Blog Tour Day

 

Today is Blog Tour Day, where authors talk about their writing process. I have been invited to take part by fellow Norfolk author Keri Beevis. Keri won an award from Rethink Press for her first novel Dead Letter Day - a wonderfully pacey thriller about a serial killer. Her second novel Dead Write will be launched shortly.

 Keri’s achievement is even greater when you consider that in addition to producing award winning novels, she also holds down a full time job, and still manages to be a really ‘fun’ person. If you want to know more about Keri, you can visit her webpage at www.keribeevis.com.

 Thanks very much for the invitation Keri.

1)     What am I working on?

I am at the editing stages of my second novel Cut & Dried, a police based murder mystery set in the late 1980’s. This one been a challenge because it is a different genre for me - my first novel Barricades was historical adventure.

When Cut & Dried is completed I am planning to switch genres yet again, to complete a half written fantasy novel intended for children aged around 10 years to early teens. After that I will probably return to historical adventure.

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

Looking at Cut & Dried, this is a difficult question because there are so many sub-genres under the murder mystery umbrella. Having served as a police officer for 22 years I am lucky enough to be able to draw on my own knowledge and experiences and I have tried to make it more than just a crime solving novel. I have tried to be as accurate as I can (hopefully without being pedantic). I have also attempted to capture something of the police culture of that period, which was a time of change and challenge for the service.

3)     Why do I write what I do?

I write what I enjoy writing, and what I feel inspired to write. There are pros and cons to being an independent author; it is much harder to market effectively without a publishing company behind me, but it means that I am free to write what I wish. This is why I haven’t yet tied myself down to a particular genre. I am really enjoying experimenting with different kinds of writing, and hopefully developing my writing skills at the same time.

4)     How does my writing process work?

I am very much a planner. I usually start out with a basic plot and storyline, often in mind-map format. After that I work out a time line for the action and if necessary for the principle characters. Then I do a more detailed outline and decide what research I need to do before I can kick off the novel. Once I begin writing, I sometimes find myself deviating from the planned storyline; for example in Barricades a new character suddenly popped up out of nowhere and had tremendous influence on both the story and the development of Javert, the lead character. A similar thing happened in Cut & Dried, when the motivation and behaviour of some of my characters deviated from my original plan and led to unforeseen twists in the plot. That’s one of the things that makes writing so exciting. One of these days I will cut loose and just begin writing, with no pre-planning at all. Not quite yet though.

Next week.

I am pleased to introduce next week’s authors, who will be blogging on 10th February.

Timothy Hurley

 Timothy is a writer and retired physician. Coast hopping between Brooklyn, New York and the San Francisco, he writes short fiction, humor and is working on a novella, Johnny Don’t March. His literary heroes, M. Twain, E. A. Poe, E. Hemingway, O. Henry, and Joseph Mitchell are not returning his emails. Timothy lives with his wife in Brooklyn, New York and Petaluma, California, where they have neither dogs nor cats. They celebrated their forty-fourth wedding anniversary the day of the Mayan Apocalypse and survived both. Timothy’s first book, Shortstack, is a collection of humorous short stories available at Amazon, where it enjoys an average 4.6 stars. His works-in-progress include: Johnny Don’t March, a novella due in 2014, a memoir of medical school years, and second short story collection. His work has appeared in The Satirist, Fiction and Verse, Scatterplot, Humor Press, The Story Shack, One Million Stories, Senior Correspondent, the Avalon Literary Review, and the print anthologies Open Doors Fractured Fairy Tales, Dark Muses, Spoken Silences, and Theme-Thology Invasion.

 Timothy returns all polite emails sent to timothyhurley44@gmail.com.

 Timothy Hurley blog: thelunaticassylum.blogspot.com

Timothy Hurley Amazon author page: http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B00ADMSPY8

My second author is - hopefully - Megan Denby. At this stage her participation is not confirmed, but I will update as soon as I have confirmation. Megan is the author of the atmospheric and exciting thriller Thistle in the Mist, which is partly set on the beautiful island of Skye. You can find out more about Megan on her website www.megandenby.com