Welcome to week seven of the Process Project!! If you don’t
know about us already, please visit The Process Project page to find out more about this project, and read interviews with
other authors.
JB: When do
your best ideas come to you? What are your best brainstorming times?
Walking the dog and in the bath! Occasionally, last
thing at night when I get into bed. When I was at the end of Bruises, about to write the last
chapter, I knew how it was going to end but I couldn’t figure out what the
order of events would be. I also wanted to give you something that would make
you want book 2. I was lying in bed one night staring at the ceiling, my mind
turning over. My husband was in the bathroom and walked out to me all of a
sudden saying ‘OMG, that’s it, that’s what I have to do…’ He gave me that ‘she
really has lost it this time!’ look, and offered to go back into the bathroom
and come out again. I had the perfect ending…
To be honest, inspiration can come from anywhere,
often when you’re least expecting it.
JB: What is
your writing routine? Do you have any writing rituals?
LL: As a busy mum of boys who are now 6 & 8, I
can’t be too choosy about where, when and how I write. I pick up whatever I’m
working on in the oddest of places: while watching swimming lessons; in the
school playground; the doctor’s office. I’ve been known to sit with a head full
of foils under the dryer, tapping away!
When I’m at home I can get a little carried away if I’m
really into a story. I might be sat at the table I use, overlooking the garden,
in the afternoon, or I might be sat on the couch in the evening, after the boys
have gone to bed. I can fully absorb myself in my work wherever I am,
especially in the busy coffee shop where I wrote most of my first (&
second) novel. I nearly always have a large bottle of water on the go, but as a
dedicated caffeine addict I love to sip a latté too. One thing I do like to do
is spread myself out, but then I do that with everything -cooking, crafting,
sewing, putting my makeup on, getting dressed… I like space so I can access all
my iThings, notebooks, pen case etc. easily. When I tie my hair back I have a
habit of ramming a pencil into the ponytail for easy access, often forgetting
it’s still there when I leave wherever I am!
JB: When
you are preparing to write a new story, what kinds of techniques or methods do
you use to organize your ideas?
LL: I love notebooks! I have at least 3 or 4 on the go
at one time, one of which is currently my 365 journal that I write something in
everyday. I also have a quote journal, and I’m tweeting a quote every day. When
I first began writing I had no idea where my story came from, it just kind of
evolved while out walking the dog and listening to music. I then threw down all
my ideas for characters and story line in a battered old notebook I found on a
shelf in my husband’s study (I think his tax receipts were supposed to be
recorded in it but it was empty!). In no particular order, anything and
everything I thought of became notes. Then I broke it down into sections, a
summary of each character – what they looked like, personality, family history,
work history, etc.. The story became mind maps in the form of rough chapters. I
have known the ending of each novel before I began to write; my story might
have changed slightly along the way, but essentially I always knew exactly
where it was going to end up. Then I started to write, working through the
notebook, ticking off the bits I’d used. I recently got to know a mum at my
boys’ school, who is also writing her first novel. She has a background in
animation scripts, so she showed me how she organizes her thoughts, and it was
interesting to learn that a more professional approach was actually a similar
process to my more amateur attempts that I’d developed naturally. The most useful
thing I learned was that she used Post-It notes in her notebook, so she could move
them around her story board. I am in the process of trying this myself now with
my fourth novel, and so far I like it.
JB: When
you’re on the road and ideas come to you, what do you usually do?
LL: I always have a notebook… always!
JB: While
you are working on a piece, do you have any particular way that you structure
your work?
LL: I write each chapter as a separate file, but save
them to one folder – in more than one location, my hard drive & in Dropbox.
I try to keep my notes together as much as possible, but honestly if anyone
looked through one of my notebooks they would never believe it was turned into
a novel. I was much clearer in my first two novels (which are essentially one
story I cut in half) where it was going & how I was going to get there, so
it was fairly easy to structure. With my third, I tried out some different
approaches: I wrote in in the first person; I started the book at the end of
the story and then took you through the events that led up to the main
character being in the situation she was in… it felt odd at first and took some
planning, but once I was into it, it was fun to write!
JB: When
it's time to revise/edit your work, do you have any particular methods that you
use to help you through the process?
LL: I always read a chapter through when I’ve finished
it, just to correct my dyslexic fingers and make sure what I’ve written does
actually make some sense. I find I can read something a gazillion times before
I notice something so obvious. I failed English at school, my grammar and
punctuation is appalling (& don’t even get my husband started on my
spelling!), as far as I’m concerned as long as my imagination and basic story
structure is there, I let the professionals (i.e. my husband!) worry about the
rest. I always read the ‘finished’ work from beginning to end before I start
any sort of editing, and nearly always on my phone so I’m not tempted to
correct any minor mistakes, I just read it like a book and make notes of any
major changes I want to make. I have a very supportive group of close friends
who love to read my work and give honest feedback. One of my biggest critics is
my mother-in-law, who can look beyond all the bad bits and constructively
criticize the deeper aspects of the book. I changed the story slightly in my
first novel as a result of this and it worked much better. Essentially, editing
for me is just going back over it enough times that I’m happy it works.
JB: Is
there any advice you can give to writers struggling to get the words flowing?
LL: You have to believe in yourself and write what you want to read. Don’t write what you
think people want you to write, write it for yourself, the way you would want
to read it. We all have our own styles, it will make you more comfortable and
confident with your work and hopefully encourage the words to flow better.
Write something everyday, doesn’t matter what it is,
the shocking weather… what you had for breakfast… the fool who thinks he can
still get through the closing doors on the Skytrain...what your kids said when
you told them they’re going to Legoland on vacation (mine don’t actually know
yet so don’t tell them!)...or just simply how you’re feeling that day. WRITE.
IT. ALL. DOWN. You never know when you might want to go back through all that
nonsense and use it.
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I want to extend a HUGE thank you to Louise for providing such rich answers to our questions! I hope you enjoyed her story as much as I did! Thanks Louise!!!!
You can follow her on the web here!
And you can get your copy of her debut novel, Bruises!
Louise grew up in the North-East of England. In 2004
she moved to Canada with her husband, for what was supposed to be one year. Ten
years, two children, two cats and a dog later, she appears to be staying. She
worked as a registered nurse until giving up her career to raise her family.
When she was diagnosed with a chronic disease, she turned to writing, combining
her knowledge of the medical world with personal life experiences. She
currently lives in Vancouver with her husband and two boys. Bruises is her debut novel.
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