Twisted Leaf Editing

Manuscript Evaluations | Developmental Editing | Line Editing | Proofreading Breathing life into your fantasy 🌿 Anti-AI - human art created, and edited, by humans for humans www.twistedleaf.co.uk

[twistedleafediting]

Twisted Leaf Editing Service List

Hello there. Permit me to go over the services that Twisted Leaf offer, what they entail and how much they cost.

I am committed to staying affordable, whilst specialising in fantasy writing. I am also committed to giving the best service I can, including communication, and tailoring my advice to you and your writing. It's something I am quite proud of.

I offer single services, as well as bundles. Read more under the cut.

Single services:

Manuscript Evaluation

£99 for 15,000 words + £5 per 1000 words thereafter

Manuscript evaluation is a comprehensive check that critically examines the manuscript’s content, structure, and overall quality.

What you get:

A comprehensive report detailing feedback on various elements such as characterisation, plot, structure, and style.

Feedback that tells you what works, what doesn’t, what needs improvement, and what needs changing.

Why it could benefit you:

Works well for lower budgets, and/or less time.

Takes less time than a developmental edit.

Gives you a big picture view of your work.

Developmental Editing

£150 for 15,000 words + £10 per 1000 words thereafter

Focusing on the overall world-building, characterisation and plot of the story, developmental editing refines and ensures the information presented to the reader.

What you get:

Editorial suggestions to elevate the flow of the plot.

Ensure your story meets the expectations of the genre and the audience.

Personalised editorial suggestions.

Why it could benefit you:

A more in-depth look at the big picture view of the story than a manuscript evaluation.

Looks at plot, characterisation, dialogue, and pacing of your writing.

Ensure the readability, flow, and logic of the writing.

Line Editing

£165 for 15,000 words + £7 per 1000 words thereafter

Line editing focuses on the use of language within the manuscript, at a sentence or paragraph level, it looks at word usage, repetitiveness, redundancy of words, reader flow, and ambiguity.

What you get:

Editorial suggestions for word choice, sentence structure, and paragraph flow.

Prioritisation of your narrative voice.

Why it could benefit you:

A line-by-line edits to look at the details of your writing.

An attention to detail that can catch details that could be improved upon.

Elevates your writing to strengthen your story.

Bundles:

The Plot Begins Bundle

£50 per hour

Manuscript evaluation with added developmental edit suggestions are done at the same time, so no waiting around for both to be done separately!

This is a great bundle if you are looking for advice concerning the overall structure, balance, and readability of your manuscript.

The Plot Twist Bundle

£60 per hour

The best of both overall structure and detail-oriented edits! This bundle includes both developmental editing and line editing.

This is a great bundle if you are looking for some feedback regarding the plot of your story whilst ensuring your use of language is as good as can be.

The Details Bundle

£70 per hour

This bundle contains line editing, copyediting, and proofreading. Copyediting is making sure the writing is clear, accurate, and correct in spelling and grammar. Proofreading is ensuring the completed manuscript is free of errors from punctuation, spelling and grammar, whilst making sure the final version of the manuscript reaches design specifications.

This is a great bundle if you are looking for edits that get into the nitty gritty of details.

To see if I'm the editor for you, head over to my website where there's also a contact form to talk to me more about any queries you may have.

[twistedleafediting]

Pride Month 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️

June is Pride Month! This month is about acceptance, equality, and celebrating LGBTQ+ people, education in LGBTQ+ history, as well as raising awareness of issues affecting the LGBTQ+ community.

Homophobia, and transphobia in all of their many forms is also prevalent as pride month calls for remembering how damaging these mindsets were and can still be.

Love is love, no matter who you are.

So let's celebrate some queer fantasy books:

Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldtree. Cozy fantasy featuring LGBT and lesbian themes. Think Dungeons and Dragons, but post-adventure and taking place in a cute coffee shop. Reviews.

The Darkness Outside Us by Eliot Schrefer. Forced proximity on an away mission in a space adventure, with an added mystery to intrigue. Reviews.

