By Parker McKenzie
“If you’re having a day where you are downtrodden, find a different way to work on your writing. Even if it’s reading books about craft, editing, or connecting with other writers, there are always ways that you can tap into the creative.”
Upwey-based Freelance writer and novelist Kylie Orr says she looks at her debut thriller novel as both a learning experience and an “apprenticeship book.”
“I’ve written some children’s books, and I was also writing feature articles for a parenting website and The Age. In my head I thought I’d be able to write chapters like they were short stories and just join them all together,” she says.
“It was a way of learning how to actually write long form, which meant it had to go through many edits. It was a fairly messy and chaotic process.”
Someone Else’s Child was published this year and she has already taken the lessons learned through the writing process.
“I had originally written the story from three different points of view. When it went to one of the edits, the feedback I got was that I nailed one of the voices but the other two really needed work,” she says.
“I learned a lot of lessons in that process that hopefully will help me have a more seamless approach with my second book, and further books after that.”
She says don’t be too hard on yourself about the words you put on the page because a lot of the finer details are created through the editing process.
“Even if you’re a meticulous planner the story might take a different path, so you spend a lot of your time writing and editing, polishing the very start of your story and then you’re going to have to change that too,” she says.
“You just need to get the story down from start to end and that’s when you go back and polish, change and edit the layers.”
She believes even though you have more creative license with fiction work, often one’s own experiences and voice find their way onto the page.
“In fiction, you can take it to places that are much more imaginative, and live vicariously through your characters and make them do stuff that maybe you wished you could do in real life and not go to jail for it,” she says.
“I always tried to write my nonfiction with an original voice and approach it in that way because I think that’s how you gain readership. People enjoy the way you approach situations,
“It was important to me in fiction to take my voice out of it, I needed the character to speak for herself. I’m quite a strong, opinionated personality, and when it’s not that kind of character I needed to be able to give her a different voice.”
Some advice for aspiring writers Orr has to offer is to take writing courses to understand the process and potentially join some writer’s groups to receive feedback and support while keeping you honest with accountability and soft deadlines.
She says instead of getting down on yourself on days you find it difficult to write creatively, find a different way to work in the writing space.
“The last two years have been really difficult for everybody. When you are going through a difficult time, some people turn to writing and some people turn away from writing,” she says.
“I have four kids and they were homeschooling, it was close to a nightmare. I found it really difficult to have any emotional energy to invest in my writing, so on the days that I just couldn’t come up with anything creative I would edit.”
You can find out more about Someone Else’s Child and Kylie Orr’s writing at www.kylieorr.com
