Blog Hop: Writing Process—#thisishowwedo

Historical Romance author Kate Robbins tagged me in a blog hop to discuss my writing process.

1. What am I working on?

Right now I’m fiddling around with my next novel. It is tentatively entitled A Soldier’s Heart and is a fictionalized account of my six months in Bosnia where I served as a peacekeeper from October 1993 to April 1994. The story follows the events that mark my descent from that of a normally functioning individual to the depths of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The title is actually a play on words as PTSD has been known by many names in the past and during the Civil War, it was called Soldier’s Heart.

2. How does my work differ from others of its genre?

There are a number of non-fiction books on the shelves written by soldiers who developed PTSD, but I don’t know of any that do it as a fiction based on the actual events. I’m hoping that as a fiction, it opens up the story to a much broader audience.

3. Why do I write what I do?

I write these stories primarily to educate the general public on what it’s like to be a soldier in modern times. To show them that the enemy today is not as clear cut as it was in wars past, and quite often, the enemy could be standing right next to us the whole time.

I also write these stories to stay sane in my retirement.

4. How does your writing process work?

With PTSD, writing doesn’t take on a routine. It can be a very haphazard thing for me. On good days, I could write for twelve hours straight. On bad days, I can’t sit in my chair for more than five minutes without wanting to do something else. And this can also vary depending on which stage of the novel I’m in. I usually start with strict research. If I can do this in the summer, I can get a lot of reading done outside on my patio.

From research, I develop the plot and characters. If the story is based on a real event, I can make up a flowchart and map out the events and the characters involved. I also write up a brief history on the major characters so that I know where they are coming from.

From there, I just write. I like to write a first draft without looking back. If something changes as I’m writing, I just make notes to act on it in the next draft. What is important is to get the first one done. I call it a mock draft because it’s usually so far off what the final product will look like, it doesn’t feel real.

The second draft is the hardest and inevitably becomes the solid first draft. For me, it means treating the mock draft like a jigsaw puzzle, breaking up the pieces and putting it back together along with the extra pieces I found along the way. Doing workshops can help a lot at this stage so that other writers can give feedback on individual components of the story.

From there, the subsequent drafts nitpick at this one, developing characters, plot and setting and working to mold the draft into a cohesive story. At this point, I also get beta-readers involved who can read the entire manuscript and provide feedback.

And like a long shower, it’s just a matter of applying the feedback, rinsing and repeating until it’s done.

This process can take about two years.

That just about sums it up. Now, Kate wanted me to tag three writers to continue the hop, but I was only able to tag one for now.

Next week, keep an eye out for Rati Mehrotra‘s contribution to the blog hop.

Born and raised in India, Rati Mehrotra is a Science Fiction and Fantasy writer currently based in Toronto. When not working on her magnum opus – a series of interconnected novels based in a fictional version of Asia – she writes short stories, and rather unreliably posts updates at her blog ratiwrites.com . Rati would like to make a clone of herself to do all her boring work so she can write full-time, although she worries about the ethical implications of this.

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