I can give my own point of view on this. Some have asked how do I struture my books, and how do I get going, and what are the thought processes involved.
I am not the kind of writer who spends very long thinking about what is happeing with the plot. When I started writing the Sequetus Series, it was a new and novel experience for me. It was 1989, and I sat down in my kitchen with a pen and a large ledger book, and simply wrote what came to mind. What came to mind was quite exciting for me. I had never thought of it before. I think I hand wrote about 25 pages that night before I stopped a couple of hours later. It was late and I had to go to work managing a construction site the next day. That was what I did for a living.
The next day I wondered what it was that I had stumbled onto. I thought about what I had written. Over the following month I would go home to find out what was happening in the story. The only way I could find out was to write it. I would sit down and write from the previous sentence of the previous night. It was as though I was reading the story as a reader, but by writing it.
So for me, it was about simply writing the story, and writing and writing. Usually, as I wrote a sentence, the next sentence would come to me. Sometimes I would experience great emotional surges that would come out with the writing. Some of my readers would tell me they cried, laughed, and so on, and so would I.
The first few books were all done this way with a pen and a dozen ledger books, which eventually stacked up a foot or so, one on top of the other. The first books from the Sequetus Series are from this time.
My brother, who is a professional artist, explained this to me as the creative-stream.Â
Recently, I had been working in the country areas of Australia, building more buildings, and I had quite a distance to drive. I was at night and week ends doing my writing, completing the last of the books. Sometimes during this driving to work at around 5:30 am, the story would come to me in flashes, but that was all.
I recall once I made a concious decision to structure these books and finish them, as they were getting long in number. But structuring make no difference. The story still went where it was going to go. It was like I had the tail of the animal, and it was going take me where it was going. It was not like I had a lot of control over it. My job, simply seemed to be the writer.
I recall once, sitting down and deciding that in this book, we will finish. That was six books from the end. Obviously it did not work. By Book 18 of the Sequetus Series I thought that must be enough. It was not, and the story continued. Finally, after Book 23, to my relief, the story did end. What was interesting however, was that as soon as I said it was finished, it was not really. That night after finishing I went home relieved, but quickly I found ideas shooting at me for the first chapter of a sequel book. The ideas seemed to pour in for the next several weeks. I did my best not to look at them.
Now that the twenty-three books of the Sequetius Series are finished I look back with amazement at the way they were written. I believe that writing like this provides a freshness. Others might do it differently.
My next book is not going to be fiction though, so I think this will be a different form of writing. But for fiction, I can only recommend a potential author to be seated, and simply start writing what comes into his mind.
I hope this helps.
I am not the kind of writer who spends very long thinking about what is happeing with the plot. When I started writing the Sequetus Series, it was a new and novel experience for me. It was 1989, and I sat down in my kitchen with a pen and a large ledger book, and simply wrote what came to mind. What came to mind was quite exciting for me. I had never thought of it before. I think I hand wrote about 25 pages that night before I stopped a couple of hours later. It was late and I had to go to work managing a construction site the next day. That was what I did for a living.
The next day I wondered what it was that I had stumbled onto. I thought about what I had written. Over the following month I would go home to find out what was happening in the story. The only way I could find out was to write it. I would sit down and write from the previous sentence of the previous night. It was as though I was reading the story as a reader, but by writing it.
So for me, it was about simply writing the story, and writing and writing. Usually, as I wrote a sentence, the next sentence would come to me. Sometimes I would experience great emotional surges that would come out with the writing. Some of my readers would tell me they cried, laughed, and so on, and so would I.
The first few books were all done this way with a pen and a dozen ledger books, which eventually stacked up a foot or so, one on top of the other. The first books from the Sequetus Series are from this time.
My brother, who is a professional artist, explained this to me as the creative-stream.Â
Recently, I had been working in the country areas of Australia, building more buildings, and I had quite a distance to drive. I was at night and week ends doing my writing, completing the last of the books. Sometimes during this driving to work at around 5:30 am, the story would come to me in flashes, but that was all.
I recall once I made a concious decision to structure these books and finish them, as they were getting long in number. But structuring make no difference. The story still went where it was going to go. It was like I had the tail of the animal, and it was going take me where it was going. It was not like I had a lot of control over it. My job, simply seemed to be the writer.
I recall once, sitting down and deciding that in this book, we will finish. That was six books from the end. Obviously it did not work. By Book 18 of the Sequetus Series I thought that must be enough. It was not, and the story continued. Finally, after Book 23, to my relief, the story did end. What was interesting however, was that as soon as I said it was finished, it was not really. That night after finishing I went home relieved, but quickly I found ideas shooting at me for the first chapter of a sequel book. The ideas seemed to pour in for the next several weeks. I did my best not to look at them.
Now that the twenty-three books of the Sequetius Series are finished I look back with amazement at the way they were written. I believe that writing like this provides a freshness. Others might do it differently.
My next book is not going to be fiction though, so I think this will be a different form of writing. But for fiction, I can only recommend a potential author to be seated, and simply start writing what comes into his mind.
I hope this helps.