Category: Writing as a Team

Two people writing as a team can have advantages over soloist authors. But to have a fruitful writing partnership we must adopt a process that utilizes our strengths, and we need a relationship that’s strong enough to support the endeavor. Here’s where we explore the matter from various angles.

A Galaxy Far Far Away

A few months ago we went on a trip with Jen’s sister and brother-in-law. The four of us booked passage on the Chandrila Starcruiser the Halcyon, and traveled to Black Spire Outpost on Batuu.* It was a very eventful trip!

We got to visit the bridge, and we had lightsaber training. The intergalactic superstar Gaya even performed several shows! Planetside on Batuu, we had a few scrapes with smugglers and the First Order, but we managed to make it out safely.

During all the excitement, the Halcyon was boarded by the First Order, and we had to choose whether to align ourselves with them or with the Rebels. Not a difficult choice, but some of our fellow passengers got it wrong. It all ended with a climactic lightsaber duel right in front of us.

Stormtrooper!, Hoth Icebreaker, the bunks in our cabin
On the bridge, the Halcyon’s registry, surprise visit from Chewbacca
Millennium Falcon, Batuu street scene, Mando!
Lightsaber action!

* We actually went to DisneyWorld, and stayed in the Galactic Starcruiser hotel. It’s a couple days of live action roleplaying with other Star Wars fans. There’s a storyline, and the entire staff stay in character the whole time. It’s pricey, but it’s a total blast. And it’s closing soon, so if you’re interested, make your reservation today.

 

Side-Hustling By the Seat of My Pants

In the great “debate” about pantsing it versus plotting things out, Rune Skelley is solidly in the plotters’ camp. That doesn’t mean we never do anything spontaneous, though. In fact, sometimes we (or, Kent at least) even write stuff without plotting it out first at all.

Only on side projects, of course. His current extracurricular fiction exercise is a short story called Pearl, which he’s very much making up from scratch. The premise and the main character popped into his head, and he just started writing. And he is very much enjoying getting to see where it’s going.

The problem is, it doesn’t know yet where it’s going. Not really. It’s going to meander a bit before it reaches the destination. Maybe that shouldn’t be called a problem. It’s just a different process. And for a short story, Kent is willing to roll with it. He might end up needing to write a novella’s worth to get that short story out of it, but journeys are said to be what life is all about. And if the seat of his pants gets a little threadbare by the time he’s done, he’ll just learn to appreciate the breeze.

With larger-scale projects, that attitude would threaten our ability to finish what we start. It’s work enough to tell the story well when you already know how it goes. Needing to invent it on the fly, keep it on track, and make the sentences sparkle is too many plates to keep spinning, especially when there are multiple POV characters and a detailed world that needs building. Add to that the need (in our case) to coordinate the efforts of two co-authors, and it’s clear that an assiduous planning regime is the only survivable option.

A writing partner is someone who always has your back, even if sometimes their own butt might not be covered.

The Writing Grotto

We’re excited to announce the newest addition to our fleet of writing locations. We’ve spoken in the past of our Writing Cave, and our Auxiliary Writing Cave, and now we’re excited to be posting our first blog entry from our Writing Grotto. Oo la la! How fancy!

The Writing Grotto is outside, and features a fire pit. We foolishly thought we would be able to have a work session there, with full productivity from both of us. It didn’t work out that way. First we had to make s’mores, and then we had to throw the ball for our canine overlords Lady Marzipan and the Bandit Lord. There was a brief interlude where we negotiated the peace between the dogs and a big fluffy orange neighbor cat who sauntered across Lady Marzipan’s realm.

And then there’s what fire does to Kent. Tending an actual wood fire scratches some deep caveman itch. It hypnotizes him in a way that the gas fire in the the Auxiliary Cave does not, and if you’re not careful he starts to wax philosophical about it. Or maybe that’s just the Golden Monkey talking.

We’re planning to spend more time in the Writing Grotto as the weather gets warmer, and we hope that we’ll equilibrate to it and actually be able to get some work done there despite the myriad distractions.

A writing partner is one who will tell you when you have marshmallow goo stuck to your chin. A good one won’t even laugh about it.

