Writers are often asked what their work process is. I usually reply that I string the words together and sometimes even in the correct order.
To be honest, my process isn't all that much. It's like throwing spaghetti strands against the wall and if they stick, they're cooked.
I have a white board covered in scribbles. I think they're mine but it may well have been the passage of a spider who had walked through paint. I have notes on Post-It slips scattered across my desk. And I still forget character her names and change them halfway through.
During the writing of the Rebecca Connolly book coming in July, I gave one character three or four different names. My editor suggested that it might be best if I choose one and stick with it. The annoying thing was, it was character who had appeared in the first book!
Frankly, it's a wonder I ever finish a book at all.
I'm nearing the end of the first complete draft of one now and I know where I want to get to. The problem is, how will I get there?
So far I've torn the big reveal apart twice and I'm mulling over a third approach.
Ah, some of you might say, if you had planned your book you wouldn't have this problem.
Au contraire, mon ami, I'd say. I don't know why I'd slip into French because I don't even speak the language. I have enough trouble with English.
I believe I would have the same problem if I planned. I'd get to this stage and something better than I had planed would occur to me and all that time spent working it all out ahead of time would have been wasted. I know this because I've tried it.
My brain is chaotic and growing even more so as I grow older (I admit to being over 40, even though I left that particular behind so long ago it's over the hills, the horizon, the rainbow and far away).
My wife used to tell me that my head is full of broken biscuits. It's filled with useless crumbs of information about movies, film music, crime novels and real-life crimes of the past. My attention can flit around like a bat trapped in a room, looking for somewhere to land but there's just too much sound and light.
The thing is, it all comes together in the end. To paraphrase Geoffrey Rush's character in 'Shakespeare in Love', I don't know how. It's a mystery.
Sometimes the joy of chaos is discovering the nugget, the gem, the punchline, that you would never have found had it been planned. Like an unwanted pregnancy. Only, once printed,it lasts longer than a lifetime. And it might be ginger.
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