Could you tell us a little bit about how the writing process for these last couple of books has been, how it is for this one, as there are so many people working on it?
Well, the first thing is that Brandon writes, and…you could talk about that, Peter. I don’t really know much about Brandon’s writing process except that it tends to be at night. (laughter)
Well, for those who aren’t aware, Brandon…(sigh)…Brandon tends to stay up until four o’clock in the morning writing, and then he gets up at noon. So he gets up at noon, and then he writes from about one to five, and then he is with the family until bedtime for the kids, and so from about…I guess he starts writing again at about eight, and then he keeps going until four. Some of you may be interested to know that he has a walking treadmill desk, so he does a lot of his writing standing up, walking on the treadmill (laughter) and when he’s not at the treadmill, he’s got multiple fireplaces around the house now, so he’s usually in front of one of those.
Are they wood-burning, or gas, or what? (laughter) I love fireplaces!
Uh…they are gas fireplaces.
Yeah, those are fun. Then Brandon gives us the first draft, and some bits are rough, and some are polished. And we go through it with our three various combs. Mine is characters and prose. Maria is continuity. I am not . (laughter) And she’s a wizard at that, and Alan is a military wizard. And notice it’s…I guess sexist, to give him the boy’s stuff. (laughter).
I get all the alcohol as well. (laughter).
That’s just ‘cause he’s lucky.
And Alan does Old Tongue and geography as well, because I kinda stink at both of those.
And I just kind of lose my temper with the geography. (laughter) And then, we get this stuff, and with this book, we’re doing a better…it is a better thing we are doing for our country this time. (laughter) We send our combined nit-picking to Brandon section by section, and right now he’s had…what did I send you last week? Five?
Part six.
Six! I’m in eight; so is Maria. (to Alan) Where are you?
Seven.
Seven. And we’ll wait until Alan has finished eight before it goes back to Brandon, so that he doesn’t lose his mind, and nine is followed only by the epilogue, so we’re almost through. And then Brandon will send it back and there will probably be more animated conversation (laughter), and this time it will include words from Brandon that sort of say, “But you said …” (laughter) And we’ll work it out, and we hope to have it in New York June 15th, and that might seem like a long time for January 8th. Believe me, it’s not. And it will…is Paul Stevens here? Yeah, hey Paul! This will save…if we can do it, it will save the coffee cart from adding Prozac and Gelusil in massive amounts, right?
Yes.
But it might be…there is [?] [whispered conversation with Alan, something about June 15th]
Scary, isn’t it? (laughter)
That’s the goal.
It is in two months.
But, we don’t think Brandon really needs to sleep. (laughter)
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