Worth the Wait – Czech Republic

Last stop Prague! A beautiful city we’d visited once before, but we had our son with us last time and there are certain sites that aren’t the sort of things you want to visit with your child (see the red photo below).

Between Budapest and Prague we drove through Slovakia. Sadly the only stop we made was at the border. We saw Bratislava from a distance, and hope to visit for real some day in the future.

Our trip was quite long, and we didn’t even pretend that we were going to do any writing while we were gone. We didn’t even take our laptops. We’ve been writing As Yet Untitled Ghost Novel #1 for about a year now, and it was really nice to look away. We came back refreshed and ready to put fingers to keyboards. As writers, we use the world around us as inspiration for our stories. Travel is a magnificent way to broaden our scope and add novelty to the idea bank. A certain location in the Ghost Series is in Eastern Europe, so if the IRS asks, this was a research trip. Our location is made up, but being able to see the landscape in person was a great help.

A good writing partner is someone you enjoy sharing a hotel room and every meal with, and someone who loves to look at your vacation photos.

Prague Astronomical Clock, St Vitus cathedral, Good King Wenceslas atop his dead horse
Two views of Prague TV tower covered with giant babies, the Museum of Sex Machines, Tyn Church
Franz Kafka’s head performs a 15-minute choreographed dance every hour

Worth the Wait: Hungary

The penultimate stop on our whirlwind tour of Eastern Europe was Hungary. Our Budapest hotel was centrally located on the Pest side of the river, and if the Chain Bridge had been open it would have been perfect. Alas, the Chain Bridge was closed for construction, which meant a lot of added walking for us when we wanted to check out the Buda side. Ah well, it keeps us fit.

Buda is the hilly side. We rode the funicular to the top and explored the Castle District at ground level, underground in the labyrinth (complete with subterranean fog), and high up in the towers of Fisherman’s Bastion (with a cup of mulled wine).

Budapest has tons of thermal hot springs. We visited Gellert Baths, a classic that opened in 1918. It has co-ed changing rooms, about a dozen pools, inside and outside, at various temperatures, and gorgeous architecture. We don’t have pictures of it because we didn’t want to dunk our phones, but you can do an image search if you’re curious.

Don’t fret. We have pictures of other things.

Hungarian parliament by night, Buda Castle as seen from our hotel room
War tubas, Fisherman’s Bastion
Run!! aka an amusing construction site, stained glass Lenin at the Museum of Communism, women’s restroom at the Museum of Communism, Monkey Bistro advertising truck, outrageous meat concoction, the horse that stole Kent’s heart

Worth the Wait Part 4: Croatia

Next stop: a very rainy Croatia!

In an attempt to stay dry, we hit up a grocery store in Vukovar and raided the snack aisle. Unfamiliar foods make great holiday gifts, just ask our family!

We visited Osijek Fortress, and walked around the old town where many buildings have bullet damage from the war in the 1990s. It was a sobering reminder of the current atrocities in Ukraine.

It was very interesting and educational to experience this different side of Croatia (literally). Previously, we’ve been to Dubrovnik and Split, which are full of palm trees and Adriatic zephyrs. We did see some bullet holes on that trip too, though.

To end on a lighter note, we met an orange chonker of a cat named Garfield. He was very sweet.

Sexxy church dude, pagan-looking straw rabbits and dragon, the scariest doorway in Croatia
war memorial in Vukovar, bullet damage in Osijek, Vukovar plaza
Osijek sports complex, Osijek window detail, Osijek Fortress

Worth the Wait Part 3: Serbia

Our tour through Eastern Europe continued in Serbia. We hiked through Djerdap national park to take in a view of the Danube (and Romania across the river). At an art commune we met a dog who fell madly in love with Jen, and we enjoyed some homemade honey rakia, a traditional Balkan spirit. (We may have also bought a couple of bottles to bring home.) Golubac Fortress is in the process of being restored. One of the first things they did was reroute the highway so that it no longer goes through the castle gates. We got there fairly late, and it was too dark to scale the rocky interior and walk along the walls, but we did climb a few of the towers.

In Belgrade we walked around in the rain, and had some delicious treats at the Hotel Moskva. Belgrade’s trams are fairly old, but their heaters really mean it, so we got nice and toasty on our way to the incredibly ornate Church of Saint Sava.

