This post was originally published at Novelicious.com and is now at WritingTipsOasis.com. WritingTipsOasis.com acquired Novelicious.com in June 2022.
Fallout, the latest novel by Sadie Jones, was published last month. Today she has answered a few questions for our Novelicious readers.
Can you tell us a little about your average writing day?
I get to my desk around 8:30am and try to get urgent emails and calls out of the way to start writing by 9:30am. I work until 1:30pm, at least, and sometimes longer, depending how it's going or how much the real world – supper, admin, etc – is demanding of me. At the beginning of a book, starting to write is very difficult and 9:30am often means later, but once I'm really working it's stopping that's hard to do.
When you are writing, do you use any celebrities or people you know as inspiration?
No, never. The moment I'm consciously thinking 'who do I know like this?' or 'who would this character look like?' the fiction dies. I have to feel I'm finding it somewhere else.
What is your favourite Women’s Fiction book of all time and why?
If Women's Fiction means a light read that a man would be unlikely to pick up, it would have to be a Jilly Cooper – probably Riders. She takes escapism to a different level. (And when I made my husband read it when we met, 20 years ago, he loved it too!)
What is your writing process? Do you plan first or dive in? How many drafts do you do?
I plan for a long time: structure, lists, character descriptions, even diagrams. I need to build up as much steam as possible because a book takes a huge amount of energy. Of course the 'plan' always goes wrong. I rewrite as I go, but I try not to do that too much. Then there's one significant second draft before the (hopefully) smaller changes and fiddles – that could go on indefinitely!
What was your journey to being a published author?
I was a sporadically employed screenwriter for 15 years, unproduced, before I turned a screen idea into my first novel, The Outcast. It was a long apprenticeship, hard to live with at the time, but invaluable in retrospect.What do you think is the biggest myth about being a novelist?
That books 'write themselves', through sheer inspiration. Of course there are extraordinary times when the writing has a life of its own, but writing is never a passive experience, and it's always hard work.
What advice can you give to our readers who want to write a novel of their own?
To love the process. Try not to think too much about your aspirations or fears and what others will think when they read it, good work has to come from somewhere very private. When your writing is read and commented on, it's pretty hard to take. I try to remember that a good note is like a present – and a bad one easily forgotten.
What are you working on at the moment?
I have been trying to start a book for a while now. I know what it is, but I'm having trouble getting in. With Fallout recently published, it's too easy to be distracted.
Thanks, Sadie!