The Gilded Crown by Marianne Gordon. A woman who can bring back the dead at a price, and a princess who is under threat of assassination.

Nimona by ND Stevenson. An impulsive shapeshifter with a knack for villainy, and a villain with a vendetta team up to prove to the kingdom that the heroes they look up to aren't who they say they are. Reviews. (also made into a film on Netflix which is animated beautifully).

Remember, if you're going to a parade, to stay hydrated!

[twistedleafediting]

World Reef Awareness Day

Today — 1st June — is World Reef Awareness Day and unites people in the ever-necessary world of reef conservation and protection. To create art is to be human, to be human is to have humanity, and humanity started in the oceans. It is important to learn about, and protect, the beautiful underwater ecosystems of the world we all live in.

Find out more about World Reef Awareness Day here.

In the meantime, you can also dive into some books that take place, on, near, or in the ocean:

Tress of the Emerald Sea - Brandon Sanderson. -> A YA high fantasy adventure involving pirates and romance. Reviews

Sea of Souls - N. C. Scrimgeour. -> A dark fantasy steeped in Scottish folklore involving monsters and magic. Reviews

Voyage of the Damned - Frances White. -> A queer fantasy mystery, a tale of intrigue and survival. Reviews

The Sirens - Emilia Hart. -> A historical fiction mystery told from two perspectives about the power of sisterhood and female resilience. Reviews

Stay hydrated and stay mindful!

[twistedleafediting]

Unhinged writing tip of the week

When reading, keep a small notebook nearby and anytime you find a sentence or paragraph that you like, note it down along with the reason why. It will help you to look at your writing from a different perspective and helps you to learn about your own phrasing and style.

[authorarbour]

AI-less tools for those who want to write!

This is the beginning of a list full of suggestions of apps / programs / tools that can be used to write that hold absolutely no AI (either for scraping or learning). I'll start:

LibreOffice -> A competent AI-less suite that rivals Microslop's Office Suite. It's free with an option to donate, and I use Writer for all my writing, and Calc occasionally for spreadsheets. I love LibreOffice and will rave about it all day if allowed.

Chronicler -> It's like creating a wikipedia for your world / characters. It's free with a paid option for further cosmetic enhancements. I enjoy it for it's ability to link things together.

vvd.world -> It's like chronicler but does the coding for you, you just write into it. There are some options for AI use to separate your writings into sub-headings, but you can turn it all off.

Honourable mention, to a time before AI and endless superfluous subscription fees, Microsoft Office Word from the early 2000s through to 2021. There's ways and means to have these versions if you just love the way Word works (I personally love it for editing), but you may need to become a bit of a pirate to find them ;)

Please add onto this list so others may benefit!

[authorarbour]

Adding onto this for visual sources!

Unsplash -> it's a stock image finder, real images created by real humans. You can find locations, items, creatures, and pictures of people. IMHO, it's better than Pinterest due to Pinterest being an ad and slop filled app at this point.

Heroforge -> Create a 3D model of your character that you can paint on the website for free, with the option to buy to print or have printed. Great for character visualisation, and your tabletop RPG.

Picrew -> Again, another way to visualise your characters for free. Many great artstyles to choose from and browse.

For those who game in the time they're not writing:

The Sims / Paralives are pretty decent for architecture and for designing characters.

Character creator on Baldur's Gate 3. It's weak as a base game creator, however it has it's own in-built mod menu where you can install any number of mods to your game, including for character creation and you can almost create anything now.

[livelaughwriteit]

Advice on Endings

I hate ending my stories. I will drag a story on long after it should have ended even though I know it should be done with. If anyone else struggles as well, here is a list of the different types of endings that are common.

