Reality Bypass

Friday Flashback: Co-authoring challenge March 19, 2010

Repost from Jan 31, 2008.

A question that’s come up recently was what it’s like to co-author books with someone that lives several states away?

       Truthfully it can be a giant pain in the butt.  To co-author anything takes a committment to clear communication and compromise. Co-Authoring a 150,000 word draft, 95,000 word book, is even more of a challenge.  We find we have to stay in pretty close to daily contact with each other which we do over email, IM and phone and we have to stay organized.  Whispers has been five years in the making, but it’s been the last about six months that we strapped in and got serious about it.  An updated outline helps a lot and then exchange of files back and forth with both of us keeping a copy of the master file and syncing it up at least once every couple of weeks.  As long as we gently keep each other on the ball we tend to do just fine, but it’s definately not for the weak of heart or the impatient.  Arguments sprout up often because text can be read in so many different ways and depending on the mood of the reader and how sleep deprived they are, so we make sure that when things get heated we take a step back and sort out what is a difference of perception and what is actually at the heart of the matter.  The other key is that we take time to goof off together so that we have casual friend time too.  No matter how compatiable you think your writing styles may be never co-author with someone you don’t like, because by the end you’ll kill each other if you don’t have a solid base to go on.    Trust us.  We know.

     ~J