Holy cow! Two in two weeks?! The deuce, you say! We do say! And it’s a special Shared Desk as we’ve recorded our panel at the Write by the Rails meeting that included a panel discussion with couples that collaborated on their writings. Joined by local authors Nick and Stacia Kelly, Tee and Pip share stories and approaches on how they make a collaboration work and also share advice on how to keep collaborations successful.
[display_podcast]
00:00 — Introduction
- Flying solo in the opening…
- Throwing in a special episode without making it special…
- Hooking up with Nick and Stacia Kelly (and yeah, Tee trips up on her name a bit in the introduction…)
- Quick Announcement — Tee & Pip will be working the York County Library on JULY 30!!!
- Teasing the next special guest for The Shared Desk…
2:47 — Collaborating Couples (with Nick & Stacia Kelly)
- Recording LIVE from the Write by the Rails writing group here in Manassas, VA
- Sadly, we can’t enact the “Bar Panel” rule here…
- Who’s on the panel tonight?
- Nick Kelly, Science Fiction author (introducing his first book this month)
- Stacia Kelly, fiction and non-fiction author
- ..and us.
- What’s the collaboration process between us?
- Stacia got an idea, but wanted to write with her husband, Nick.
- Nick works more with the nitty-gritty, not so well on the romance…
- Nic and Stacia discover their differences in how they write.
- The truth of successful collaboration, and how marrying your writing partner is not the sure-fire solution to a great process.
- Pip and Tee talk a bit about Discovery Writing.
- When you do the open idea sessions, all four of us need to write it down!
- Pip & Tee flinch over the “Red Pen” experience with Harper Voyager.
- How does collaboration go with people outside the writing experience?
- Editorial pains
- Working with cover artists
- Okay, Tee could get behind the “Hot Tub” sessions….
- Working on the covers of Kindred & Wings and Dawn’s Early Light…
- When Collaborations go wrong…
- Stacia stands alone as the writer amongst the experts. Let the madness commence!
- Tee finally reveals the story behind his first story…and it is as epic as the story itself….
- Pip’s “bad experience” was actually not that bad.
- Facing the worst-case scenario as a married couple.
- The panel goes deep into having an Exit Plan and the importance of communication.
- Mad props to Delilah S. Dawson for coming through…
- Unexpected Collaborations
- Working with book bloggers on blog tours
- Collaborating with other authors in your worlds
- Spending some quality time on Jack Mangan and his influence on The Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences….
- What you need for a solid collaboration — Trust, Communications, and an Editorial Timeline
40:45 — Questions from the Audience
- How do you divide responsibilities between yourselves?
- Pip and Tee evolve their collaborative process from when they went from a podcast-for-pay to a series from Harper Voyager and Ace.
- Pip & Tee’s biggest argument
- Stacia makes Nick put on a “special suit” for working out fight scenes.
- Nick breaks down their writing process using a musical analogy.
- How did Pip and Tee first meet?
- Meeting online
- Everybody wanted to collaborate with Tee because…
- The open honesty from New Zealand
- Do you all do your own editing?
- Why hiring an editor is so important.
- Stacia’s editing resource — http://autocrit.com
- But you should still edit your own drafts before going to an editor.
- When is the editing done?
- The little discoveries when you go deep into editing
- What an editor should never say to a writer…
- How many Beta Readers do you have?
- What to expect from Beta Readers
- What are you doing when you’re not writing?
- It’s a wide field of expertise.
- Tee’s suggestion: A social media panel for writers (with a quick tangent on John Scalzi)
- A quick discussion on Hootsuite and other strategies in social media
- ….and that’s all from us here at Write By the Rails!
Find us on Twitter at either Tee’s or Pip’s account, leave us a voicemail or question for the show at 703.791.1701, or leave us a comment here at the blog.
Enjoy the ride
and we’ll catch you later.
I had an absolute blast. Collaboration is just one small piece of information that writers can learn from Tee and Pip. Very fun time!
So…I need to send Nick halfway across the world to keep up 🙂
Pingback: Author Interview: Nick Kelly & CONTEST!!! « DEB SANDERS
Pingback: Guest Blog & Podcast: Tee Morris & Pip Ballantine | Nick Kelly
Pingback: Endless Possibilities Blog Tour 2014: Nick Kelly on Crossing the Line and How Far to Cross It
Pingback: Endless Possibilities Blog Tour 2014: Stacia Kelly on Setting Stages and Creating Worlds
Pingback: Episode #31: Reflections and Lessons Learned from a Blog Tour (with Nick & Stacia Kelly) | The Shared Desk