Author's Workflow Quotes

Generally I start writing when I have even the smallest idea of how a book is going to go, because the physical process of writing itself keeps the mind active and focused on the job at hand. Usually I write in about 5 drafts, but that simply means there are 5 definite times when I go in a linear fashion from the beginning to the end of the book.

I jump around in the plotting stage, where I basically just make a bulleted list of every damn thing that happens in the entire book.

I think about all my scenes. I do so much revising as I go along; I wonder how I could write books if I hadn't grown up in the computer age. I think I'd be a very different writer. I find myself cutting and pasting, changing things around, and deleting whole paragraphs constantly.

It usually takes me about three years to research and write one of my historical sagas; this is one reason why I take medieval mystery breaks, for they can be completed in only a year.

Writing a play, you have to retain it all in your head - you need more time. With prose, you can snatch an hour here, an hour there.

There are some writers who are done when they finish a draft because they've thought it through beforehand. Whereas I'll finish a first draft and I'm nowhere near done.

Usually, I start thinking about my next novel soon after completing the latest, and it can take anywhere from a month to 6 months to come up with a story.