HOW CAN TWO WRITERS WORK ON ONE PROJECT?

It isn’t as difficult as you might think.  We do a lot of talking and batting ideas around, making sure to take notes so nothing is forgotten.

JJ started book one with a dynamite chapter that left me wondering, “How can I match that?!” It seemed daunting, but I woke about 3:30 one morning and turned on the computer, wrote a chapter and went back to bed.  Pretty easy. 

One thing that helps—both when you’re working alone and with a collaborator—is casting your characters.  We choose actors for each role.  It helps with description as well as keeping characters “in character”.

Here’s an example.  I was working on a vampire story (not published) with a character named Graham who had psychotic moments now and then.  My inspiration was a scene from the first Lethal Weapon.  It was just after Riggs (played by Mel Gibson) “rescued” a potential suicide by handcuffing himself to the man and jumping off a roof.  Danny Glover’s character confronts Riggs, and the wild look in Riggs’ eyes and his totally insane behavior inspired Graham.  If I felt I “lost” Graham at any point, I could watch that one scene and get him back.

Do JJ and I disagree?  You bet!  But we’ve learned to compromise.  And while I was editing book three, JJ was busy starting book four.  Once book three was published, I began on book four, doing the editing, adding some description, making sure timelines worked, etc. 

Once a book is finished, we each do a final read-through.  Yes, the computer sometimes decides it knows better than we do when it comes to spelling, grammar, punctuation or spacing...  Like today, JJ typed “brunette” and the computer instantly changed it to “brown haired person”, and changed hormone to...  Well, we won’t go there.

Suffice it to say, we’ve managed to catch most of the glitches.