What inspires you to get out of bed each day?
I'm a happily married husband and the father of a delightful daughter (currently working far away in sunny Australia). But what motivates me to rise from slumber each morning, now I'm retired from employment, is the urge to set down new stories and work on those currently in progress. At present, I'm writing a new science fiction novel set on Mars.
Writing is both a compulsion and a pleasure for me. Has been since I wrote my first story as a teenager. It is therapeutic, fulfilling, exciting and allows the writer to live many lives vicariously through those of his creations.
I'm fortunate in that I enjoy every stage of the writing process. Not so keen on the promotional activity necessary to get the books sold, but I do love the idea of readers enjoying my books.
What is your writing process?
I'm what's known as a 'pantster', which means I write by the seat of my pants. Effectively, this means I have an idea, surround it with themes and then develop characters. I do detailed histories and descriptions of my characters, get to know them, and then I develop a very loose framework for the story in my head. I don't plot. I don't write down the story structure or framework. I simply sit down at the keyboard and place my characters into the landscape and settings I've devised in my mind and place barriers and challenges before them. This means that my stories are character driven and often take turns I never envisaged. Sometimes that involves me in extensive rewrites, as event occur in the story that I then need to allude to in earlier chapters.
It's a method of working that keeps my mind and spirit fresh as the story develops, allowing me to enjoy the tension, journey and conclusion in the same way I hope my readers will find it.
Many writers find this sort of approach terrifying, but it works for me and may stem from my habit as a child and teenager of making up stories on the spot for my friends and, later, for my younger brother at his bedtime.
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