Full Circle – Mirror the beginning of the story, show how the tone has shifted from start to end

Bittersweet – Character wins at the cost of something else, creates emotional depth

Emotional resolution – Focuses more on the growth of the characters than the events of the story

Twist – reveal something that changes the readers perspective or understanding

Open – doesn’t answer all the questions or solve all the conflicts of the story, leaving room for interpretation

Quiet – Subtle, reflective ending rather than a dramatic event

Sacrifice – The character has to give something up to achieve a greater goal

Hopeful – Despite the events of the story, there is a distinct sense that everything will be okay

Consequence – Shows how the characters choices throughout the story impact the world or their relationship

Character choice – centers on a decision that defines who the character has become through the story

[writingdose]

being a writer is

50% daydreaming about plots and writing

50% procrastinating/suffering during the actual writing process

[livelaughwriteit]

Writing Sexual Tension

Some tips and tricks I’ve seen on Tumblr, on Pinterest or have learned the hard way while writing. These are pretty basic but sometimes basic is good!

Realizing they can feel the person touching them. Maybe they’re not touching but they can feel the warmth.

Accidentally saying something flirty and both of you freeze. Or saying something flirty and the other person panicking and running away

Eyes dropping to lips. Eyes looking them up and down. Eyes unable to look away. Eyes unable to make contact without blushing. Eyes are you best friend.

Mirroring. When people have crushes or like someone (or want someone to like them) they do what is called mirroring. If character 1 crosses their arms and character 2 has a crush on them, have character 2 cross their arms too.

New Girl taught me about toes. If their feet are facing you, they want to stay. If their feet are pointed away, they want to leave. I’ve found its not always true but its something you can mention or use.

Unable to stop smiling. Unable to stop laughing.

Touching the other one when you laugh. Touching them to move them out of the way. Touching them and not moving your hand away

Hugging them when you see them. Sharing a bed. Trying to be near them at all moments.

Looking at their lips and fantasizing about kissing them.

Watching others interact in some way with them or how they act around them and being super jealous, wondering why they don’t act that way with you.

[livelaughwriteit]

What happens when your character realizes they're in love...

Here are some things that may happen when your character realizes they are in love with someone. These can be totally obvious or be super subtle. I think that can depend on your character's mannerisms and personality! Have fun writing!

Notice everything. They start to notice things about the other person. Have freak outs when they notice they notice. They notice nervous ticks, small details no one else notices, patterns.

Hyperawareness. They become hyperaware of their own bodies and what they are doing as well as the other person’s body. They are unable to think about anything other than how close the person is. What they smell like.

They may change their behavior. They may become mean, guarded or distant. They may embrace it, try to see how the other person feels. All that matters is nothing is as natural as it had felt like before. They may realize they want to share everything with that person or notice that they have been sharing everything and stop. Inconsistencies may occur where they are normal one day and distant the next while they try to make it appear like everything is the same.

Self-sabotage. Not all characters will do this, sometimes they will. They might think that the relationship will never happen and that it is doomed before it starts. It may cause them to pull away even more, stop hanging out and “protect” themselves but ultimately push the other person away. Silence becomes deafening and everything is a sign of whether the other person feels the same.

[twistedleafediting]

Unhinged writing tip of the week

Your target audience (ideally) is you! Write what you want to see in a book, no one else will tell the story that's begging to get out of your heart. Be unapologetically you and write it.

[nondelphic]

i’m not procrastinating. i’m allowing the story to ferment. like kimchi. or a crime scene

[twistedleafediting]

Twisted Leaf Editing & Our Stance on AI

It sucks. Rant incoming, I apologise in advance.

Plain and simply, AI "writing" is unethical, it is causing witch hunts within the writing community and quite frankly, if you as an AI "writer" / "artist" wanted to complete the task of creating something such as prose or poems or art, then you would have picked up a pen or pencil long ago.

"But I'm disabled and I need the tools." There are plenty of tools out there for disabled artists / writers. There's audio-dictation, I've seen people paint with their feet or their mouths. Artists create their own way in the world, they create their own tools and work-flow along the way. (For the purposes of clarity, spell-check has been around for decades, and is not classed as AI use).

