FAQ

Last Updated 2nd January, 2012

 

Why do you have this fancy webpage when you don’t have much published?

The majority of my published work is under a pen name. I want the things published under this name and that name to remain separate and I wanted the editing, e-book and query services associated with this name, despite the pen name appearing more ‘qualified’.

 

Do you have an agent?

I’ve had two-- one was a big, famous New York Literary Agency--but I seem to have very bad luck keeping them. Both contracts ended on good terms and both said I write great stuff and I’m lovely to work with, so the problem seems to be bad luck and bad timing. It’s made me a little gun-shy with agents though. I’m very effective at writing query letters that get requests for partials though.

 

How often do you write?

Every single day.

 

What’s it like being a full-time writer?

Sometimes I get up (always around 5am when it’s quiet) and think ‘I feel fancy today, I think I’ll put on pants’. I usually do a few thousand words first though. Some days, I never managed pants at all and just put more pyjamas on after my shower.

I remember reading an article by a fashion writer who said it was important to wake up, shower, get dressed in civilised closed and put on full make up before she wrote and that all authors should do the same. She was it was disrespectful to do anything less.

I say she’s procrastinating and anyone dicking around with eyeliner before they write has a serious priority issue. I always check for urgent emails before I write, but I don’t have breakfast—I often don’t even have a drink—until the first thousand words are on the page.

If you want to be a career writer, you have to write a lot. You’re running your own business, so you get NO days off. You’ll be in front of the computer on birthdays, on Christmas and probably on holidays. You need to meet your word quota for the day and when you start, it will be much higher.

The best way to work out your quota is this: work out how much you want to earn in a week. Work out how much you are being paid per word. Work out how many words you have to do in a week and divide it by six, then write that much every day. You need that spare day to catch up or give yourself a safety buffer. You don’t get a day off.

So if you’re earning $20, 000 per book and they’re 100, 000 word books, you’re earning twenty cents a word. If you want to earn $1000 a week, you need to write five thousand words. You also have to edit one novel while you write another, or there is a gap. Alternatively, you can do double the words a week so you can break to focus on editing.

So that’s what it’s like to be a writer. You get up, every day, and you write until you reach a quota. You have to produce a consistent quality of work when you are sick, when it is Christmas, when there are police cars raiding a house down the street, when the dog is in labour and so on.

Consistency and self motivation are key. Clothes are optional.

Are you married?

No.

Will you go out with me?

No.

What is your secret pen name you wrote all your other books under?

Not telling.