   2. There's more room for the natural flow of scribbles, notes, and doodles. It's all part of the process that I feel is easier on paper-- that brain dump that just is always a little more organic on paper than with technology.
   3. It's also super exciting and motivating to see your novel in print form, even if it is double-spaced, single-sided letter-sized paper. Your words sitting in front of you in a stack is just so amazing.
2. Back to the main point after that little detour! Now you're going to read through the whole thing... if you can, in one sitting. If not, just as soon as possible. Don't try editing at all during this time, unless you printed out the copy with sections you already planned on deleting. For instance, if you happened to write it during NaNoWriMo and you put in a monologue about the weather just to add words, knowing you'd take it out later for publishing-- cross through those now with a red pen. Also, if you notice a character that wanders around with no purpose, give a quick note about them as well. Other than those kinds of things though, refrain from editing! This stage is to just get a feel for your book.

Step Two: By this time, you probably have an idea of what you got right and what you got wrong in your draft. But as I said, don't randomly attack the thing with scribbled-y red ink. If you go back to the beginning, grab an aqua pen. You're going to read through the book again, this time focusing on emotions/tension/reactions, etc. What places make you laugh? cry? feel suspense? Are there no emotions when there should be? Or maybe the wrong ones? Did your character act or say something out of their norm? Is their behavior too melodramatic? Too stoic? This is the time to go through and mark with your aqua pen all the feels (or where there should be some). Make sure that you're following what your character's responses would be, not what yours would be.

Step Three:  Grab an orange pen, and this time you're going to read through it again, looking for places where you're bored, confused, there are plot holes or inconsistencies. If you need to fact-check various things in your book, this is the time to put a little asterisk or something besides those things to check later.

Step Four: 

1. Stop now and reevaluate. You will probably want to change some more major things here. After this step, I realized I needed to rewrite the entire ending for Jonas and Olivia. If you have huge scenes that need to be changed which will take the book in an entirely different direction, or you need to get rid of or fix a character you noticed was there for no good reason (noticed in Step One) go ahead and do that now.
2. To eliminate the need of having to reprint everything again, just write these things on the backs of the pages or on extra notebook paper--unless it's a really big change that involves thousands of words--then stick to the computer. :) This is the time to fix big plot changes, flat characters, tension, reactions, emotions, etc.
3. If you had to rewrite a lot in this stage, you may want to go back to the beginning steps and hit those sections with the previous colors of editing, just to make sure the new parts get the same quality of editing.

Step Five: Take a purple pen and read through your manuscript, this time searching out your descriptions. Not enough? Purple pen to the rescue. Too much? Cross some out. Not written to your satisfaction? Melodramatic? Cliche? Cheesy? Purple pen. Anything that has to do with descriptions tackle now.

Step Six: This time, with a pink pen, check your dialogue. Mark the passages with too little dialogue, and the places with an overabundance. Mark where you lose track of who's speaking, or if too many sentences start with "I". All your dialogue problems should be fixed in this step.

Step Seven: Read through your book again, this time with a green pen. You're going to check now for places where you could use 1 word in place of 10, where words are repeated too closely together, where you use the word in the wrong context and that sort of thing. This is getting more into the details, and by now you probably have a rainbow-inked manuscript, but don't worry--you're close to the end!

Once you finish Step Seven, you're going to have a book full of different colored markings, sticky notes, and scribbled memos. This is the time now to go through your novel on the computer, fixing all the things you marked in the manuscript. By the time you're done, your book will be much better and should be ready for the line-by-line editing stage.

Don't worry if this color-coded editing process takes a long time. That's ok, as long as you don't stop for months in-between stages. (That can make you forget things about the book that you need to keep in mind while editing). Each step may take anywhere from a couple of days to a couple of weeks, depending on how much you need to fix, how long the book is, how much time you have to work on it at once, etc. That's the beauty of this method though-- because it is smaller steps covering the whole novel, rather than trying to remember everything to look out for and crawling through the book, it is super adaptable to whatever schedule works for you. It not only gets editing done in logical steps, but you won't have to worry that you've forgotten important details from chapter two when you're trying to edit chapter forty-seven. 

If you use this technique, I would love to see it! Post your colorful manuscript on your Instagram with the hashtag #fearlesscolorcodedediting for a chance to be featured on our IG story spotlights! 

