This post was originally published at Novelicious.com and is now at WritingTipsOasis.com. WritingTipsOasis.com acquired Novelicious.com in June 2022.
Amanda Brooke's second novel, Another Way To Fall, was published last week. Below are a few questions she recently answered for us.
Can you tell us a little about your average writing day?
That would really depend on whether it was during the working week or the weekend. I still work full time which means I have to squeeze in my new writing career as if it was still a hobby albeit one that consumes much of my free time and has deadlines to meet. I’m usually home from ‘work’ by late afternoon and fire up the computer as soon as I step through the door. There’s a quick break to feed myself and my teenage daughter and then it’s back to my writing until I’m finished which can be as early as 7pm but often stretches beyond 9pm. Weekends are another matter entirely. Given a choice I’d write in the mornings as I love being able to spend the rest of the day pottering around with the scenes I’ve just written still lurking inside my head. That’s usually when I’ll get a sudden flash of inspiration that will set me up for the next day’s labours.
When you are writing, do you use any celebrities or people you know as inspiration?
It is tempting and I have toyed with the idea. I’ll even go so far as to say I’ve started at the plotting stage with an idea of one character or another being similar to someone I might have met but it doesn’t really go beyond that. Once I’ve started giving a character a life of their own it’s their voice I hear, their persona that drives them to take the decisions they take and nothing else. We are all unique, even those of us contained within the written page.
What is your favourite Women’s Fiction book of all time and why?
My taste in books is eclectic to say the least so trying to pick one favourite Women’s Fiction book is near impossible. If I had to choose then the sentimentalist in me would pick something by Melissa Nathan, probably Persuading Annie because that was the first of her books I read. I picked it up at the library because of the name, her surname was the same as my newborn son. The last of her books I read was also the author’s last, The Learning Curve. On the day I opened it up and read in the foreword how Melissa had died at only 37 leaving a 3 year old son, I had just lost my own little boy and even while it was sad it was almost reassuring to realise that if there was such a place as heaven then there were mothers there yearning for their children as well as children who had been taken from their mothers too soon.
What is your writing process? Do you plan first or dive in? How many drafts do you do?
I start with the basic premise for a story but where that comes from heaven only knows. From there ’ll write a synopsis which is the basis for the novel that my agent and editor are expecting from me. Now all I have to do is turn a two page summary into a full length manuscript. To begin with I try to divide the story up into about twelve sections so I can think about pace and sub-plots and a little about character development but not too much. I don’t tend to get a real feel for my characters until I’m into the second draft at least.
When I first began to write, I foolishly imagined that the very first draft of my novel would be an unpolished version of the final product. Now I know better. Those very first attempts will be written, rewritten and sometimes completely cut so I try not to labour for hours over each and every sentence. I’ll often develop new ideas as I go along, even new characters that should have been there from the start but I never go back and rewrite scenes until I’ve finished the draft I’m working on, it’s too much like taking two steps forward and one step back. Instead, I make a note of the changes and pick them up second time around. When I have a draft that I’m happy with then I send it off to my agent. His feedback is invaluable, it’s the first time I will have let anyone read it and it’s usually at this point that the rewriting begins in earnest. A revised draft will be sent to my editor next and the process begins all over again, starting with any major restructuring before moving on to gradual refinement of the manuscript and then
the final stage is the page proof. I honestly couldn’t say how many drafts that can add up to but I would think I’ve reread or rewritten at least a dozen versions of my novel before it’s ready for the harshest critic, the reader.
What was your journey to being a published author?
I wasn’t one of those people who always knew they wanted to be a writer. And when I did begin to write it had more to do with surviving a nightmare than it was about pursuing a dream. My twenty-one month old son Nathan was diagnosed with leukaemia in 2004 and writing poetry and keeping a journal helped me remain strong for both my son and his older sister Jessica. When he died in 2006, again I turned to writing, about Nathan first and foremost but once I was sure I had preserved every precious memory, I realised that I didn’t want to give up writing. Somewhere along the way I had discovered a dream to become an author and Yesterday’s Sun was picked up by my agent Luigi Bonomi in 2011. He was the one who helped me knock the manuscript into shape and secured a two book deal with HarperCollins. Amazingly my debut novel was selected for the Richard and Judy Book Club in 2012. My second book Another Way to Fall and a novella The Keeper of Secrets have been published this year and I have another two books and another novella in the pipeline too. It’s been a long and painful journey and one that has come at an unbearable price but becoming an author is one Nathan’s many legacies and he deserves all the credit.
What do you think is the biggest myth about being a novelist?
From personal experience, the biggest myth is that all published novelists are full-time writers. I read with envy when an established author describes their typical working day and it is actually writing and not the nine to five job that continues to pay the mortgage. I’d love to get there one day but the publishing world isn’t a particularly secure one. It’s hard work trying to juggle two careers but I feel immensely lucky and privileged to be a published author and while I have the opportunity and I continue to love writing, and I can’t imagine not, then I’m more than happy to put in the hours.
What advice can you give to our readers who want to write a novel of their own?
It’s never too late to start! In fact age and experience can have a distinct advantage. Many years ago I heard an author explain that people who say they want to write a book never will; if they truly wanted to write then they would already be doing it. I don’t think that’s particularly true, it certainly wasn’t true of me but hearing that probably put me off for a while. I wasn’t someone who had started writing from an early age and I didn’t have huge aspirations to be a writer. All those weird stories and scenarios I kept thinking up stayed firmly in my head. What I will say however is that the story has to be something that you absolutely want to write. Don’t write because you want a book published but because you’re desperate to read this fantastic novel that you’re already starting to create in your mind. That way when you’re ready to put in the countless hours it’s going to take to create your masterpiece, it will be a page turner for you too even though you’re the one filling those pages.
What are you working on at the moment?
I’ve just completed the very first draft of my fourth novel which I’m now setting to one side so I can concentrate on what will hopefully be the last significant rewrite of my third. It’s called ‘Where I Found You,’ and it’s the story of two expectant mums who meet by chance at the side of a lake. They both love sitting on the same park bench that holds the history of their lives and has borne witness to their individual hopes, fears and heartaches. I love this part of the writing process because I know the story and the characters so well and I really have fallen in love with them, I can’t wait until it’s published next year.
Thanks, Amanda!