How do you write?
This is a question I get asked quite a lot the other question being 'How do you come up with your ideas?'
Very often writing just involves getting your butt down on the chair and getting on with it. It is hard and it is painful and often you feel like you are swimming against the tide but if you want to be a writer you do it. I started writing many years ago using pen and paper, it took me hours to get the words down but I forced myself to do so many a day. Typing up the story was my first set of edits making the typed up version the second draft - further edits and more work followed before it was even suitable to be given to my then editor. This is how things went for a very long time until I started to write directly upon the computer and then my trusted tablet which has travelled all over with me recently.
From time to time I'll switch back to writing with pen and paper and so my writing room is piled up with fresh and half filled notepads, pens are spread all over the place meaning I am never far from a writing implement. Yes it does take a while to type up the words I've written which means I probably write far slower but somehow I feel more connected to the story. Be it that I can remember where I was when I wrote that sentence or knowing why my handwriting is more of a scrawl at points there is something real about working in ink.
I now know I will always switch between writing straight onto the computer and writing in pen and I gladly accept the fact that I'll be not working efficiently however working inefficiently is far more preferable than not working at all.
So how about you - how do you write?
