My good friend Matt Price alerted me to this interesting item the other day:

It’s a screen-capture video Brandon Sanderson (or Branderson, as I like to call him) posted of himself writing his next book in real-time.  You may know Branderson as the famed author of the Mistborn series and finisher of The Wheel of Time.  Although I have yet to read one of his books, I’ve been greatly impressed by the vast amount of well-received work he’s able to put out.

That’s why this video surprises me.  Seeing him in the writing process, it would appear that he is nearly as obsessive, indecisive, and back-and-forth as I am.  This is honestly painful for me to watch, because it’s too much like seeing myself write (complete with cursor-twitching, shunting stuff below, and pre-chapter notes).  I actually had to stop myself from grabbing at the keyboard and mouse to try and make edits to what he was doing.  With his level of output, I expected him to be a draft-blaster who’d zip through and edit later, but now I’m even more amazed with his productivity.  I suppose he did do 400 words in twenty minutes, though, which if a consistent pace would be nothing to scoff at.

Anyway, if you want to see how one prolific author goes about whipping up a draft (or how I do, for that matter), give it a watch.

As a side note, I am pleased to see that he still double-spaces sentences.  Even if he forgot how to spell ‘oar’.

Bene scribete.