A piece of advice I read in an article lately said that writers should start at the end of their story and plan from there. In other words, know where you want to go before starting the journey. It may seem obvious, but not everyone does that.
I literally did this with the series SMUGGLERS IN PARADISE. Almost three years ago (November 2013 to be precise) I wrote the draft of PSYCHOLOGY OF CHOOSING. It’s a psychological thriller dealing with human trafficking and global smuggling.
When I was nearing what I wanted to be the end I was a little word constipated and one day scratched out a new character relationship map in hopes of running across an Ah-Ha moment to loosen things up. It worked and a large chunk of story background literally spewed forth onto my page.
When I finished the draft I decided that I needed to write a prequel to PSYCHOLOGY OF CHOOSING and that turned into Book 1 – GAME OF WIT AND CHANCE: BEGINNINGS which in turn led to Book 2 – ONE FISH, TWO FISH, BIG FISH, LITTLE FISH: SILVER DAWN. Now I’m finally back to the start of the ending.
It’s been a long road and one in which I’ve learned a great deal. Two and a half years…probably three years before I finally publish Book 1 (I hope to have it out by November 2016)…have passed. I’ve taken a lot of classes, published two books via the Indie route, gotten a lot of feedback and, I hope, have continued to grow as a writer.
I’m really excited to be at this point and am grateful to those old and new friends that have read, given feedback and helped do a little publicity to get the story this far. I love hearing what you like, am extremely grateful for your feedback on what you want to see more of in the future, appreciate the constructive feedback you’ve given me and am open to more of all of it.
Thanks for traveling the path this far with me.
