My Writing Process Blog Tour
The intrepid Danielle Birch tagged me on Facebook for a My Writing Process Blog Tour.
Below are my answers to the four questions I was asked:
1) What am I working on?
Just the Way You Are is the fourth and last story in the Just Life series. It's Jonathan's story - he's the one who had been living with abusive Anthony (Cole), Mark's ex. At the end of Just in Time, Anthony stabs Jonathan, Liam and himself and they all end up in hospital with Liam and Mark tentatively deciding to see where their relationship could take them.
At the beginning of Just the Way You Are, Jonathan is just out of hospital and packing up his belongings to leave Anthony.
2) How does my work differ from others of its genre?
There are a lot of stories out there in different sub-genres. A lot of them feel larger than life. That's not a bad thing but my writing isn't often like that (although sometimes it is). It's more often about ordinary people living ordinary lives and sometimes having to do extraordinary things to achieve their dreams. I hope it makes ordinary people feel like extraordinary lives are achievable or, conversely, that ordinary lives lived happily are just about perfect.
3) Why do I write what I do?
If you asked my family, they'd probably say 'because she's a nightmare if she isn't writing'. I do get very antsy if I'm not writing regularly. I have all these people inside my head clamouring for their tales to be told and I can't contain them.
I also write because everyone needs a voice. I write in a niche market because it is a niche. It's the smaller avenues that often don't have a voice. I work with adolescents, many of whom don't have access to material that helps them feel normal and accepted. So why don't I write for adolescents? I reiterate: I work with adolescents. Anyone who's spent any time with adolescents knows what a challenge they can present to your mental equilibrium. Spending 8-10 hours a day around them ensures I don't want them in my head outside work. There are a lot of adults out there who haven't been told often enough that they're wonderful just the way they are. I hope my work goes some way toward giving my readers a message that everyone, whoever they are, deserves unconditional acceptance and love (with the emphasis on unconditional).
4) How does your writing process work?
I don't plot. Clarification: I never have a plot or outline when I start a story. By the end of the first chapter I have several partially completed character profiles, usually just physical descriptions and background. These are built up as I write and get to know my characters better. By the end of writing, they include goal, motivation, conflict, emotional reactions to various things, etc. By the end of about 8000-10000 words, I'll have a scene description completed and a mind map or list of possible plot directions. Somewhere between 30000 and 60000 words, depending on how easily the words are flowing, I'll have to stop and look at the structure of the story. That's when I check I have all the important elements in and my characters' goals, motivations and conflict are responding accordingly. At this point I'll often rewrite scenes in different points of view so they're stronger and I'll add, delete or combine secondary or minor characters. I might or might not have finished the story at that stage. With longer works, I often have to do the structural thing before the direction to the end becomes clear because I still don't have a complete outline. I will also, at some stage, create a scene map so I can keep track of what's happening when and whose point of view it's told in.
I don't want to know the ending of the story until I write it, or just before. If I find out how things are going to end before I get there, I lose interest and stop writing. I have a lot of stories that have four or five chapters written, then the last chapter for the ending and the rest is still missing--years later.
All this going back and forth usually means that by the time the story is finished it's basically been through four or five rounds of edits.
Shorter works are different. Quite often, with short stories and short novellas, the entire story appears in my head over a period of time as I sit on my back deck watching the clouds go by. As soon as I begin to imagine the ending, I open my computer and begin typing. When it works like this, there's very little editing to be done. The stories are short enough they hang together easily, and after all that thinking, most of the glitches have been worked out.
I'm a 'build a bridge and get over it' kind of person. I don't have a lot of tolerance for wallowing in self-destructive emotions and get very impatient with myself when I do it in my own life. I do understand that readers need and want to know how characters feel and deal. This means I often have to go back through my work and layer in the emotional reactions to things happening to my characters. They feel it, just don't always show it. It's this aspect of writing I find the most challenging.
