Gestation of a Novel
I’m frequently asked how long it takes me to write a book and I’m never sure how to answer because I’m not sure what the person is asking. Do they mean the actual physical act of writing? Or do they mean everything involved from conception to finished product? Conception to finished product covers a lot of time because the imagination is triggered in countless ways. What kind of things trigger a writer’s imagination? They can include song lyrics, historical events, a sentence in a book or magazine, a casual conversation, a new recipe or even a dream. Once an idea takes hold, I start a file. This is normally a physical file, but I also use computer files. I come up with a working title and when I run across photos, newspaper articles, reference books, possible character names, research about possible jobs for a character or snippets of information about the time period, I put them in the file. During this phase, I collect possibilities that may be used to tell that story...