Stay Fearless!

Victoria

Works in Progress {sneak peek}

Hello, friends.

Once again, this isn't coming to you on a Monday. So sorry about that.

One reason for the delay is that I've been writing a book. While I'm no longer participating in NaNoWriMo events due to their stepping too far into politics rather than sticking to the writing-community services they offer, I am still writing.

Do you remember a very long while back when you voted on which story I should work on? At the time, I thought I was ready to work on the elderly ladies on a road trip story. Apparently, I wasn't then. But I am now.

In fact, back in June, I worked up a very detailed scene-by-scene outline for the story, which is now going to be a book rather than a screenplay (though I may write that version later, just in case anyone wants to make a movie out of it at some point). This story is now my primary project this month.

Of course I have a couple of other ones I'm chipping away on. I can hardly ever focus solely on one project at a time, thanks to my undiagnosed ADD. Yet, I find that working on multiple projects actually aids my creativity instead of harming it.

Maybe it takes me longer to finish each story that way, but the good news is there may be multiple stories finished up around the same time because of this process.

Some of you might be wondering how I keep the various storylines, character names, and plot points straight if I'm working on multiple books at the same time.

Pockets of Time {Focus on Jesus + Life Update}

My next verse to learn for our Focus on Jesus Scripture Memory event is a long one, so it may take me a few weeks to really get it remembered.

We'll still be adding another verse to the mix in a couple of weeks, so I suppose I better find some extra pockets of time for studying between jobs.

Speaking of which, it's time for a bit of a life update.

I know I'm due (overdue, really) to deliver to you another short story. As much as I've tried to pen a few, my mind hasn't been cooperating for such things lately. I'm hoping to be able to get one written in the next few weeks.

You see, I've been working hard on a full-length story for Camp NaNo last month, and the story isn't finished yet, so I'm still plugging away at it. The research has been random, the plot pretty fun to play with, and the characters surprising at times. It's a blast hanging out with this crazy cast of folks, and I can hardly wait until you get to meet them too. Of course, I've got to straighten them out a bit first. First drafts can be pretty rough.

Writing Update {Camp NaNoWriMo 2020}

Hey, friends! Just a swift little writing update for you.

This month is Camp NaNoWriMo, and that means I've been busy typing furiously for the past several weeks. While Camp isn't quite over yet, I have already passed the goal I set prior to the start. February and March were slower creative months for me, so I wasn't sure what to expect for April. Well, I blasted right past the 35,000-word goal I set and am staring down the barrel of 65k. It's looking like I'll be hitting 70,000 words or more.

Woot woot!

Yep, I'm pretty excited. Not only about the word count but about the story itself. Since it's a work in progress, I can't share a ton of details. However, I can tell you that my research has included a few very interesting things. I've had to Google wingsuits, baseball statistics, types of climbing equipment, special needs saddles, and various types of wheelchairs. It's always fun to see the wide variety of things I have to research for any given story I'm working on, and I always learn a lot of information that broadens my horizons. The trick then is to avoid huge information dumps -- or at least make sure to edit them out before the final draft.

The story is taking shape, though it's a pretty rough draft. It's feeling like the early chapters will require some pretty heavy edits, but I often feel like that at this stage of the first draft. Sometimes I'm right and other times I'm wrong and the scenes ended up coming out better than I thought. The scene I was working on yesterday (which was really earlier today for me, because I'm writing this on Sunday night, not Monday morning), came together so well that I might not need to do much more than a quick proofread on it. We'll see if I still feel that same level of confidence once I print out the full draft and pull out my colorful pens and settle in for some color-coded editing.

Slightly Unprepared But Excited

Camp NaNoWriMo starts in two days.

Two days!

Am I ready?

Not exactly. Not as prepared as I’d like to be, anyway.

See, I used to be a pantser, a writer that has a small spark of an idea and then dives into writing the story by the seat of their pants. The creativity and flow of that style is wonderful and right up my alley. However, when I used the pantser method, I inevitably ended up with slumpy middles and struggled to finish out the final chapter or two of my stories. This was a huge problem.

