Co-Authoring

A while back, my friend Lee Owens and I wrote a book together. It's called RIPPED APART. We were both going through some stuff so it wound up coming out in the story. Talk about living vicariously through our characters.  But anyways, this blog is about co-authoring.

Co-authoring is not for everyone. If you're selfish, not flexible and just mean--it's definitely not for you. You have to be willing to do what my drama teacher drilled into my head all through University--you have to be willing to say YES to almost everything your partner comes up with.  Just say YES and see where it goes. If you are willing to say yes, you'd be so surprise at the beautiful things you can come up with!


It's hard enough writing by yourself, so why would anyone in their right mind write with someone else? I mean damn, we can barely get along as is. But there is something magnificiently breath-taking about  having the use of two brains for one wonderful product! When I wrote with John Simpson, it was amazing! It was a waiting game, sitting on the edge of my seat, biting my nails to see what was coming next! It's a genuine reaction because you don't know! It's the mystery of it all.

Lee Owens was amazing as well. We would spend hours at Tim Hortons with our labtops and extra batteries, notepads and pens and just wrote. I think we put someone's kids through college with the amount of ice-caps and muffins we bought.

They are so many things you have to worry about with co-authoring. For me, I find you have to worry about people flaking. That's happened to me on so many occassions I've lost count.  Find people you TRUST not to flake. At the end of the day if they flake, there isn't much you can do. You can't use the story unless you have a signed contract that says if one person flake the other can use the whole story. Other than tht you basically have to go through and discard all the bits from the other person and lord knows no one has that kind of time and for me the patience.  You then have to worry about contracts and agreeing on edits and agreeing on covers...Hence why you can't be hard, unflinching and mean. This is not just YOUR work--its the work of all the authors involved.

It's not all cake and coffee....if you're not allergic to coffee.

With technology today, you can write a book with someone from anywhere in the world. With google docs, and MSN Skydrive and a whole slew of other programs. You can have access to your file at anytime together! The beauty of google docs is you can be in there at the same time, chatting and seeing what's written!

Pick your writing partner carefully:

1. Pick someone you trust. There's nothing worse than a wishy-washy person who starts out writing, it starts getting good then the person disappears. Do NOT find your writing partner on kijiji or craigslist--it's not worth the aggravation.
2. Make sure you both have access to the file at all times so it's backed up. Google Docs is amazing for writing together but it sucks for formatting. I would suggest just use google doc as a back up and send each other word files back and forth.
3. Before you start writing, set out the rules and stand by them.  No incest, no grose-icks. Decide between genres then sweet/sensual/erotic/bdsm. There's nothing worse than writing and you want to go scald-your-skin-hot and your partner wants to go behind-closed-door-loveys. Then what do you do?
4. Do not restrict story ideas.  Say YES to everything (within reason). Be open.
5. Check in with each other from time to time. Phone calls, facebook, emails, skype, msn, yahoo messenger...take time to talk to each other.
6. Edits---oh the dreaded E word. First round of edits, USE TRACK CHANGES ALL THE TIME! It sucks having someone edit and you have NO clue what they did. Edit your sections first, the bits that you wrote. Then go through an ensure everything flows and there are no spelling errors. Do not edit your partner's bits at the first round. You cannot read your partner's mind and know what is supposed to be there.

Here's one co authored piece I got done and it was amazing!

One act of violence, is enough to shatter a love that should have lasted a life time.

One act of violence sends Colby Master's life spiralling out of control and sends his lover Leo Giofranco from his life. It took a year of healing to give Colby some time to come to his senses but is he too late? Has he hurt Leo too much to be forgiven? Wiill Colby be able to make amends or has Leo moved on?

This is on Amazon!

I hope this helps you...

Love,
Remmy Duchene