writers collaboration

[NicoleDreadful]

Here's another old thread I think might be interesting to revive. Are there folks currently on the forum who have done collaborative projects? How did you divide things up, or did you sit side by side? Did you finish the work? How does pitching a co-authored piece work, or self-publishing? Did the collaboration carry over into the marketing efforts?

[tmso]

Well, we are kind of doing a collaborative work with The End anthology, and there was the Seven Threads effort from way back.

And some time ago, someone tried to get together a shared world anthology, but I don't think it go anywhere.

For any collaborative work, you need firm commitment and a strong leader. Oh, and a good plan.

[Edward M. Grant]

For any collaborative work, you need firm commitment and a strong leader. Oh, and a good plan.

And a rights agreement so your work isn't wasted when the other writer drops out and you don't have the right to complete the story without them.

[RedMage]

Here's another old thread I think might be interesting to revive. Are there folks currently on the forum who have done collaborative projects? How did you divide things up, or did you sit side by side? Did you finish the work? How does pitching a co-authored piece work, or self-publishing? Did the collaboration carry over into the marketing efforts?

I saw one of the posts on the first page of this thread before it died was "Why are you asking?" And I am wondering that, too, Nicole.

My cousin and his best friend have spent the last few years writing an epic fantasy series. They now have the first book completed and have started pitching it to agents and publishers. The only thing I really know about their process is that they developed the characters together, one is better at writing fight scenes and the other better at dialogue, and that they may write scenes individually in the beginning but they edit, correct, develop, and polish together. I have no idea of the legal details of their partnership.

I have always thought it would be fun to collaborate on a story. Not an anthology, because those are collaborations on a theme or an idea and the individual stories are completely different from each other. I tried a shared world collaboration once, born out of a discussion here on sffworld. It didn't work out. Looking back, it was a lesson in needing to know what you are going to be doing before you begin and needing to have committment and passion from all collaborators. I still think it would be fun, not to mention constantly exciting, to collaborate on a story together with someone.