"But AI is a good tool." No. No it isn't. It's paying a bootlegger for their copy of Shrek 6 (which at the time of writing this, does not exist). The AI mostly being used is generative AI, or LLMs (Language Learning Models) to use the scientific jargon. The same AI that was scraping and being fed with stolen works. What it's pumping out is slop that was mish-mashed together from works that it took without permission and you can even search for what was stolen: here, and here. Inspiration is good, until it's plagiarism. And friends, AI is a thief with no original ideas.

"It doesn't harm anyone." I am a firm supporter of our natural world and the resources that AI datacentres take away from us is abhorrent. Including from our own brains.

That all being said, our stance on AI is simple: human hands create human works for human consumption. Why should editing be automated by a machine? I edit proudly by hand, because your work should be treated with the same gentleness as handling a new-born baby.

[allthingswhumpyandangsty]

nobody “writes like ai” as long as they write, then they write. period. there’s no “writing like ai”. because by saying someone “writes like ai”, you’re implying that ai actually writes and that ai is the blueprint. but what ai does is mimic human-made works.

ai writes (aka they’re mimicking) like humans. not the other way around.

saying “this writer writes like ai” is the equivalent of saying “your work looks like those other works that copied yours”

[twistedleafediting]

Let's Discuss - Perspective

I have briefly touched upon perspective in writing during the discussion of The Narrative Voice. But today, I'd like to dive a little deeper into it.

Perspective follows your main character (or characters, depending on if you're writing from multiple viewpoints), and can influence the way you write the story of your book.

There are three point of views you can write from:

First person perspective -> Good for unreliable narration, diving deep into the thoughts of your main character, and for seeing the world through their eyes. Examples of this: The Dresden Files by Jim Butcher, The Farseer Trilogy by Robin Hobb, The Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells.

Second person perspective -> Good for turning the audience into the character, great for interactive reads. Examples are few, but the main one that springs to mind is the Give Yourself Goosebumps by R. L. Stine and Scholastic Press.

Third person perspective -> Good for turning the narration into a character themself (if so chosen), reliable narration and ability to hop between characters viewpoints with ease. Examples: The Raven Scholar by Antonia Hodgson, Discworld by Terry Pratchett, most of Brandon Sanderson's Cosmere Universe.

Readers like different perspectives and each writer will have a preference, but as a writer it is your job to pick the best one for your story and your style.

As well as the perspective of the main character/narrator, you also have to choose which tense to write in.

Past, present, or future?

Past tense, this is the easiest to write in, and as such easy for the readers. Everything has already happened, you're just describing it. Think of it like writing a diary.

Present tense, this is where you write as if the scene is happening in front of you. A lot of writers have trouble with this initially as it's easy to accidentally slip into past tense whilst writing (which is why proofreading and editing are important!). However, when done correctly, it can be very impactful.

Future tense, you're writing things that will happen, before they come to pass. This, in my personal opinion is the hardest to write and more difficult to read. However, this one can work quite well with a second-person perspective.

Finding and sticking to the tense you've chosen can be a challenge, but once you do and it fits nicely with the perspective of narration, you will see that you can elevate your own writing voice and style even before an editor looks at it.

If you haven't had any experience with any of the perspectives listed above, I recommend finding and reading books or stories that feature them. Get a feel of those writing styles as a reader, and see what you like and what you don't like about each.

Remember, writing is a marathon, not a sprint, and you train for it by reading and writing little experimental drabs.

[anexperimentallife]

Also applies to "AI" "artists" and "musicians."

[an0neemouse]

Write whatever you want. Write that incredibly niche thing that only two other people on earth will get. Write the super indulgent cliche thing that makes you kick your feet giddily. Write the angry rage story that whumps them all and makes people cry.

Whatever it is that YOU want to write. Write it. Because only YOU can.

[twistedleafediting]

Unhinged writing tip of the week

Stop writing. Seriously, just stop. Get up, stretch, go for a little walk and see how many steps you can get in on your way to get a glass of water. Open a window and breathe in the fresh air. Then go back to writing.