Join me with bestselling author Tracy Buchanan on the livestream that looks at the little things that make a big differences to writers.
Tracy writes gripping thrillers that delve into the darkest corners of family, psychology and forensic investigation. Her books explore secrets, lies and the dangerous choices people make when pushed to the edge.
And, as a child, she crafted stories using cut-outs from her mum’s Littlewoods catalogues! She also runs one of the best writers’ groups on Facebook and is a brilliant advocate for authors. It’s going to be a really lively one, so pop the date in your diaries now!
MARK: What’s the thing that makes you think that you’re ready to start writing on a project?
NADINE: Because I’m a planner; once I’ve done the plan. If I haven’t done a plan and I’m like, well, yeah, it’s like… if there’s no outline, then I wouldn’t be comfortable writing. Because I know what would happen. I would just get to 20,000 words and then that would be it. I’ll just be… I don’t know what I’m doing with the story. But, and I say, it doesn’t need to be a, you know, a beat by beat by beat outline of the whole story. But it’s a general one. And once I’ve got that in place: okay, now I’m ready to start writing,
MARK: It kind of occurs to me, that’s the point in the story where you need to start making serious choices, story choices that have consequences. You know, the first 20,000 words you’re introducing people, you’re having fun, setting everything up. And then it’s like: we can start making serious decisions now. So it’s kind of scary, isn’t it? You don’t know where you’re going.
NADINE: I think that’s exactly it. I’ve mentioned this for my own podcast recently, I was writing this book, and I had a character called Nick. I didn’t have a plan for it. And, you know, the beginning’s, you know, all the set ups, that’s all the fun stuff. But then I got Nick into… Nick got released from prison, and then he went home. Now he’s sitting in his dad’s house, sitting in his dad’s kitchen. And to this day, he’s still there cause I’m like… I don’t know what to do with you now. I don’t know what. I don’t know what to do. So to this day, Nick is still sitting in his dad’s kitchen.
MARK: What small thing has made a big difference to your creative process?
NADINE: What I do now… Before I just used to write my first draft — and it sounds like a big thing, but it’s not, it’s a small thing — I write the first draft, and then after that, then do the rewrite, brief re-structure, whatever. That’s the second draft. But now I don’t. I write up to act two, and then once I finish act two in the first draft, that’s when I start doing the rewrite. Because now I’m doing the rewrite, I have a clearer idea of how… I’ve fixed everything now, so I know exactly how that last third is going to finish. And I started doing that. I think with… I think I did it with The Kill List, and I think it was just a timing issue I had. Like, a personal time finishing, I thought, I’m not going to get this done if I wait to finish it. I thought, let me just start rewriting it now. When I did that, I thought, this is a better way for me to work. So that’s what I do now.
MARK: And when you get to that two thirds point, you just plough on and get straight through to the end.
NADINE: Yeah, because I’m not thinking… When I’m writing that first draft, I’m already thinking, well, I already know I need to change this now. I need to change this character, put it in a different location, or I’m just going to get rid of that subplot. I just know these things aren’t going to work. And by the time I’ve done the second draft, I’ve already done that. And then I said, that last third is… I can’t say seamless, but it’s a lot smoother. I’m not fixing things.
MARK: Yeah, it’s so weird because I’ve just done that myself actually. You know, I’m talking about trilogies being hard. I got about I was 80,000 words on this, and the ending is there, and I’m kind of thinking, hmmm… And then I’m writing, I thought, ‘Oh, that’s what this is about!’ So I’ve realised, actually, what it’s about. So I’ve had to go back and sort of, you know, make changes. And now the ending just feels so much… Not, like you say, not easier, but I know where I’m going now. I know I’m going to do it. Yeah.
NADINE: You have a much clearer… There’s no debris in your path. That’s the best way.
MARK: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It’s a lot less cluttered, isn’t it?
Nadine Matheson is the bestselling author of the DI Henley crime thrillers and presenter of the Conversation Podcast.
We Discuss:
Writing as a planner Nadine’s great tip for finishing first drafts Why not reading the small print was great for her career We have a fun rant about META and book piracy And much more!
Join me live with bestselling crime author Nadine Matheson!
THURSDAY 27TH MARCH, 8PM GMT.
Nadine’s debut crime fiction novel, The Jigsaw Man, was won by HQ (HarperCollins) in a six-publisher auction. The best-selling ‘The Jigsaw Man’ was published in 2021, has been translated into fifteen languages and has been optioned for television. Nadine is also the presenter of The Conversation podcast, which for my money is one of the best British podcasts for author interviews. Nadine is a brilliant writer and really insightful on the craft and business of writing. You are not going to want to miss this one! Join us live and be part of the podcast.
Thanks to all those readers who helped make the publication day of The Corn Bride so amazing!🌽👰 And would you be up for a spoiler livestream? Let me know below in the comments…
MARK: Question from Gavin here. Does rereading yesterday’s chapter and editing as you go slow down the drafting too? Or are the time savings on future drafts worth the effort on earlier drafts? That’s a great question there Gavin. So you’re spending that time, sort of, re-read… build up momentum up. Does that mean when you sort of break through the wall of yesterday’s work and you’re writing fresh words today, you’re moving faster and with more clarity than you would otherwise?
GARETH: I think so, yeah, definitely. And I also try never to end a day’s work at the end of a chapter, because if you end up at the end of a chapter, then the next day you wake up to a blank white page again and I’ll have to get started. And it’s, you know, there’s enough white space to make Ranulph Fiennes nervous and… So it’s going back and sort of editing the the previous chapter gives you like a run up. And it definitely, definitely does save time doing future drafts. Because you’ve already picked up a lot of, you know, a lot of problems, a lot of typos and stuff, you will still have to go back and change, but you’ve done some of it.
This month’s special guest Gareth L Powell reveals the biggest mistake of his writing career, but how this particular disaster was a blessing in disguise…
MARK: What’s the biggest mistake you’ve ever made in your writing career?
GARETH: Oh, Lord. The worst thing — I don’t know if it’s a mistake, It could have been an Act of God — But was when the first half of the first draft of Descendant Machine vanished.
MARK: Oh, God, I remember this.Yeah, yeah, yeah.
GARETH: I’d been working on it for three months, I think. And then one day, it just wasn’t on my computer. It wasn’t in the recycle bin. It wasn’t, you know, anywhere. I used various kind of, programs to claw through the hard drive to try and find it. And… nothing. It just completely vanished. So if unless I just did something ridiculously stupid in my sleep or, you know… I don’t know what, I’ve no idea what happened to it. But this entire three months work just absolutely vanished. That was a big setback because, you know, that was when I, you know, you go in that feeling where you just go cold.
MARK: Yeah.
GARETH: You know in the, sort of Agatha Christie films from the 70s when there’s, like, a pistol blast or a scream, and then you’d get a shot of a load of crows flapping up from a tree. It’s kind of like that. I just uttered a curse. Venomous. It turned the air to glass and… And I lay on the sofa and thought, I’m never gonna write again. It’s all over.
MARK: And I remember talking to this, about this at the time, and it was just one of those complete mysteries. It wasn’t like you weren’t backing stuff up. It just absolutely vanished. Is it… because this happened to a friend of mine the other day, and I said, Oh, this happens to all sorts of writers, but every one of them tells me that when they go back and rewrite it, it’s so much better. Would you say that’s true, or am I just trying to make my friend feel good?
GARETH: No, that’s true, but the book I wrote was, substantially different from the first draft I had done, and much better for. So it was a blessing in a very, very heavy disguise.
Mark Stay Writes 