About Paul Beech:
I am a bookseller from Portsmouth, and enjoy music, writing (of course!), playing my bass guitar (badly) and annoying my wife and daughter (which I seem to do without realizing it). We live in a tiny flat, together with a cat and thousands of books.
What inspires you to write?
I think I am most inspired by my own thoughts, feelings, frustrations, fears and desires. I unconsciously put a fair portion of my own psyche into my main character, Joe. The other thing that inspires me is great art, whether it’s amazing films (‘Valerie and Her Week of Wonders’, ‘Picnic at Hanging Rock’), great literature (‘Franny and Zooey’, ‘Dracula’) or fantastic artworks (particularly from the Expressionist movement).
Tell us about your writing process.
Living in a tiny flat, I found I could only write by taking over my parents’ backroom. As this was only possible two days a week (when I was off work), it took me a long time to finish ‘Shekinah’. I can drive myself very hard, often writing for up to seven hours a day (with short breaks). Once the plot was in place, the actual writing came fairly easily, though I revised it many times to make it as good as I was able.
For Fiction Writers: Do you listen (or talk to) to your characters?
No. When I am writing, I am fully in the world of my book, and feel very attached to my characters; but I am not the kind of author to imagine them living their own lives, independent of my book, and I feel I know them all too well to chat to them – I know exactly what they would say and how they would say it.
What advice would you give other writers?
Never give up. One thing you must understand is that no writer’s first draft is actually any good – some even junk up to 80% of their first drafts when revising them. The important thing is to get something down, and to keep on writing something – anything – every day. It helps to keep a notebook with you at all times, as you never know when inspiration might hit you.
How did you decide how to publish your books?
I sent out two waves of submissions to agents, but the time lag between submission and hearing back was usually up to four months, so I quickly got bored of waiting. When I discovered how easy it was to upload my book as a Kindle eBook (and how much more I could make in royalties) it seemed silly to publish my book any other way.
What do you think about the future of book publishing?
The sales of physical books are on the up again, against all expectations, so this feels like a new era of bookselling; but eBooks are still a major force to be reckoned with, and by far the easiest way for a new author to get his or her book out there.
What genres do you write?: Fiction, Fantasy, Paranormal, Literary
What formats are your books in?: eBook
Website(s)
Link To Paul Beech Page On Amazon
Your Social Media Links
Goodreads
Facebook
Twitter
All information in this post is presented “as is” supplied by the author. We don’t edit to allow you the reader to hear the author in their own voice.
