Ask the Author: Kevin Chapman
Answered Questions (6)
Kevin Chapman
By writing. Seriously, just write the first 500 words that come into your head. Don't worry about the topic, they don't need to be related to whatever project you're working on, anything works, write a shopping list even! Just write 500 words, and by the time you've done that, you should be warmed up and ready to go.
Kevin Chapman
I'm an ego maniac, and so far having people tell me they like something I wrote is a long way from getting old.
Kevin Chapman
What are you waiting for? Self publishing is so easy to do these days, and I don't have any formal writing training, and haven't sat in an English lesson since I was 15. But here I am with two books out that people seem to really enjoy, and another four or five releasing by the end of 2014.
The key thing for me is set yourself a writing target (I started at 1000 words a day, but now look for around 2500) and force yourself to write EVERY DAY. Even when you don't feel like it. The words soon rack up, and when you're putting rough drafts together, every word is valuable because it helps you shape the final product when it comes to re-writing and editing.
The key thing for me is set yourself a writing target (I started at 1000 words a day, but now look for around 2500) and force yourself to write EVERY DAY. Even when you don't feel like it. The words soon rack up, and when you're putting rough drafts together, every word is valuable because it helps you shape the final product when it comes to re-writing and editing.
Kevin Chapman
We've pretty much finished off the first three Best Thing From books now, so that project goes on the back burner for a few months now (Volume 4 isn't out until October).
We're just starting our first two fiction projects, which I've promised not to talk about publicly until we've told our mailing list about them. But they're both funny, character driven serials that'll be released in weekly 10,000 word installments between early September and the end of the year.
We're just starting our first two fiction projects, which I've promised not to talk about publicly until we've told our mailing list about them. But they're both funny, character driven serials that'll be released in weekly 10,000 word installments between early September and the end of the year.
Kevin Chapman
I just plug myself into some loud music to block the rest of the world out and start typing.
When I was at university one of my lecturers gave me a great tip for writing that's kind of stuck with me - you don't need to know what you're going to be writing about before you start typing. Just sit down and force yourself to start typing whatever's in your head. Worst case scenario is you've warmed up a bit before getting on with the main event, but nine times out of ten something usable will appear within the first 500 words. Those 500 word warm-ups often end up on my website as blog posts, so you can tell when I've been lacking inspiration. When we were forcing ourselves to get through 3000 words each a day recently to get the first three Best Thing From books written, I racked up 50 days of consecutive blog posts warming up my brain!
When I was at university one of my lecturers gave me a great tip for writing that's kind of stuck with me - you don't need to know what you're going to be writing about before you start typing. Just sit down and force yourself to start typing whatever's in your head. Worst case scenario is you've warmed up a bit before getting on with the main event, but nine times out of ten something usable will appear within the first 500 words. Those 500 word warm-ups often end up on my website as blog posts, so you can tell when I've been lacking inspiration. When we were forcing ourselves to get through 3000 words each a day recently to get the first three Best Thing From books written, I racked up 50 days of consecutive blog posts warming up my brain!
Kevin Chapman
This is kind of a cheat question at this stage of my writing career, because all I've got released at this stage are tie in books to my podcast. Ask me again in a year, there are novels on the way...
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