My inspiration today is a fellow erotic romance writer, the fabulous Susan Laine (http://www.susan-laine-author.fi/61879159) . We’ve become good friends discovering lots of things in common like we hate vampire stories but love werewolf ones. We jokingly said we should collaborate on a werewolf story (M/M/F) bringing together our mutual European roots (Susan is Finnish, and I, of course, am English) which combined our usual writing styles and for fun started to plot a story outline. This led onto character profiles, description of the setting, wolf behaviour story-building and so on. And we found it ABSOLUTELY invigorating to bounce ideas off someone as like-minded as the other. It was such fun and energising. I can’t emphasise what an adrenaline rush it was – I think everyone should collaborate with someone else at least once in their lives even if they go no further than the ‘brainstorming’.
Along the way we said ‘is this for real, shall we actually do this?’ So decided to write a chapter each and passed it back to the other to see if our writing styles meshed and the other was taking the characters in the same direction. Part of us was worried about being possessive of ‘our characters’ but since we planned the story together neither of us have felt that way and both of us are happy to concede to the other if they have a better idea.
I know that other writers have had problems when collaborating and it has ended long standing friendships. I have already indicated possible problems with character development but what happens if one writer becomes more enthusiastic than the other or even bored or have other commitments so that one person gives more time to it than the other. These are all things we need to consider before we go any further so all I can say is …….. watch this space! (Of course, if you hear about a Finnish woman murdering an English one you know what has happened and not to hold your breath waiting for a werewolf story).
Jen
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