How Do I Write So Fast?
Many authors take a year or more to write a single book. This is so ingrained as a standard expectation that when a writer puts out their books significantly more quickly than that, eyebrows are raised and questions are asked as to whether the supposed author is doing all their own work.
Before the age of AI, people would ask if the author had the help of ghostwriters. These days, however, many assume that if an author seems to write abnormally quickly they must be using generative AI in at least part of the process.
As I’ve stated elsewhere on my website, I have never used AI in any part of the writing process except in research, and I always check my results as well as I can. It is my opinion that using AI to help with the more “boring” parts of writing is a missed opportunity to strengthen one’s skills.
If I don’t use AI, and I don’t use an assistant, how then do I write my books so quickly?
There are several factors. The first is simply that my books are relatively short, usually between 45,000 and 55,000 words. This is by design. The shorter length holds my attention as a writer better. I hope that it tends to hold my reader’s attention better as well, since shorter books must have faster pacing.
The second factor is that, since I primarily write Pride and Prejudice variations, I am working from an established setting and group of characters. A big part of the writing process is world building and character creation. With variations on an established story, I don’t have to do that, at least not much.
Thirdly, I do not have a full-time job, nor do I have children to care for. All of my children are grown, and I had to quit my job many years ago. While the amount of time I can spend actually typing is limited due to my health, I have all the time in the world to dream up scenarios, scenes, plot devices, and wording. This makes it so that when I do sit down to type, the process is relatively smooth, since the ideas are already organized in my mind.
This leads me to my final reason: editing. Many authors write as the words and scenes flow out of them, almost like brainstorming. Then, when they edit, they end up having to re-work scenes or even completely delete them. This results in wasted time and effort. Since I spend a great deal of time daydreaming about how I want my story to go, I do not often have to rework things quite so dramatically.
This is not to say that my methods are any better than anyone else’s. Every author has their own way of doing things, and sometimes a failed scene leads to something far better than it could have been if it had never failed in the first place. It is only that with my personal limitations, I must be as efficient with my physical efforts as possible.
I am not the only writer who writes as quickly as I do, though. Many of the most famous and prolific writers have methods that hasten the process in some way. Rachel Aaron actually wrote a book on the subject. It is called 2k to 10k: Writing Faster, Writing Better, and Writing More of What You Love. It discusses how she plans out her books meticulously so that when she does write, it is far faster and far smoother than she could have done without the planning.
Stephen King is another example. Many of his books were published just three months apart. Considering his books tend to be about twice as long as mine, my average of six to eight weeks doesn’t seem so impossible. I have looked into his writing process, and though it was not intentional, my own process is fairly similar to his.
If you are curious, I would recommend taking a look at his book, On Writing, or you can search YouTube for videos about his writing process. Ultimately, I tend to focus on the joy of creation. When I do, the words and ideas simply flow, not always perfectly and not always easily, but they do. When I focus on the work or on my self-imposed deadlines, that is when I get stuck.
I will see you all again when I post my next entry. Farewell for now.