ED JAMES
The crime novelist talks Lynne Hackles through his frenetic writing schedule
Lynne Hackles
My Writing Day
Ed James has written 22 books. Nineteen of them since April 2012. ‘It sounds quite bonkers,’ he says, ‘though two are practice novels that don’t count, I suppose!’ This is Ed’s fifth year of writing full-time and confesses he’s just got over ‘the fear’.
‘I work set hours,’ he says. ‘Starting between 8am and 9am, work until lunchtime, then do some more in the afternoon. I try to structure each book so that I’m spending an equal amount of time on outlining, writing the first draft, and revising for a second draft, which goes off to editing. I write at a furious pace so am trying to spend more time on outlining and taking longer to draft. 3/3/3 is what I’m aiming for now!