My good friend and fellow novelist JoeAnn Hart recently sent me a note inviting me to add my humble comments to the “My Writing Process Blog Hop.” JoeAnn’s recent novel “Float” is a delectable chowda featuring Duncan Leland, whose business and marriage are both headed for Davy Jones’ locker. A local gangster named Osbert Marpol talks him into a shady loan arrangement, but Duncan soon realizes that it’s only a matter of time before the rising tide engulfs him. JoeAnn’s incisive novel reveals the angst and drama of family, the environment, and business in a tough seaside town in Maine.
To participate in the “My Writing Process Blog Hop,” it’s suggested that you answer four questions:
1. What are you working on?
I’m always working on two or three books for my valued clients. Right now I’m ghostwriting a book about using digital communications tools in business, and I’m editing a science fiction novel about a planet that contains a vast new source of cheap energy. As for my own books, I’ve just released “The Body on the Rocks,” a collection of twelve short stories set in Gloucester and featuring detective Chris Mark. You can find at at Toad Hall Bookstore in Rockport. I’m looking forward to the publication of the first Kevin Lone thriller “Avita Doesn’t Love You,” from Whiskey Creek Press in October 2014.
2. How does your work differ from others of its genre?
My Kevin Lone thrillers are told in what used to be called the epistolary format. This allows my characters to speak for themselves in a way that is both vivid and emotionally powerful. I present myself not as the author, but merely as the editor of their stories.
3. Why do you write what you write?
I write thrillers because it’s interesting to see what people do when they’re put under the most extreme pressure.
4. How does your writing process work?
I sit down and write. Then I go back and re-write. Then I re-write some more. When I’m thoroughly sick of the damned thing, I re-write it again. Then I ask my wonderful wife to read it. Kim Smith is a terrific editor as well as a published author (click here), and she always has useful comments. If possible, I don’t open the file for a few weeks, and then I review it again and try to imagine I’m reading it for the first time. My goals are: 1. Be interesting; 2. Be believable. The second goal is extremely important to me.