Writing a Book

I am writing a book. I have already sold it. This is much better than writing with your fingers crossed, just hoping that someone will pick it up. I can set myself deadlines, research properly, budget...

First draft I call draft zero, cause it is just looking for a story - writing for the sake of it, taking the characters out for a walk, goading them to a fight. Not worrying too much about where it is going at this stage.

I usually start on paper, and write lots of dialogue between the characters - getting a sense of who they are, and a rough idea of the plot. Just keep them talking.

All the scene setting and the prose can come later.

For me a scene only works when people are talking. Like today I wrote about this cop telling a guy that a relative had died. It was okay. But it came alive when I put them in a situation where they had to wait around, so they had to make chit chat, and the cop starts telling the guy about his holidays, cause he can't think of anything else to talk about. It's really banal dialogue but because the situation is dramatic, it works. I think there will be lots of such chit-chat in this book.


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