Joshua 2 vs Joshua 3

All my online writing buddies are all talking about this post today. It’s about how an author falls in and then out of love with their manuscript.

Right now I’m madly in love with Joshua 3, convinced it’s the cleverest and prettiest book ever. Meanwhile I’m sullenly continuing to date Joshua 2 even though we both know it’ll soon be over. And Joshua 1 is my glamorous ex- who’s gone on to much better things than me. (In a sexy orange outfit, no less.)

My life right now:

In the mornings I go straight to the desk and fiff and faff for a bit. Then I read through yesterday’s new words once again and tweak. Then I look at my plan for Joshua 3 and see where I’m up to. And then, just as I’m thinking that I really don’t feel in the mood, I start writing.

Somehow, I get words out. This is where a writer reaps the benefit of having established a work habit. If I only wrote when I felt in the mood, these days, I would hardly ever write. After the first 200 words it gets easier. Sometimes I’m done in two hours – the whole 1000 word quota. Very, very rarely I write more. This only happens when I have a particularly emotional scene to write – I can get just in the right mood and have to write that.

Writing action is both the worst bit and the best. When you write action, paradoxically everything slows down. Action eats words. A chapter might take 1500 words if it’s just dialogue and revelation. But when there’s action you can chew through 4000 words during which only minutes have passed. So you write and you come back the next day and for Josh…maybe only minutes – or seconds – have gone by. As the writer you dwell in those moments for a long time. Those action sequences become the focus of your thoughts, sometimes for days at a time.

(My as-yet-unsold manuscript ‘Jaguar’s Realm’ is largely one long chase – writing that was really tiring! The poor hero, Leo, hardly ever had a chance to sit down. I really felt for him  as I had to invent scrape after scrape.)

So…in the morning, 1000 words of Joshua 3. Working title is TIGER KIDNAP, but today I thought of another: ZERO MOMENT. Any preferences?

And in the afternoon it’s down to Starbucks with my laptop and fifty pages of the ms for Joshua 2 (most likely ICE SHOCK or DARK ICE), plus my editor’s notes. I grab an iced mocha and a panini and chug through the revisions.

My pal Susie Day usually turns up with her manuscript for her own second novel, also to be published by Scholastic. It’s going to be called GIRL MEETS CAKE. Cool title huh?

We work and then we talk. About writing, editing, Doctor Who and TV and books and movies. We sob to each other about the few difficulties of writing. It’s okay, it’s lovely being a writer, but turns out that it drives you quite, quite mad to make up stories for a living. So we are crazy together.

Thank goodness for Susie, I’d probably crack up without her to talk to. I don’t even know why, but I’m definitely not as sane as I was when I was a scientist. I think I have the sort of mind that needs to do dull things repetitively, like make up test-tubes of chemical reactions and repeat experiments, for at least a small part of the day. Having to be creative all day long is unleashing some scary part of my psyche that I’m not sure was supposed to operate at more than 5%. I’m still struggling to adapt, to be honest.

It’s important to point out that if we lived in Jamaica, we’d make the effort to do as Ian Fleming did in his afternoons, and go snorkeling. But we don’t, so we write.

Today I reached 35,000 words. I’m close to writing the midpoint of the novel – I always try to make this super-dramatic. From the midpoint on, I try to pick up the pace so that a fast-paced story becomes roller-coasterish. (That’s why all the facts and knowledge have to come in the first half. Later I don’t want readers to have to pause to learn.)

DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA how hard it is to do this? If you write thrillers for a living then you do. Otherwise, well it’s surprising just how hard it is. I’m not going to tell how either, so thurp.

35,000 words. And still at least that much more to go…