Voices of Fiction - Time to write a book - Part Two

Welcome to Voices of Fiction.

We continue with our discussion of how long it takes to write a book.

Please welcome our guests.

Karen Cioffi is a multi-award-winning author, freelance/ghostwriter, editor, and online marketer, as well as the founder and manager of Writers on the Move. - Website, Website, Website

Jade Varden is the author of the Deck of Lies series, a collection of YA mystery books that show what happens when dark family secrets are exposed. Jade also provides professional writing tips to other indie authors on her blog. - Twitter, Blog, Amazon

Thea Landen writes erotic literature, frequently in a sci-fi/fantasy setting. When she's not writing, or thinking about writing, her hands and mind are occupied by either yarn crafts or role-playing games. Blog, Amazon, AllRomanceBooks

Author and editor, Penny Lockwood Ehrenkranz has published more than 100 articles, 75 stories, six e books, a chapbook, one MG novel, a short story collection, and her stories have been included in two anthologies. She writes for both adults and children. She edits for two small traditional publishers. Website, Blog, MuseItUp 

Liz Crowe’s groundbreaking romance sub-genre, “Romance for Real Life,” has gained thousands of fans and followers who are interested less in the “HEA” and more in the “WHA” (“What Happens After?”) Her books are set in the not-so-common worlds of breweries, on the soccer pitch and in high-powered real estate offices. Don’t ask her for anything “like” a Budweiser or risk painful injury. - Website,  Blog, Facebook


Welcome Authors!

Question: How long does it take you to write a book?

Karen Cioffi: This depends on what I’m writing. It took me around two years to write my middle grade fantasy, Walking Through Walls. Picture books seem to take me much less time, maybe a couple of months. My nonfiction writing and marketing books can take a couple of weeks to a month.

Jade Varden: Writing time all depends on the book. Even a short book may require a ton of research, and that’s time-consuming. The longest I ever spent working one just one book was two years; it involved a lot of research, and the book was quite long.

Thea Landen: Depends on the length of the book! My first book was around 32K words, and it took me about a month to write. Since then, I've been writing longer novels, and they usually take me at least a couple of months. (I've also added going back to school to this equation, and that adds to the time!)

Penny Ehrenkranz: I prefer writing short stories to actual books. These tend to take a week or less depending upon how much editing I need to do. The middle grade novels I’ve written, however, did take considerably longer. At the time these were written, I was also working outside the home and only able to write in my “spare” time. Working within those restrictions, it took over six months to complete the first draft and probably a year before I was able to submit a finished manuscript. 

Liz Crowe: Depends on how busy I am with my brewery frankly. I wrote a 100,000 word novel (Essence of Time) in 2 weeks but wrote nearly around the clock. I tend to "marathon" when I get an idea and keep working/writing until the project is complete. The busier I get the harder that is, of course.

Thank you all for joining us today.

Readers feel free to ask questions concerning this topic in the comments. Also feel free to send questions to chergreen@chergreen.com Subject: Voices of Fiction Question, and have them answered by the participating authors in later editions.

There’s also room for more authors to participate. Drop me an email, Subject: Voices of Fiction.

(Disclaimer - Bios and photos submitted by authors.)