About Kal S. Davian:
Author, reader, artist, designer, father, disc-golfer, gamer, sci-fi and physics lover, Mt.Dew addict, imaginationist. I love to write, and I have no plans to stop. While my skills are still improving, I know what I enjoy and what I want to write about. Most of my time is devoted to writing my life’s work, Nihilian Effect.
What inspires you to write?
The unrelenting need to create. Writing just seemed the most achievable method. With just a few words, I can create worlds.
Tell us about your writing process.
I have been working on this world for a long time (and sometimes with the help of others), so there is a lot of content to choose from when I want to start a new book. In the beginning, I used notebooks all throughout middle and high school, but now, I completely rely on the pc. If I get an idea for a new story, I will first jot the idea down in notepad file that contains a small list of story ideas I have. If I feel it is strong enough of an idea for a story and I start to get more ideas how to expound on it, I will make it its own notepad file and start gathering any notes for it in there in no particular order, marking those I think are good or bad.
When it comes time to turn that story into a book, I will brainstorm about it for days, go through all my notepad files for my world–some 200 or so, each with multiple pages–and pull out any notes that apply to that story in particular and paste it into its file. After a lot of brainstorming and when I feel the idea for the new book is strong enough, I will start to place some of the notes at the bottom of the doc file that I plan to write in in a semi-chronological order. As I come to those parts of the story that the notes apply to, I delete the note, or move it into an outtakes doc file if I happened to have changed the original idea. I try to save every idea, new or old, because you never know if you need to come back to it, or if it might spark a different idea later.
Writing the book itself has processes all its own. I am a free-writer, meaning I do very little plotting. I make sure that I know my goal for the story and its characters, what I want to include from the notes and how I want it to play out. Beyond that, I do not plot at all, unless I hit a wall, then I will take a little time to brainstorm again and micro-manage the next scene. Writing for me is just as much an adventure as I hope it is for the reader because even I do not know how the story will play out until it is finished. Many people plan things out entirely, and that is fine, but I always say that you can only plan so much before it ends up as actual writing, and the moment you do start writing, everything changes. Although, I do expect I will need to do more thorough planning and plotting for larger stories later on. So far, everything has been under 50k words, so it has been pretty simple to write this way.
For Fiction Writers: Do you listen (or talk to) to your characters?
No, that is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard.
What advice would you give other writers?
I started working on my story back when I was 12, and spent years working on it. Then 4 years ago, I came to a realization: how long did I want to wait to bring this idea to fruition? When did I want to show it to the world? Would it be 5 years, or maybe 10 years down the road? I realized I was wasting my time, and I did not want to wait anymore. I sat down and started writing, and finished the story. Now I have 3 books out and a 4th in editing, with many more planned.
I have many pieces of advice I would give, but the most important is to just shut up and write. There is nothing else to it. I tell people this constantly. The questions you have to ask yourself are, “How badly do I want my stories to exist? How long do you want to wait for your story to be finished?” Stop letting the menial problems get in the way. Only you can stop you. All I have to do is shut up and write.
How did you decide how to publish your books?
I had never thought that online self-publishing even existed until a friend and fellow writer, Sander F., started self-publishing his works. I had read many articles and feedback on the difficulties and cons of big biz publishing, and self-publishing seemed like the obvious and promising choice at the time. I hope to one day be accepted by the big biz publishers, but until then, self-publishing all the way.
What do you think about the future of book publishing?
Publishing is now in the hands of the writers thanks to self-publishing. Who knows where authors will take it or what the future has in store for us. The methods may change, but there will always be a need for storytellers.
What do you use?: Beta Readers
What genres do you write?: Science Fiction, Fantasy, Dark, Paranormal
What formats are your books in?: eBook
Website(s)
Kal S. Davian Home Page Link
Link To Kal S. Davian Page On Amazon
