The Year of Making it Happen – Part1: Plans

I thought I might pen a few words about the other bits of a writer’s life other than the writing bit. For when a writer isn’t writing he or she needs to be thinking about how to get the next writing job. In the past I haven’t been as good at this as I might have been but during this. “The Year of Making it Happen” ™, I have been improving. How?

Well, it’s all about communication, which you’d be forgiven for thinking is a forte of the writer. Or rather, it’s about the organisation of communication because, let’s face it, most writers *are* good at communication. It’s all about timescales and forward planning and that can become a bit of a haze when you are knee deep in a script or up to your armpits in prose.

Any commission – hell, almost *every* commission – takes an age to garner, wheedle and cajole your way into. It then takes an age to tweak, red-, re-submit and hear back about. This is because everyone is busy and everyone is commissioning months if not years in advance. Then you actually have to write the commission.

Ideally, what should be happening is that during the writing of commission A you should already have commissions B-D lined up. You should also be making noises – and hearing encouraging things back – about potential commissions E-G. I know some writers who expand those three commissions by a great deal but they may be a tad more in demand at the moment than I am. Sigh. One day, Dinnick, one day…

For example, at the beginning of the year my good friend John Dorney was asked to pitch for the Bernice Summerfield audio range. At the time he was also writing a Companion Chronicle and kindly asked me if I would like to help him out due to time constraints. This is a rare occurrence in writing as most people prefer to keep commissions to themselves even if they have said “yes” to waaay too many things and are struggling! John, though, is a pro. And he trusted me not to screw it up. I think. Anyway, we were commissioned on 25^th January 2010.

The same day I received an email from Jim Swallow asking me if I’d like to be involved with the next season of Stargate audios. Being the massive fan I am of that series, I jumped at the chance and agreed to attend a writer’s meeting in early February.

So, suddenly I had one and half scripts to write. Then, on 11^th February,  Xanna Eve Chown emailed me and ask if I could pitch some ideas for Big Finish’s new range of Audio Short Trips.

Before all this, I should say that I have been on at Big Finish to write Inside Story 2, a follow up to Benjamin Cook’s brilliant warts ‘n’ all book about the production of the first 50 Doctor Who plays Big Finish undertook. There had been a bit of a false start in 2009, but I had arranged to discuss stuff with Nick and Jason in LA! As you do.

The Gallifrey One convention in LA was a turning point for me. I am so glad that Tony Lee convinced me that it would be good thing to go and very grateful to the marvellous Shaun Lyon for inviting me! I had a wonderful time partly because of the bonds I forged there with Nick Briggs and the contacts I made with other wonderful and varied people – fans and professionals alike. It was a road to Damascus moment!

So while I was there, I got talking to Jason about IS2 and it transpired that he wasn’t keen to do such a full and frank book this time around. If you re-read the book you can see why. Half of it is probably actionable! So what they wanted was an episode guide. I suggested the title “The Big Finish Companion” and the rest was history – although I am still putting it together now because it turned out to be a more mammoth undertaking than any one of us had realised. It has been put back and rather ironically and totally fantastically it will be launched at next year’s Gallifrey One event in Los Angeles, where it was born, really!

I also made good contacts in the world of comics and graphic novels out there and used them mercilessly to garner some form of understand of how strips were blocked. Matthew Dow Smith and Paul J. Salamoff were extremely generous in their time and in sending me some scripts to look at. Tony Lee, once more, stepped in to give me a 101 lesson on it all and I am hoping that I’ll have something to say on the comics front very soon!

This takes us to the beginning of March. So the first quarter went like that! A bit of writing and a lot of emailing, meeting and traveling. Tony (yes, OK, he’s my guru) says that getting a commission form someone is like borrowing money: you are far more likely to lend money to someone you know, like and trust than a complete stranger even if you have heard they are good for it!