Ask the Author: Ivan D. Wainewright
Answered Questions (5)
Ivan D. Wainewright
I'd go to Erin Morgenstern's Night Circus. Who wouldn't want to wander and wonder around her world.
Ivan D. Wainewright
Organising the audiobook version of The Other Times of Caroline Tangent. Rather exciting!
Ivan D. Wainewright
If I am trying to plan a story, or consider how I can take an existing narrative in a different direction, I love Mind Mapping. Drawing mind maps helps me far more than simply writing lists on paper or on a computer screen. I find it especially helpful when I am first thinking about a new story. I may already have a simple, central idea in my mind, but when I draw it out as a Mind Map, it gives me a far better process for expanding it and making me see what is good – or not so good.
The other thing I do, if I am stuck on a plot point or wanting to think how I could move a story along, is drive round the M25 – seriously! I do this when I am visiting my mother and I find that being alone in the car with no other distractions helps me focus my mind on whatever problem I am trying to overcome!
The other thing I do, if I am stuck on a plot point or wanting to think how I could move a story along, is drive round the M25 – seriously! I do this when I am visiting my mother and I find that being alone in the car with no other distractions helps me focus my mind on whatever problem I am trying to overcome!
Ivan D. Wainewright
1) Write what you like to read.
2) Finish something! I can’t tell you how many “Chapter ones” I wrote… Finish a book, even if it’s not your best work – it gives you such good experience and a great feeling of achievement.
2) Finish something! I can’t tell you how many “Chapter ones” I wrote… Finish a book, even if it’s not your best work – it gives you such good experience and a great feeling of achievement.
Ivan D. Wainewright
I was doing my usual “writing activity” of surfing the web, and I read a forum discussing people’s favourite ever gigs; and gigs they wished they’d been to. And it just popped into my head: what if someone invented a time machine so you could go and see any concert in history? Then I almost immediately thought of the ‘major twist’ in the book. I couldn’t quite believe that no one had incorporated either concept in a novel already, so I spent two hours Googling and looking at various book sites trying to find out. When I realised my idea might be new, I thought I’d better write it quick!
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