With short stories appearing in nine anthologies, his first novel "Night of the Long Shadows" published last year and just announced as the winner of the Scribe award for best gaming related original novel, "The Oracle of the Morrigan" due out on September 23rd, and another novel scheduled for publication in 2009, plus writing for a South African television series, Paul Crilley remains disarmingly modest about his achievements as I found out when I emailed him to ask if he'd consider sharing his experience with us. His reply ... "And I'd love to do the interview. I'm quite flattered actually. :-) (Although I have to say I'm far from successful. Hopefully some day.)". Although we weren't able to talk directly, Paul found time to answer the questions I sent him.
Liz: How do you work best? Do you prefer to have music playing in the background or is that a distraction for you? Do you use images, photos and the like for inspiration?
Paul: I’m an incurable procrastinator. I always say that if you want a tidy house, marry a writer, because they tend to do everything else before they actually settle down write. At least, I’m like that. I love writing, but I’ll put it off as long as possible before actually sitting down behind the desk. I’ll wash dishes, vacuum the house, go to gym – anything really, to delay the act of applying the posterior to the seat. I think it’s because of this that I’ve always been a late-night writer. I tend to get my best work done when everyone has gone to bed. There are no distractions then. No reasons for me to put it off any longer. I listen to music when I write. Usually instrumental movie scores. The Lord of the Rings music is a favourite.
Liz: Would you call yourself a planner or are you a "panster"? In other words, do you outline everything before you start and then stick to the plan, or are you more of a "go with the flow" writer and just let the story write itself?
Paul: I do outline, yes. But that doesn’t mean I stick to the outline. Things grow organically as I write, and if I forced myself to stick the plan, I would end up with a weaker book. Part of the joy of writing is discovering a subplot or side character that suggests a different route for you to take. I like to plan, but I also like to be surprised, so I hold the reins very lightly.
Liz: What tools do you use when you write? Pen and paper, or do you type directly into a word processor? Which software packages do you use? Do you use any "mind-mapping" tools to help develop the story?
Paul: My handwriting is terrible, so I type directly into the computer. I plan my books in MS Onenote. I love the organizational tools it offers me. I can paste pictures, web pages, links, anything. I also like the fact that I can just click anywhere on the screen and start typing. Then I sometimes use the drawing tools to create mind maps out of these notes. A program I am toying around with at the moment is Liquid Story Binder XE. It’s a program for writers, and I think I’ll be writing my next book in it. It’s got a steep learning curve, but I think it will be worth it once I’ve figured out all the options. For any macheads out there, I’ve heard amazing things about Scrivener.
Liz: How do you manage your time?
Paul: Urg. I don’t. I’m terrible. My day consists of putting things off, then panicking and trying to get things done. I also write for South African television. That pays my actually day to day bills, so I have to make sure I get all that writing done first before I can get on with my own projects. I dream of the day when I can just write my books and actually make a living out of it.
Liz: Is "writers block" a problem for you? How do you push through it? Do you use any particular tools or processes to get going again?
Paul: I haven’t ever had writer’s block. I do sometimes get a touch of the fear at the beginning of a book, (I’m going through it on my current project, actually), but it fades way once I’ve got the first ten thousand words written. The start is always slow for me. It takes a while to warm up into the mindspace of writing a complete book.
Liz: What about drafts and revisions? What's your process? Do you go through the manuscript on screen or on paper. How many times do you do this. Do you prefer to get feedback from a critique group or beta readers, or do you edit without any additional input?
Paul: I try different things all the time. I used to me a “perfect one page before moving on” kind of writer, but I found myself going over and over a page until it lost its sparkle, so now I tend to write a pretty decent first draft, then go back through the book once it’s finished and clean it up. By pretty decent, I mean it’s not a rough draft, but it’s not final draft either. There will be things to fix, but it shouldn’t be anything drastic. I tend to write a lot of notes to myself during this draft, things that I need to go back and fix at a later stage. The temptation is to stop right then and fix them, but that stops the forward motion and I don’t like that.
Liz: Several of your short stories have been published. How do you go about planning those compared to how you plan a full-length novel?
Paul: Short stories tend to come to me as an image or a single idea. Then I can plan the story around that one spark. Novels are an untidy mess spanning multiple notebooks that sometimes take a year or two to plan. Every now and then I will gather my hastily jotted down notes and transcribe them into Onenote, then throw away all the pieces of paper (a very cathartic thing to do), and start the process again until I have the complete plot/backstory/character list/villain’s plans etc. This was how I planned my most recent book, The Invisible Order. It takes place in Victorian England and revolves around a hidden war between two factions of Faerie, so I had so much research to do it was ridiculous. I was finding torn bits of paper with ideas on them under the bed, wedged between books, on my wife’s desk. I’ll probably still be finding notes when I finish the sequel.
Liz: You also write for television. How has that influenced your novel and short story writing process?
Paul: To be honest, I’m not sure it has. I find that screenwriting is so sparse in detail, that if I’ve been doing it for any length of time, I have to force myself back into the mindset of prose when I switch to the books.
Liz: Your published credits include works that were created in collaboration with other writers. Has writing for television helped with that? When you work on in collaboration with someone else, how is the work apportioned? How do you choose whose name is listed first?
Paul: Yes, it has helped in that sense. You have to put the ego aside in television and realize it’s not about what you want, but what the producer wants. You give them what they are paying for. As to who gets their name first in collaborations, that is for the editing and marketing people to decide. For my upcoming Hallowmere book, I am co-credited with series creator Tiffany Trent. I wrote the book, but Tiffany created the whole series and wrote the first three books, so obviously her name has to go on the cover as well. It’s really about name recognition.
Liz: Any advice for us unpublished writers?
Paul: Let me see. The best advice I came across was in an interview with Terry Pratchett. His words were, (and I paraphrase here), You wouldn’t expect to be a professional boxer if you didn’t practice every day. You’d get in the ring, and you’d work and work and work until you got better and better. It’s the same with writing. You have to practice and practice. Every single day. I agree with that. Even though I am a procrastinator, I still get my set amount of words done every day. I aim for 1000 words, but it doesn’t have to be that high. Do what you can. Even two or three hundred. Even one hundred. It doesn’t matter. But set a target and stick to it. It really does help. Also, I find it very helpful to read outside your genre. Read everything you can get your hands on. You’re bound to learn something new, something that will pop up again in some future story or book. Nothing is ever wasted.
Read more about Paul at his website www.paulcrilley.com
Paul's publishing credits
Novels
"Night of the Long Shadows" -- Wizards of the Coast - available now
"The Oracle of the Morrigan" -- Mirrorstone Books – 2008
Book 1 of “The Adventures of Abraxis Wren” – Wizards of the Coast - 2009
Short stories
"A Tapestry Of Souls" -- FATE FANTASTIC, Daw Books - October 2007
"Tears Of Gold" -- SOMETHING MAGIC THIS WAY COMES, Daw Books - March 2008
"Sunday Afternoon, 848,988"-- DOCTOR WHO -- DESTINATION PRAGUE
"The Invisible Order" -- UNDER COVER OF DARKNESS, Daw Books
"The Ice Maiden Speaketh" -- BASH DOWN THE DOOR AND SLICE OPEN THE BAD GUY
"The Hermit of the Skies" (with Mike Resnick) -- LIFTPORT
"Death Before Dawn" -- TotLW, Wizards of the Coast
"And I Will Sing A Lullaby" -- I, ALIEN, Daw Books
"The Echo of Silence"-- NEW VOICES IN SCIENCE FICTION, Daw Books
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