The First Draft is in the Can, Well the Word Doc!

J.J. Westerman has completed his first draft of the first book, The Catalyst – In Search of the Amis Trinity.

After 6 months of mostly 5:30am writing sessions, all 98,914 words of it are finished. There has been a big change right at the last moment to the ending of the book and a change to the entire series. The moment of epiphany came when JJ was speaking to his wife, Emma about the length of the book. It was well on course to be 150,000 words, too long for a debut author aiming their work at teens. So, the latter middle section has been cut and the Trilogy has become the Chronicles, to allow for more than three books. The intended ending for the first book has gone in as planned but has been adapted to fit the new story line. Not only is the book all the better for the last-minute change, it leaves it on a cliff hanger with even J J wanting to know what’s going to happen next (although he has a fair idea)!

J. J. Westerman has learnt a lot about his writing style and storytelling ability after completing the first draft of his first attempt at a full-length novel. It was surprising that a lot of the beliefs and principles J J holds dear manifested themselves in his writing. The love of animals and their hugely important role in his life comes to fruition as the animals almost become the brightest stars of the show. Also, the love he has for his family both present and past can been seen dotted throughout the 148 pages of A4.

The biggest lesson learned, however, has been the escapism and cathartic benefits that writing has brought him. In a very stressful year of 2020 with a baby, Zachary has not been able to cuddle Grandparents, Aunties, Uncles, Godparents and play with friends. Escaping for a few hours a day meant JJ has had the positivity to get through 2020 stronger and happier than when he entered it, mostly due to his wife’s support and the brightest star in all the connected worlds, his son Zach.

The overall story has flowed organically but is rooted in a firm spine. JJ planned a rough outline of the three books (which will now likely be at least five) and then carefully planned three chapters ahead. This led to the flexibility of new ideas and allowed the characters to grow naturally but also resulted in consistency and running themes. Consistency of themes is a very important aspect to JJ and what he has enjoyed most about the books he has read. J. J. Westerman is very happy with the last few chapters of the book, after it changed so dramatically, with two chapters that have been written now to be included in the second book. With this change, it makes the crescendo more powerful and improves the pacing. Freya’s character arc is clearer but she is still rooted in her noble upbringing and morals, whereas Zach has a lot more scope to grow in the rest of the series as he teaches and learns from Freya.

JJ is already preparing for the rewrite and 2nd draft and has on-boarded a very old friend to help with this. Dr. Joy recently obtained his PhD in History from the University of Southampton and his thesis passed with no corrections. He has kindly offered to check J. J.’s work and be a sounding board for story rewrite ideas. Dr. Joy is very creative in his own right and is an excellent guitarist. In fact, J. J. met his wife at one of Dr. Joy’s gigs back in 2005.

It will be interesting to see how different the second draft is compared to the first. Watch this space.

Written by Josh Hawker