Up next:
Amelia Bishop
KJ Charles
AB Gayle
Please check out the blogs of these fabulous writers.
Below are my answers to the four questions I was asked:
1) What am I working on?
Just the Way You Are is the fourth and last story in the Just Life series. It's Jonathan's story - he's the one who had been living with abusive Anthony (Cole), Mark's ex. At the end of Just in Time, Anthony stabs Jonathan, Liam and himself and they all end up in hospital with Liam and Mark tentatively deciding to see where their relationship could take them.
At the beginning of Just the Way You Are, Jonathan is just out of hospital and packing up his belongings to leave Anthony.
2) How does my work differ from others of its genre?
There are a lot of stories out there in different sub-genres. A lot of them feel larger than life. That's not a bad thing but my writing isn't often like that (although sometimes it is). It's more often about ordinary people living ordinary lives and sometimes having to do extraordinary things to achieve their dreams. I hope it makes ordinary people feel like extraordinary lives are achievable or, conversely, that ordinary lives lived happily are just about perfect.
3) Why do I write what I do?
If you asked my family, they'd probably say 'because she's a nightmare if she isn't writing'. I do get very antsy if I'm not writing regularly. I have all these people inside my head clamouring for their tales to be told and I can't contain them.
I also write because everyone needs a voice. I write in a niche market because it is a niche. It's the smaller avenues that often don't have a voice. I work with adolescents, many of whom don't have access to material that helps them feel normal and accepted. So why don't I write for adolescents? I reiterate: I work with adolescents. Anyone who's spent any time with adolescents knows what a challenge they can present to your mental equilibrium. Spending 8-10 hours a day around them ensures I don't want them in my head outside work. There are a lot of adults out there who haven't been told often enough that they're wonderful just the way they are. I hope my work goes some way toward giving my readers a message that everyone, whoever they are, deserves unconditional acceptance and love (with the emphasis on unconditional).
4) How does your writing process work?
I don't plot. Clarification: I never have a plot or outline when I start a story. By the end of the first chapter I have several partially completed character profiles, usually just physical descriptions and background. These are built up as I write and get to know my characters better. By the end of writing, they include goal, motivation, conflict, emotional reactions to various things, etc. By the end of about 8000-10000 words, I'll have a scene description completed and a mind map or list of possible plot directions. Somewhere between 30000 and 60000 words, depending on how easily the words are flowing, I'll have to stop and look at the structure of the story. That's when I check I have all the important elements in and my characters' goals, motivations and conflict are responding accordingly. At this point I'll often rewrite scenes in different points of view so they're stronger and I'll add, delete or combine secondary or minor characters. I might or might not have finished the story at that stage. With longer works, I often have to do the structural thing before the direction to the end becomes clear because I still don't have a complete outline. I will also, at some stage, create a scene map so I can keep track of what's happening when and whose point of view it's told in.
I don't want to know the ending of the story until I write it, or just before. If I find out how things are going to end before I get there, I lose interest and stop writing. I have a lot of stories that have four or five chapters written, then the last chapter for the ending and the rest is still missing--years later.
All this going back and forth usually means that by the time the story is finished it's basically been through four or five rounds of edits.
Shorter works are different. Quite often, with short stories and short novellas, the entire story appears in my head over a period of time as I sit on my back deck watching the clouds go by. As soon as I begin to imagine the ending, I open my computer and begin typing. When it works like this, there's very little editing to be done. The stories are short enough they hang together easily, and after all that thinking, most of the glitches have been worked out.
I'm a 'build a bridge and get over it' kind of person. I don't have a lot of tolerance for wallowing in self-destructive emotions and get very impatient with myself when I do it in my own life. I do understand that readers need and want to know how characters feel and deal. This means I often have to go back through my work and layer in the emotional reactions to things happening to my characters. They feel it, just don't always show it. It's this aspect of writing I find the most challenging.
Up next:
Amelia Bishop
KJ Charles
AB Gayle
Please check out the blogs of these fabulous writers.
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