How to Co-Author a Best Seller

 

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What’s great about co-authoring?

Just about everything.

You get two fan bases, your books out sooner, and a writer buddy. Also, there are two minds to create a greater illusion. If you are as lucky as me, your buddy will an awesome writer, and you will get better as you work together.

How to we do it?

I can only speak from my own experience, writing with Chantel Seabrook.

For the first is the series, Dark Vortex, we joined together to work on a not-yet finished manuscript. It was a lot of fun bringing something dead back to life and it made the Amazon bestseller list.

Book two of the Mated by Magic Series, Dark Tremor, is much different. We needed to start from scratch.

She and I were both finishing other manuscripts when we paused to work out the plot. Our writing processes differ, yet pinging back and forth on instant message, in less than a day, Chantel and I created a wonderful story line.

First, we decided on our main characters. We chose the younger brother, of the hero in Dark Vortex and sent him out west.

Then, we had to find our heroine and gave her a unique magic power. We gave her a name, a look, and a background. Mind you, by now, Chantel are messaging each other back and forth in a frenzy. Bwa ha ha…..

What if her mother died? What if she is a recluse? What if he intrudes on her space. How do they meet? Do they like each other at first?

I’m not a great one to write an outline but I always have clear charts of goal, motivation, and conflict. And a dastardly nemesis.

She is an out-liner. Together, it was like, WOW.

Chapter by chapter, we ricocheted a document back and forth. Each time one appended onto the other’s imagination, trying to take it up a notch. We laughed and cried on instant messaging.

We needed what Alfred Hitchcock called ‘The McGuffin’. That’s the something that everyone in the story is after. We paused for a lunch break and I came with a ‘gem’ of an idea. A rare stone found only out west. You will need to read the story to find out more.

I lol’ed and researched on Google, while eating my salad.

Soon after, we had a mcGuffin, a bad guy, a love affair, and a conflict of epic proportions.

When we agreed upon the final chapter, after a lot of stuff blowing up and heated sex. we had to pause for a sanity break. Both of us had to finish our current projects.

This week, I was the first to finish as I sent my third Medieval romance to my editor. Chantel is finishing her a third shape-shifter.

I am writing like crazy, but only have a few hours a day. She’s a full time Mom, but is more productive. She will soon catch up and take over where I leave off. We’ll pass the document back and forth, pausing where it just feels right to pause.

I normally write my first draft in dialog, but because we are a team, I am taking the time to add in some scenery. That too, is new for me, and I am getting to be a better, faster, writer.

We will be done another book in half the time it would take us, writing alone.

And…well, it’s just very cool.

So, there you have it, in a nutshell. We don’t, as some critics thought, have one person write one chapter in one POV, and one in the other. We write as one seamless entity. I have no problem passing the ball to her for a few chapters, then taking it back.

That’s all there is.

Good Luck!

Hope you get as lucky as me.

 

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