Now that I’ve reached a major milestone in the writing of my latest work-in-progress, I thought some of you might be interested in hearing about the process I follow when writing a book. This is multi-faceted, so I may end up having a follow-up or two in which I examine some elements, such as choosing a title or creating a cover, in their own posts. But this will be a broad overview of writing a book, from beginning to end. Just for funsies, I’m going to do this in the form of a listicle.

• Get an idea: This could be a whole new idea for a brand new story with characters I’ve never written about, or, as in this case, it is an idea for a specific plot that fits within the larger narrative of Harry and Dee Shalan. Before I started this book, I knew where I needed to start, which was right after the main characters’ wedding. And I knew where I needed to end, which is approximately where a previous Shalan Adventure, Harsh Prey, starts. So I had a start and end point, but I needed a case for Harry to investigate. That case came from two, mostly unrelated, things: the growth of family-run farms in the area and an article I read about how illegal marijuana sales are still a phenomenon despite the number of states that have legalized it.
• Build a plot: This is probably one of those categories that will end up being a post unto itself, although I’ve covered it before in a previous version of this blog, but the short version is that, when I started writing, I knew the main characters and premise, but did not have a full plot outline. I knew, in very broad strokes, who the bad guys were and I knew two important things that needed to happen to Harry and Dee that would precipitate the major crisis in the third act of the book. But that was literally all I had. I’m what you call a pantser. I fly by the seat of my pants. It has its disadvantages, but it fits my brain and my style.
• Write the rough draft: For plotters (the opposite of a pantser–see previous bullet), this is generally a point-A-to-point-B kind of proposition. The movement is forward only, with changes, edits, and proofreading reserved for a later draft. For a pantser, though, it’s sometimes less linear. It was decidedly less linear for me this time. I had to go back and do some surgery in earlier chapters when I decided to reveal a perpetrator in a completely different way and change their role in the crime.
• Let someone else read it: This is a scary point in the process, because this is where you risk finding out your book makes no sense or, worse, is just plain boring. Best case scenario, the beta reader will find holes in the plot or inconsistencies, like a character’s name changing partway through or events being out of logical order.
• Put it in writing: This is a step I didn’t always use. After fixing any major gaffes the beta reader has shown me, I print out the document, put it in a three-ring binder, and physically edit it with a pencil. I didn’t think I needed to do this until I did it. At the urging of some other writers, I tried it with my last book, Hold Your Peace, thinking it wouldn’t change anything. I’ve been wrong many times, but rarely that wrong. I saw things I completely missed on the first edit, which had been on-screen.
• Finalize the manuscript: This may take two or three subsequent drafts. It rarely does for me. I’ve never found it necessary to go back and start over once I have a rough draft complete. I may do substantial editing, including rearranging, adding, or subtracting plot points. But it’s never involved scrapping a preliminary draft and starting from scratch. I’m not saying it would never happen, but it certainly hasn’t happened yet.
• Ancillary stuff: This is the part of being an author that has little to do with the actual writing, though there is definitely a lot of creativity that goes into many elements of it. I’ll go into more detail on this in another post or two soon, but this step includes choosing a title, creating the blurb for the back cover, creating the cover itself, writing the author bio, dedication page, preface, and formatting the book for submission. Parts of this are fun, but parts are just plain tedious, yet absolutely necessary and must be done well. Some of these things are the reason someone picks up or rejects a book, so getting it wrong can mean the difference between a successful book and a flop. No pressure.

So that’s the process in a really small nutshell. Some things will get a more thorough treatment in subsequent posts, though I’m not firm on which ones. If there is something you’d like to know more about, please feel free to comment and I’ll answer you directly and/or talk about it in another post. Even if you don’t have any questions, I love hearing from you, so please stop in and say hello.

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