Saturday, March 9, 2013

It's a process

I just finished writing the fourth book in my Nyx Slaughter series and was a little surprised to still get it all out in just over a week. Granted we are only talking about 52,000 words, so it isn't War and Peace or anything, but I feel good about the length and pace of it.

When I read books, I find myself skipping over vast chunks of content that don't move fast enough for me or are overly descriptive about things I really don't care about. Because of that, I try to keep things short and sweet.

I find when I am writing, I have to wait to really begin until I work the opening line out in my mind. Usually that line is someone saying something and it takes me time to figure out the perfect way to start the conversation. I tend to figure it all out right before I fall asleep. Thankfully, I have a good memory because you won't see me jumping out of bed to grab my laptop.

The ending of the book is usually played out in my mind before the first line is even written. I find that I write the end out and then drive everything else to get to that point. On the way, I do end up changing it slightly based on where the characters take me, but it stays in essentially the same form.

All the middle parts tend to just work themselves out. I start writing things and the characters really take me places. I used to laugh when I heard authors saying things like that, but it is true for me too. I can be writing a scene and all of a sudden I put my hands over my eyes and shake my head asking myself, "Why are they doing this to me?"

As far as the editing process goes, I am still working that out a little. I started out just reading through it myself and then having a friend go over it. I found that when I would go over it again, I would continue to find issues. I started reading it aloud to myself and that helped some, but I still read things how I envisioned them and not what was actually written. To help with that, I have started to convert my Word docs into pdfs and letting Acrobat read the book to me. This helped a lot. After having it read to me three or four times, I think things look pretty good.

For the book I just finished, I am letting it sit until the end of the month. I think, after a week or two, I will have it read to me one last time before publishing it. The first three were works I had already completed so they went out pretty quickly and grouped together. I want to have a little air in between them and this one.

The fifth book, Night Lurks, already has an ending in my mind. I even have a couple scenes played out, but haven't got the synopsis ready, just yet. The cover was done a couple days ago and it is my favorite one so far. I expect to actually start writing next week and hope for an end of April release. By then I hope to have some more feedback on the first three, so I can figure out if I am nuts about this whole writing deal.

I like my books and the few people that have read and left comments on them seem to like them, but I can be a pessimistic and a worrier, so I am always afraid to hear they aren't as good as I really think they are. In a way, it doesn't matter because I love the world I have created. I think that is what every author has to believe. There are always critics and in life you have to take the good with the bad.

Well until next time, happy reading.

Amber

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