Karl Malden in Belgrade, border crossing, treats at the Hotel Moskva

 

Golubac Fortress, Church of St Sava, the face of Decebalus, view of the Danube and Romania

Our travels continue next week!

Worth the Wait Part 2: Bulgaria

After Romania, we were off to Bulgaria. We’ve been trying to learn Russian for a while now, and our knowledge of the Cyrillic alphabet came it quite handy on this whole trip.

Entering Bulgaria

As you can tell from the architecture, the Soviet Union left their thumbprints all over the region.

Our guide insisted that Bulgarian yogurt is the best in the world, but we were more impressed with the rose liqueur. There was also some rose brandy, which was hella intense, but it was the liqueur that we bought to bring home. We think it’ll be great over ice cream.

Obviously the USSR isn’t responsible for the awesome Wile E Coyote landscape.

More next week!

Worth the Wait

We love to travel. We love to see what life is like in other parts of the world, and visit amazing sights. We had an epic trip to Eastern Europe planned for March of 2020, which didn’t happen for obvious reasons. At first we postponed it a year, thinking “Eh, the pandemic will surely be over by then.” Ahem. So then we postponed it again.

One of the stops on our itinerary was Romania, which is right next door to Ukraine, so things were looking iffy again for a while, but by fall 2022 we were comfortable enough — and vaccinated and boosted — to go. And we are so glad we did.

We met some amazing people, ate some delicious new foods, drank some intriguing new beverages, and managed to squeeze in some research at the same time.

First stop: Romania. Our Bucharest hotel was next door to the Romanian parliament, aka “The Heaviest Building in the World.” Who knew they kept track of such things? We took a side trip to Transylvania to explore some castles and the breathtaking Carpathian Mountains. Kent drank a Dracula beer in the village below Castle Bran. It was red, but contained no actual blood. Bummer. We also visited Snagov Monastery which is both the burial place of Vlad the Impaler and an ostrich sanctuary. One stop shopping for all your touristic needs!

Disappointingly, the Bank of Transylvania is not a blood bank.

We’ll continue our travelog next week. See you then!

Where Do You See Yourselves in 12 Months?

Welcome to 2023, Rune Skelley! What do you plan to do with your time?

Thanks for having us, Rune. It’s great to be here. To the surprise of, probably, no one, we plan to continue writing As Yet Untitled Ghost Novel #1. Last winter when we started it we expected to finish the first draft within the year, but since that didn’t happen it needs to be our top priority.

How long will it take?

That’s anyone’s guess, but we are 99% sure we’ll reach the end this year. It would be nice to say 100%, but it’s smart to leave a little wiggle room.

And, assuming you do finish Book 1, what then? Will you write Book 2?

Potentially, but it’s unlikely. We’ll probably need to recharge our composition batteries. Writing a novel takes a lot out of you, even when you have a coauthor. It helps a lot to look away and do something else.

Something related, perhaps, to the rest of the series?

Perhaps. We were talking about this recently. One of the main advantages to plotting the entire four book series at once is that it allows us to make adjustments to the big picture as we go. When Book 1 is done, we’ll go through the outlines for the remaining books and see if there are any adjustments we need to make. That can mean adding or subtracting things from the future books, or it can mean going back into #1 and making tweaks to introduce or highlight things that will pay off later. It’s a lot to keep track of, but we really feel that it enhances the story world.

Are your other series completely done?

The Science Novels are as done as any writing project ever is, but we do have a Music Novel that needs to be edited. Feedback from our critique group is awaiting our attention, so that will be what we turn to if we need a bigger break before writing Ghosty Book 2.

What about the new story world you occasionally tease about?

We haven’t talked about that much recently, but it’s simmering away on the back burner.

Any exciting trips this year?

Yes! We have a very cool trip planned for later in the year, right after Kent retires from his day job.

Wait, what?

We saved the biggest announcement for last. After too many years chained to his desk at Corporate-DayJob Incorporated, Kent will be retiring in 2023, so he can be chained to his desk at SkelleyCo Amalgamated Fiction Enterprises, LLC! We’re very excited to see what that does for our productivity. 2023 will be a year of big changes around the Writing Cave!