Happy birthday, Diana Gabaldon: Understanding the writing method
Let’s celebrate Diana Gabaldon’s birthday by looking at her writing method
Jan. 11 is a special day in the world of Outlander. It’s Diana Gabaldon’s birthday.
We like to celebrate birthdays with posts centered on the person. While we all know just how much Gabaldon means to the world of Outlander as the creator of the books, we’ve looked at that before.
Today, I want to take a look at her writing method. Without her writing method, we wouldn’t have the descriptions and the epic story we do have. Her writing method allows her to start simply and build on top of that.
It’s something she’s explained a lot over the years. There are videos of her explaining how she gets to the descriptions that she does.
And it’s her writing method that leads to the books taking a while to write. You can’t rush this non-linear method of writing. It’s not possible to rush as descriptions flow and characters talk to her. That’s something I can relate to as someone who regularly talks about my own characters talking to me.
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Multiple Outlander books on the go at the same time
One thing Diana Gabaldon has talked about is how she’ll get snippets from other books. When she gets the inspiration for those snippets she’ll work on them and save them. There’s no point in pushing them back and hoping they come up again. That’s not the way writing works.
It’s another reason her books take long to write. She’s not just working on the one book.
However, eventually, a book will take over. Right now, it’s been Go Tell the Bees That I Am Gone, which she is close to finishing—she’s not there yet!
After that, there’s the question of whether she’ll work on Outlander Book 10 or the prequel book. She’ll work on both of them a little and see which one takes over. I know a lot of people are hoping it’s the 10th book in the main series, but you can’t always control the creative process.
Whatever works! We’ve already seen the success so far over the last 30 years or so!
Next. The Outlander books in chronological order. dark
Happy birthday, Diana Gabaldon!