Therefore, I decided to read articles (and I mean dozens of articles) about plotting. There are charts and graphs and tips and many, many outline types out there. It can be overwhelming. Even as I felt myself sinking in the vast ocean of plotting advice and forms and such, I knew that I had to figure out a way to pull some details together prior to writing the first draft. I needed the guidance of a plot or outline. It would be helpful to know my characters at least a little bit before trying to tell their story (otherwise, I end up exploring and discovering who they are in draft one and then having to do heavy edits in rounds two, three, and four).

Preparing for Camp NaNoWriMo

Camp NaNoWriMo is in one month.

One month.

I am not yet ready for this, but I will be. During March, I'll be doing prep work for the first NaNo event of the year.

Character development is a large part of my preparation. If I don't know the characters well enough, writing in their voices becomes practically impossible. So I'm learning all I can about them as I work through a couple of different questionnaires. The loooooong one is only for the two leads, whereas the short form will be for several supporting cast members. I'm diving into their personalities, emotions, and dreams as well as their fears, faults, and sorrows.

One of the neat things I've already learned through the long form is that this particular form gives me insights not only into the leads but also into their friends and relatives. Any important relationships they have get explored through this form, which should, in theory, make the short form for the supporting cast go a lot quicker as I'm already figuring out bits and pieces (and sometimes large chunks!) of who these supporting characters are and how they effect the leads' lives.

The Flower {a short story}

Would the young boy never decide? Mortimer checked his wristwatch one more time and looked to the door. He should flip the sign to Closed and lock the child in until he made his choice, but it would be unprofessional and inappropriate. Still, he needed to close down the shop for the day. His Margaretta would have dinner on the table by now. He could almost taste the rich aroma of his favorite homemade tomato and mascarpone sauce wafting down the back staircase.

Coins clinked together as the towheaded boy in the ratty shirt and hole-spattered jeans counted the money in his palm again. He eyed the medium-sized bouquet of red roses displayed atop the glass counter in front of him. Valentine’s Day was only around the corner, but surely this scrap of a boy couldn’t afford such a bundle of deep-ruby petals.

“What’ll it be?” Mortimer didn’t mean to sound so gruff about it. The day had worn him out. Four orders had been cancelled, due to breakups mere days before the most romantic holiday of the year. Poor chums. Hadn’t found a true pearl like his Margaretta. He decided to soften his tone a bit and try to encourage the lad to make a quick decision. “Have you considered the daisies? There’s a full rainbow of colors to choose from, just in the bins behind you there.”

The boy turned his torso to look for a long moment at the various shades of daisies not far beyond where he stood rooted to the linoleum tiles that had seen better days. When he turned back around, his shoulders curled forward, and his chin nearly disappeared into his t-shirt. “Didn’t sell my bike to Tommy for no stupid daisies.” He swiped a wrist beneath his nose as he sniffed.

Mortimer couldn’t miss the glimmer in the kid’s eyes.

November Review {part one}

Late again, I’m afraid. The holidays and recovery from the busy week have caught up to me, apparently. I’ll try to do better next week, y’all.

The next few weeks here at Writing to Inspire will be a recap of my November. I'm eager to hear about yours too, so please share in the comment section as you're able.

NaNoWriMo

November’s writing challenge, National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), was wonderful for me. I started out editing several chapters of an old favorite, but then I discovered writing crawls in the NaNo forums.

Writing crawls usually contain different tasks within a story format, and each task is writing related. For example, you might be challenged to write 300 words in 15 minutes, to sprint to 100 words, or to write for 30 minutes without taking a break. Some of the crawls even incorporate stretch breaks, snack times, and exercises to keep the back, wrists, and neck from getting too tight from being hunched over the computer (or pad of paper).

Characters Who Celebrate Christmas In the Story {reading challenge}

Holiday Baking

It's the week of Thanksgiving here in America, and that means I'm busy baking and cooking up a storm. I finally decided on the new recipes I'll be trying. I've been told holidays are not the times to test out new-to-me recipes, but I beg to differ. I've only come across a couple of duds over the years, and thankfully they were ones I taste tested before sharing... which means I didn't share those couple of things. But I've found some really great dishes over the holidays through my teens and twenties. Now that I'm in my thirties, I feel like it's practically tradition for me to try something new for Thanksgiving and Christmas and sometimes even New Year's Day.