Writing (and particularly writing a novel) requires, ultimately, a range of skills, not all of which may come naturally to an aspiring writer. There is world-building; there is plotting; there is the creation of believable and interesting characters; there is the writing of dialogue, of action scenes, of atmospheric descriptive passages.

I believe I do some of these things well. I believe I do others rather poorly, and although I'd like to learn, there are times when I think I should play to my strengths more than try and eliminate my weaknesses.

That would mean working with someone else, who had a similar enough vision that our creative ideas didn't clash, and whose strengths would cover my weaknesses (and vice versa).

There are few successful collaborations apparently on the market, though they do occur, but of course it is entirely possible that co-authors use an individual pseudonym and so the practice of co-writing may be more common than it otherwise appears.

I'd be interested to know if other people have considered this. Because writing is a very creative, and very individual, process, I can see that people might shun the idea; the dilution of one's hard-worked creation may be anathema (although any writer who works in TV or film, for example, has to accept that their intiial vision will be changed, usually almost beyond recognition, before it reaches the world). So, could you do it? Would you do it? What do you think are the advantages and disadvantages?

You see, you won't have the same vision. You won't have the same style. You ahve to merge these things together smoothly and seemlessly.

But then, having a partner to work on a project with can keep you motivated when you otherwise might not be.

The reason being that (according to some of my favorite authors) it's easier to write something that is funny if you have someone to bounce the jokes off of. Also, the back and forth of the novel work can lead to an escalation of humor, giving opportunity to even funnier jokes as each one tries to take a joke higher.
Also it provides a chance to learn what joke is not working before the work is submitted.

If you're interested in that approach I could probably dig up a link for you.

But I don't know if I could do it. Yes, someone could write me a plot, but I might veer from it, or I might write dialogue for the characters that the plotter thought was terrible. There might be huge arguments, unless boundaries were very clearly defined.

He's strong on ideas, but I write less sucky (mutual agreement being the only yardstick here), so we hash out the ideas, agree to a plan, and then I write. We had to sit down and define in detail the individual roles, responsibilities, and where each has the final say on what.

I'm very skeptical where one is a famous writer and another not-so-famous. The Rendezvous with Rama series is my expection, Clarke and Gentry Lee did a pretty good collabration. But, it's rare, very rare, usually I wonder who did what, and so on, if the more famous writer was just there to lend thier name. I don't like being played like that.

As far as writing, it's definitly not for everybody. I guess it would depend on the motive of writing. Personally, I write as a creative outlet, to put my imagination to some use, and hope to improve enough to share this with others. Yeah, the words sometimes (only sometimes?) do get in the way of the story, but I do want the feeling of having completed something myself. That's a good feeling.

First of all, my co-author, Micha, and I have been writing together since 1998. We started out playing online "Play By Email" role-playing games in the Star Trek universe. We have gotten to know each other well during the years. While we initially got to know each other online, she and her husband moved to my state and lived here for a few months, so we got to know each other face-to-face during that time.

Our current WIP is based on an original alternate-world fantasy PBEM RPG that we developed. I LOVE the interactivity of a PBEM RPG, and didn’t want to give that up. Writing seemed like such a solitary thing to me. I love having someone to bounce ideas off, someone to help me brainstorm my way past the sticky spots. Micha has created the character of one of the story's three primary protagonists. She has developed the backstory for a section of the country we are in, and created the portion of the magic that pertains to her favorite topic of healing.

Our long friendship has allowed us to have faith in each other when it comes to writing. We have learned to marry our writing together in a way that is, I believe, seamless. She has her quirks, I have mine. There are very few points that have become battle ground issues between us, and we have learned to be flexible with each other, and to be willing to make changes. Overall, between us, it’s worked quite well. But I cannot think of another single person I could do this sort of thing with as easily.

We agreed, since I’m better at the mechanics of writing (she’s dyslexic), and since I was the one with the burning drive to craft our game into a book, that I would do the primary writing. I feel the book needs to have one voice. As I finish chapters, I pass them over to Michelle for review. She comments, makes changes, I re-write, then submit it to the writing group I belong to.

We are still playing the alternate world PBEM game. The game is about to wrap up “Book Two” while our writing of a novel is still redrafting Book One.

My advice to anyone considering collaboration is to get clear on your process first of all. Who has the final say when you disagree? How will you work out your disagreements? Will one person write, and another be the “idea” guy? What are your duties? And how will you split the rewards? Your personalities have to work well together, to supplement each other. It’s like marriage to some degree.

IF Micha and I make it into publication (and we are many pages away from the attempt), we both realize there will be a piddling amount of money to be had. We aren’t doing this for the money. We are doing it for the love of writing, and the love of our characters.

The rest is just icing on the cake.

Oh... and IF we ever make it into print, I believe we plan to use a single name as a pseudonym. People don't need to know there were two of us working on this story. They just want to know the story is good.

Most collaborations I know of one wrote chapter 1, the other did corrections and wrote chapter 2, back and forth. Or one writer got one character/place the other got a different character/place. The point is, both (or all) writers wrote, instead of correcting or making suggestions.

I am taking the core of her writing and revising it for grammar, spelling and punctuation. The rewrite is mine, but the initial writing was hers in the sections she developed. (We did a lot of JPs, or "Joint Posts" where we tossed a segment back and forth and massaged it together. She wrote her character, I wrote mine.) If I feel a change needs to be made to the core premise, I run my ideas past her before making changes.

She has been very involved in the overall writing of the first draft, but she is less involved in the second draft rewrite and edits. Her dyslexia factors into this decision. As long is she is comfortable with the content, she usually bows to my greater prowess with spelling. If she didn't have dyslexia (and a houseful of kids to keep up with), we would probably have a different arrangement for the rewrite.

Her brother was strongest at sketching out the full plot and at writing descriptive passages (esp. of clothing!); she was stronger at dialog and characterization. I believe they did a thorough outline and then divided up the scenes between them, and then worked together on editing and revising for consistency, etc.

My friend is the M, her brother is the J.

I would collaborate. But I and my collaborator would have to learn the craft first.

And while I think about it:

• You would have to know what sort of story you wanted to write from the beginning. Planning and assigning tasks would have to be the most critical part of the process.

• Don't expect more from your collaborator than you do from yourself.

• Allow the collaborator to work from their strengths and interests, in the manner in which they excel, and don't shuffle them off onto the boring, laborious or otherwise 'unloved' part of the process. In other words, don't just collaborate with someone so that they can do all the yucky stuff.

• If you see a problem developing, speak up as soon as you can so it does not grow into a project killer.
It's simpler to find solutions to problems early in the process before time, energy and talent has been thoroughly invested in something that doesn't work. The resulting time wasted and frustration in trying to fix what already exists will stall the project and can easily kill a partnership.

• Respect the talent, skill and insight of your collaborator and work with someone who respects yours.

• Be dependable. Set and meet deadlines, but make them realistic ones. Don't promise to complete things in timeframes that are ridiculously short. You know the method and speed with which you write.

• Pay attention to maintaining the nature of your relationship. For instance, if you collaborate with friends, make the time to do the sort of things friends do WITHOUT obsessing about the project.

This last one may or may not be valid.

• Call in trusted, impartial and independent readers to critique and/or edit the WIP treating all the components as part of a whole project and limit the ongoing critiques of each other's individual components.