Michael Craig, author of Doppelganger: Harbinger of Evil, on the absolute necessity for writers to get ideas down on paper – or anywhere – so the idea is not lost.
I have a full-time job, a wife, 5 kids and 2 grandchildren, I have friends and hobbies, so how do I have time to write?
Richard Osman says it’s a discipline, like going to the gym, you can put it off or find excuses not to go but when you put on your trainers, you are in gym mode and writing is like that for him. I can relate to this, but I work slightly differently.
I always carry a notepad wherever I go, and at home a notepad is never too far away, my left elbow is touching one right now.
I’m a planner, always have been. I have lists, lots of lists, to-do-lists with a 1-4 priority score in the margin. My lists are a mix of nice things to do and some things that I need to do but do not necessarily like to do. So, what I do is I get myself started with a job I like to do and then I’m in the zone and I’ll alternate between a nice and a not so nice task until I’m through my list.
I write like that too, in my main pad, yes, I have different pads, one pad has the main plot set out in bullets, in no particular order, some are chronological, some are a sub plot that I haven’t yet decided where they fit, and my characters sit here too. When I write I do not write the book from start to finish, I write chapters or sections of the book in the same way as I manage my to-do-lists.
Write it down, somewhere, anywhere . . .
When I have an idea, I write it down, somewhere, anywhere, I just have to get it down on paper. If I do not, I become anxious that I might forget the idea and I want to read it back straight away to see if it is any good.
Sometimes I will write the whole chapter, word for work, other times it will be a note to me saying ‘Kyle does this here”
I’ve quoted Richard Osman quite deliberately early as he was my inspiration to sit down and write my story. I’d been carrying the story around in my head, on a pad, a couple of chapters and some typed up on a portable hard drive, since 2001. I was stuck and I didn’t know why.
I couldn’t get the words down, the words did not flow, there was no story to the words. Looking back, I was trying too hard to polish the first few chapters before I moved on.
I read Richard’s books, I was fan of his from his House of Games show, I have a red toolbox, the box of possibilities he calls it, mine contains herbs and spices and my chef knives, a present from my wife and I love it. It even has the blue and black avatar logo on it. If you have read his books, you will know just how brilliant they are, I was struck with how easy they were to read.
Then in an interview, but I can’t remember where I heard it. Maybe I made it up in my head, but Richard said that if you have an idea for a book just write it, don’t edit or finesse it as you go, get it down. Or words to that effect.
I was reading We Solve Murders on holiday in Kos, in October 2024, trusty pad by my side seeking inspiration. Richard’s voice in my head saying, ‘just get it down’, my wife’s voice saying, ‘are you going to start that book of yours?’ and then it happened.
After too many Long Island iced teas at the all-inclusive bar the story in all its colours came to me in a dream as if I was watching it as a Guy Richie film.
The next morning, I started writing in my pad, over the next 10 days 30,000 words were in two A5 sized pads, one a William Hill pad where I had been doing some HR consultancy work and a jazzy blue, Kos souvenir pad. I had not read over my work, no editing, no scribbling out, 30,000 words of my story. I just ‘got it down’.
Back home in Garforth, Leeds, I began to type it up. Disciplined like Richard had advised, I’d sit, and I’d type, 2 to 3 hours per night.
Then came the pivotal part of my process, I needed someone to read what I had produced. My poor wife. I smuggled my laptop into the car on our 3-hour drive to Stowe Gardens, Buckinghamshire, in early November to visit the WWII silhouette art memorial. Once in the car my unsuspecting wife was presented with approximately 25,000 words to read. She didn’t want to read it; she was worried that it wouldn’t be any good. I knew that she would be brutally honest and if it wasn’t any good, she would tell me.
My instructions were to correct typos and spelling mistakes, and to highlight in yellow any parts she did not like, or I should remove. He instruction to me “shut up and let me read”.
For just over 3-hours we sat in silence, the occasional clicking of the keyboard. We pulled into the carpark “well?” I said……
“It’s rather good, you have a unique writing style, you have something here”.
“Consider changing the start, it is not a good start to the book, wooden, I almost gave up after the first 2 chapters”
The book originally started with the flight to Amsterdam; I added a prologue and retyped the first two chapters and my book was halfway there.
Doppelganger, Harbinger of Evil was finished by the end of the year and published in January 2025, I’ve just finished the sequel and commissioned the font cover, the same way as the first, words in a pad when I have an idea. A couple of hours per night, a couple of nights per week.
(c) Michael Craig
Michael Craig is a HR Consultant at York St John University. Having dealt with people his whole life, he has seen the best and worst in mankind and those experiences have inspired some of the characters in his book.
About Doppelganger: Harbinger of Evil by Michael Craig
A horrific and disturbing violent assault amidst a straightforward drug deal creates tension between the powerful and dangerous Bakker and Volvov families.
Who is The Apparition, is he a small-time incompetent criminal or an accomplished assassin, and master of disguise?
The Devil has reappeared after two decades and is now on the hunt of The Apparition, the terror of The Dutchman has returned.
Will Isla’s inheritance be the death of her?
Can a mistaken identity lead to an innocent man being framed for crimes that he did not commit?
Order your copy of Doppelganger: Harbinger of Evil by Michael Craig online here.
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