A short interview about the writing process

Step 1: Acknowledge the person and the blog site that invited you to take part. [That's me: www.katheckenbach.com] Yes, it was Kat who invited me to join this blog hop. You ought to check out her fantasy YA. And check out her list of other writers who are participating.

Step 2: Answer four questions about your writing process.

1)      What am I working on?

Right now I'm between books as I have just finished the first draft of Killing The Siij.  Josh is reading the book to his son. When Josh is done with that he will go through the book and spice up the fight scenes. I have asked him to make sure Minerstown is spelled the same all the way through. He will check for other kinds of continuity before he hands it back to me for editing. I'm still editing The Scarred King II, and will likely continue until the book is sent to the printer. Even then I will want to recall the book and change things.

2)       How does my work differ from others of its genre?

In the case of The Scarred King series, I'm writing science-fiction that reads like fantasy (technology sufficiently advanced will look like magic) On this world, the peoples have only pieces of technology that withstood their spaceship crashes thousands of years before. Brandon Sanderson does something like that BRILLIANTLY in The Way of Kings. I am rather less brilliant as he does what I am trying to do. I bring a fact-based mindset to the stories. When my heroes get sick, they stay sick for a while. When they get hurt, they stay hurt for a while. Sometimes when firing arrows, they miss.

3)       Why do I write what I do?

In the case of The Scarred King series, I am trying to provide content for my son's media empire to come. For the previous books, I dunno. It seems like a stupid activity to me, this writing out of theology and physics questions and trying to see what different answers look like. This writing is much work with no reward and I write crap anyway and who am I to think I should add to the million books published a year? And then I meet someone who has read Shatterworld forty times. I tear up every time I think about that. Forty times. Because no matter what stage of life she was at, she found somebody in the book to identify with. Forty times. Excuse me while I go get a tissue.

4)       How does your writing process work?

I'm not sure it does.      Okay, somebody, editor or husband or son, will suggest something for me to write. My first reaction is always, "No, I can't." But some days later I will suddenly realize that "Yes, I can." And then I meditate on the issue until I have enough clarity to start.