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I had such fun in this interview with thriller, Sci-Fi and Western author Steve Windsor. I first heard about Steve, through the Summit Interviews that Chandler Bolt did in July 2015. He writes fast and is inspiring to listen to:) You can find his fiction books over at stevewindsor.com. He also writes his awesome Nine Day novel series to help first-time writers learn to outline, write and self-edit their books. You can find more about his non-fiction books at authorbasics.com which he has cofounded with his writing partner Lise Cartwright. You can connect with Steve on Facebook or Twitter.

Watch the Video Interview

Summary of the Interview

*Steve shares his story of how he was jammed into a cubicle in middle management – an IT Director at a tech company for his professional life. When he was laid off, he interviewed for jobs for awhile, until his wife got a job as a ICU nurse, then his wife encouraged him to write. So in-between the busy-ness of taking care of his kids, he wrote his novels.

*He said the book & movie Conversations With God sparked the idea of asking real questions and telling the truth to yourself. So he asked himself real questions around writing. From there, he decided he would get into the habit and mindset of pumping out words. He knew that the more words he typed everyday, the better he would get.

*Each step of story structure, story beats, writing, editing and self-publishing he learned along the way. Steve says he choose to start writing fiction because he knew he could bury his opinions, sarcasm and viewpoints on the world inside the characters – without ruining his life by his words in the outside world.

*His first book was 250,000 words and turned epic. After he’d written two and a half books, he looked at them and said you suck. Self Publishing School helped his writing and marketing improve. He learned his writing style, which is to start at 5am and write until 7pm. He goes to his favorite coffee shop Pete’s and writes all day there.

*His last fiction book, he wrote in 9 days. He encourages writers to choose where you want to spend your time. You can roam the malls shopping, go to BBQ’s with friends or if you want more books written, you can write.

“You need to get serious and decide that writing is about production. In order to produce it takes the time put in writing. You can’t skip the production part.” Steve Windsor

*For his own fiction novels, it took writing the first 3 books to get to the 4th book where people said I loved this book. How you write is affected by how much you’ve written.

*Steve encourages writers to watch movies critically to look for the formula – story structure. a)the hero comes in & doesn’t want to change. b)Something bad happens that sends the hero for a tail-spin. c)Hero tries to turn around & fight the system but fails. d) Hero finally knows what she/he has to do and almost fails again, but then miraculously wins and comes out of it. Because of the many questions he gets about story structure, Steve now offers a 4 Part Story Structure template to authors now, to help them understand story structure.

*Larry Brooks book Story Engineering or Story Structure — Demystified really help fiction writers understand story structure. Steve simplifies story structure even further in his great book Nine Day Novel: Writing Fiction: How to Use Story Structure and Write Your Fiction Novel Faster (Fiction Writing Basics Book 2). 

*Steve talks about how story beats are action and reaction. It’s that simple. He says when you write your story beats, there are 17 different pieces in a 4 part story structure that are action/reaction story beats. You can fill those pieces in before you ever start writing so you know the direction your hero is going.

“The wonderful thing about fiction is that you can write anything you want. RIP OFF the filter and write the crazy that’s in your head. Readers want to connect with the REAL that’s in your head.” Steve Windsor

*He encourages writers don’t try to skip the struggle of hard work. In the suffering is where you’re building your skills of how to pace a book, where your first sentence is, where you put your commas, ellipses and dialogue tags and where your action beats go. It’s like learning a new language.

*For first-time writers, start by knowing your first book isn’t going to be awesome. Until you start putting your own words on paper, you’re not learning anything – you’re just reading.

*When the money’s not flowing and you’re writing the 4th book in a series… you have to still love writing. Steve says, he switched for awhile and wrote the non-fiction books because that’s where more of the money was at the time. You have to be able to pivot as authors. Like Nick Stephenson did with his online course, Your First 10,000 Readers and Mark Dawson did with his Facebook Ads course. So even fiction writers go back to non-fiction if they need to, to make more money.

*You need to have the internal fire burning to write – even if all you want is the passive income – you still have to write real and worthwhile stuff. Put the words down with your own fingers.

*Get your ideas from research. Steve said that’s where he’s got his best ideas.

*The biggest thing is to let go of your self-censorship and put your thoughts inside a book. Characters can say and do anything… so let them. And keep writing more books.

You can find more about what Steve is up to in his fiction series at stevewindsor.com, or find out more about his non-fiction books and resources for writers at authorbasics.com.

What’s your #1 struggle as you write your fiction novel? I’d love to hear your ideas in the comments.

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