J.D. Kirk, author of 'The One That Got Away' - Prolific writer discusses self-publishing, staying healthy, and his very busy year
Writer's Routine
Dan Simpson
4.9 • 599 Ratings
🗓️ 25 May 2023
⏱️ 58 minutes
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Summary
J.D. Kirk is a prolific writer. He's written comics and screenplays, under the name Barry Hutchison he's published over 170 children's books, and is back with a new crime novel, 'The One That Got Away'.
It's the first in the DI Heather Filson series, about a 15 year old girl who doesn’t make it home so is suspected as another teenage runaway. However, when her grandfather, a notorious Glasgow gangster, disagrees, it takes Heather Filson into a battle of underworld enemies, and her own past.
We talk about J.D's decision to self-publish. It certainly comes with more control and freedom, but what about the additional pressure of being responsible for everything when you need to make money for your family? We also run through his relentless writing schedule - he published over 100 books in about 5 years, and you can hear about the peculiar condition he suffers from, and why it makes some aspects of writing easier for him.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello, welcome along to writers' routine. This week we're chatting to J.D. Kirk, who has written |
| 0:13.5 | a lot of everything, really, comics, screenplays, kids' books, and now crime books. We chat about |
| 0:19.8 | how he stays mentally and physically healthy |
| 0:22.6 | as he writes, also about the hectic routine of his writing year, and as he self-publishes |
| 0:30.6 | many titles, how much pressure he feels directly being involved in every choice while needing |
| 0:37.3 | to make things financially work for the family. |
| 0:39.9 | Pressure's fine if you have a sense of control that goes along with it. If you go, okay, this is, |
| 0:44.2 | this is pressure, but I can affect change on this. When you're working for traditional publishers, |
| 0:51.8 | you have no real control over what's happening with your books. |
| 0:55.5 | You've given your books over to a publisher and they then decide everything that happens with |
| 1:00.9 | that book. You know, I wrote three books for a publisher that were all written up front and they |
| 1:06.0 | decided to put one out a year for three years. And it's like, well, they're all written. Why are we holding |
| 1:12.3 | off this huge gap? But that's what fit with their publishing schedule. Lots more coming up with |
| 1:19.0 | JD Kirk in this week's writer's routine. Yes, hello, welcome along. It's writers' routine where we take a look through an author's |
| 1:32.6 | working day. We dive down. We pick up some tips and advice about how they plan their work, |
| 1:38.1 | their life, their day, their space to give them the best opportunity of getting an idea from |
| 1:43.3 | their head onto the page. |
| 1:45.3 | My name's Dan Simpson. |
| 1:46.3 | Thank you very much for listening and sharing. |
| 1:49.0 | Thank you very much also to Plotter because for just a little while more, they are helping |
| 1:54.2 | to power the show, just like their software can power your writing. |
| 1:58.8 | Plotter is a writing tool that does what the title suggests. It |
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