My writing process...

...yes, there is one!

Thank you to lovely Hannah Emery for nominating me to take part in the fabulous online Writing Process Blog Tour in which writers of all kinds discuss – you guessed it – the writing process.

You can find Hannah’s own blog here: http://hannahcemery.wordpress.com/

Before you arrived, Hannah and I had a good natter over coffee and chocolate cupcakes.  So now we’ll get down to business and I’ll try to answer her questions.

What am I working on?

I’m researching and making notes for a new novel about a woman who marries the wrong man. But the right man is a commitment-phobe who has lots of unresolved emotional issues, travels the world trying to get himself killed on various dangerous assignments, and he’s also the best friend of the heroine’s husband. So...

How does my work differ from others in its genre?

I write romantic fiction and am always very much aware that my readers are going to demand emotional satisfaction from my stories.  I’m allowed to put my heroes and heroines through the mill, but they always need to emerge from their ordeals better and wiser people who are at last ready to make each other happy. As for how my work differs from other stories in its genre – all writers speak with their own individual voices, and when we are dreaming up stories we all bring our own loves, hates, obsessions, prejudices, hopes and fears to the desk.  So I suppose my work differs from that of other writers because I’m not them, I’m me.

Why do I write what I do?

I’m endlessly fascinated by the different kinds of emotional relationships which exist between husbands and wives, parents and children, friends and friends.  When we meet a married couple for the first time, for example, we sometimes think: how can she live with him? Or: how can he bear to be with that woman?  Or, on a more positive note: they seem so happy.  What is the secret of this relationship’s success?  I love to speculate and accompany my invented characters on their emotional journeys.

How does my writing process work?

I’m a planner who spends a lot of time researching and making notes.  My first drafts tend to be very short because all I’m doing at this early stage is getting the story down.  What comes first?  I suppose it’s the concept – I decide what I’m writing about: revenge, forgiveness, regeneration, hope, loss, loyalty, betrayal, any or all of these.  Once I have a theme or concept in mind, the story always seems to flow.  But if I didn’t know what I was writing about, I know I’d get stuck.

Now I have talked about my writing process, I nominate Cathie Hartigan to do the same. Check out Cathie’s blog via www.creativewritingmatters.co.uk for writing news, competitions, help with your own creative writing and lots more! Also, you might be interested in a how-to book Cathie and I wrote together, The Creative Writing Student's Handbook - http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00JS5LQ4M.