Asked Questions

As a known author I am often asked questions on how I write. This is one from tonight.

Can you tell me about your experience writing your first book or novel? How long did it take from start to publication?

I answered

I had been writing short stories for years, submitting them for publication and had a few published. Editors, friends and other authors kept on telling me that Novels make money, short stories hardly ever do and they were right but for some reason I kept procrastinating. Maybe I felt I was not good enough, maybe I was worried about failure or embarrassment. I cannot say as it was a long time ago. Also, I was worried that my “loved” short stories did not mean that I would write a good novel. I was never a confident fellow.

A short time after writing a cool, short, imaginative tale; my employer and I parted ways. I was placed on “gardening leave” for three months. Paid but not working. I found a new job almost instantly but could not start for three months and so decided it was time to write a novel. I had this short story which was lovely and I saw a novel in it almost immediately. I reworked the short tale, worked and reworked it until I had what I wanted. The short story became a short novel in or around a three month time frame. But creating the novel and seeing it to publication is a long and onerous process. From the time I wrote the short story to full release took around two and a half years. As I became more experienced and able to produce a higher quality of work, times reduced. Yet, even now my next book is almost always written before the last has been published.

It is simply the way things work unless you wish to try self publishing.