Dear Reader,
I’m still deep into writing this book, so thought would give you an update!
So far, I have decided on the victim, I have invented all of my characters and the crime has been committed! The start of the book is the part I find the easiest to write. Introducing all of the new characters, imagining them in my head, giving them all a reason to wish harm upon the victim, making them real people with real problems and also think about how they are linked to other characters in the story. It’s always plain sailing until after the crime has been committed and then I stop and think... what happens next?
Then I get a little stuck…this is where I am today!
The reason being, is that I don’t know at this stage who actually committed the crime! It sounds odd to say, considering I’m writing the book, but when writing my first series, I found that if I knew who the murderer was from the start, so did everyone else when they read the book. Sometimes I have an inkling who it is, but mostly if I do, that person changes. I’m one of those people where I like everything to be neat, so everything in my mind has to slot together. Often, I’m convinced I know who the killer is and then one part of evidence just doesn’t seem to fit. Then it becomes apparent that it was actually – someone else.
It seems so much harder if I’m writing a book, not knowing the outcome, not knowing ‘whodunnit’ but I feel in the end it’s a more authentic book if I’m going on a journey myself, feeling my way, rather than looking at something already mapped out in detail via a plot and writing the book is simply a case of typing.
It does mean that my first draft can be rather haphazard, to say the least! I’d hate for anyone to read my early drafts! But in the end, I hope that I’m making the experience for my readers more interesting than it might be if I’d plotted it out. And maybe I instil a sense of angst and urgency into Lady Ellen, not knowing who has committed the crime, as I am after all, on a deadline! That feeling of: 'Oh no! The book needs to be with Becky (my editor) by the end of August, and I don’t even know whodunnit yet!!' …is more than a little stressful…
I had better get back to it and will do another update this soon...
Thank you so much to those going on this journey with me,
Kelly xxx
