Ask the Author: Larry Verstraete
Answered Questions (4)
Larry Verstraete
Right now, I am drafting a second middle grade novel. The process is quite different this time - more open and less structured than the first novel, Missing in Paradise. So far, so good. Progress is steady.
Larry Verstraete
Prime writing time for me is first thing in the morning. I head out the door, drive to a nearby coffee shop, and write from there with a cup of coffee at my side. I’ve kept the same habit for over 25 years now so there’s no point in changing it now. The hum of voices in the coffee shop, a table free of clutter, unlimited hot coffee – all of these are essential ingredients to my writing process.
Larry Verstraete
I rarely have writer's block. I keep a steady routine - up early, out for coffee at a nearby café where I write for an hour or two. As soon as I sit at my favourite table, I start writing. Being in a familiar place, away from the distractions of home, responsible for only one thing - writing - helps set the tone. I usually start by reviewing something I wrote the day before, and that makes the jump to new material easy.
Larry Verstraete
My recent book, 'Missing in Paradise', is fiction, a new form for me, and something I've worked on here and there for the past 10 years. It's hard to say exactly where the idea to write about two friends on the hunt for treasure started, but I am sure it had a lot to do with my own boyhood. I was one of those kids who dug in the family garden, convinced I'd stumble upon pirate gold between the rows of tomatoes. Either that or dig a hole to China! Writing this book was a way of living out my own fantasies, I suppose.
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