So, you and a fellow writer (or more than one!) have a brilliant idea. It is a concept for a project that could only be executed by your brains working in collaboration, and you want nothing more than to start right away.
But before you take the leap and start a shared Google Drive folder, you’ll want to stop and make sure you’re compatible as collaborators. Learning whether you’re able to work together nicely—and how you’d work together to make it nice—could save you a lot of heartache.
On Communication
1. How do you prefer to communicate?
Some people lose emails. Some people live their lives on Do Not Disturb mode and never see most of their notifications. Some people almost exclusively use Messenger. And there are dozens of other scenarios and personality quirks that could change your primary way of getting in contact with each other.
It’s best that you and your writing partner(s) make clear which mode of communication suits you immediately. That way, you will know where to look for updates, and things you send won’t get lost amongst other apps!
2. How often do you think we should check in with each other?
Everyone has a different rhythm to their life, and we all go through seasons where doing the things we want to do, or promise to do, becomes difficult. Regular check-ins will help you spot those seasons and navigate through them, so your project never falls by the wayside.
3. What style of feedback do you prefer to receive?
This might be a tricky question for people to answer. In fact, you may not even have a full and complete answer. I, for example, can spot a “compliment sandwich” (a compliment followed by critique followed by another compliment) a mile away, and I don’t typically love receiving them. But if you were to ask me what format I’d like my feedback in, I wouldn’t have an immediate or clear response.
Still, don’t skip this question! Even just asking about styles of feedback will help you both be aware of how you phrase comments and critiques, and the answers will reveal themselves eventually.
4. What should we do if we disagree?
This is an uncomfortable question, but it’s better to have a strategy thought of before you need to use it. Otherwise, you might slip into a disagreement that snowballs into an argument, and a fair percentage of the time, there’s no need for arguing.
On the Process
5. How do you feel about deadlines?
Are you the kind of person who works best with a little pressure and a time crunch? What about your writing partner(s)? If one or more doesn’t work best with a deadline, how else could you stay on track?
6. What methods do you use to keep track of progress?
Pacemaker.press? Reedsy’s built-in progress tracker? NaNoWriMo’s word count tracker? A bullet journal? If one of you has a cool tool, it could be helpful to get familiar with it—or even adopt it entirely. That way, check-ins during the drafting phase could become a quick glance of a screenshot.
7. How do you think we should divide our workload?
If you and one other writer are writing a single novel, you might just divide the chapters in half, reading each as you go. It’s true that this is a popular way to co-write, but is it the best way for you and your writing partner(s)?
The answer to dividing your workload well—especially between three or more writers—lies in playing to your strengths. Because writing a book is not just writing; there’s also planning, revisions, marketing, and so on. If one of you is excellent at developing characters from scratch while the other loves to worldbuild, it might not make sense for you to each do half of those jobs when you could simply assign the best person for the job.
8. What do you think the timeline would look like for getting this project started (and done)?
It’s so fun to talk about future projects, but there comes a time when the talking has to stop so the work can begin. You could happily chatter away in the planning phase forever—and I’ve definitely done that before—but that won’t get you a completed book!
You need to hold each other accountable, of course, but also remember to be kind. Life happens!
9. What apps, programs, or websites should we use to manage our files and ideas?
If you’re going down the list, you’ll have already established the way you’ll communicate, but being able to talk to each other is only half the battle. You need someplace to store the products of your conversations.
Ideally, you will come to the table with a system already in mind for how to share the project files. But if you don’t, it will come as no surprise to you that I’m going to recommend Google Drive. Everyone with a (free!) Gmail account has their own Google Drive, which means you already have Google Docs for co-writing and Google Sites as an option for your project’s wiki.
On the Project
10. What is your vision for the project?
This might seem like an obvious question to ask, but it’s important that you don’t let its obviousness stop you from bringing it up. Just because you both seem to be on the same wavelength now doesn’t mean you’ll stay that way. Get in writing a mission statement for your project you can return to (or revise) if needed. (Truth be told, that’s probably a smart thing to do at the start of any project!)
11. What would you consider to be the most important part of the project?
When you are in the brainstorming phase of a project, it’s easy to get excited about your favorite ideas and store them away for later, but the opinions of your writing partner(s) need equal attention. After writing your mission statement, brainstorm the parts of the project that make this concept so inspiring for you, and advocate for those parts as long as they aren’t detrimental to the story you wind up telling. Because as we all know, stories can change before our eyes.
12. How will we marry our writing styles?
This is even more important if one or both of you normally writes in a different genre or subgenre. We all have different styles, and of course, we can switch styles if the situation calls for it. (Blog Post Megan’s voice is very different from Historical Romance Megan’s voice, which is different than my pen names’ voices!)
But even if you write in the same genre, choosing words and structuring sentences can get tricky. Do you plan to hire a copy editor? Will one of you be the “lead voice” that the other mimics? Decide now, especially if you plan to write under a single pen name.
