I understand that you and your fellow writers are working in sequence on the series: first Allston, then you, then Denning, and so on. How closely do you three keep in touch? And are you already writing book five?
Yes, it's a juggling act. We stay in touch by e-mail, but the real anchors are the editors, Shelly Shapiro at Del Rey and Sue Rostoni at Lucasfilm. Readers might think that it's a simple sequential thing -- that each author reads what the previous one has written and picks up from it -- but it can't work that way at all. We've all got different work commitments, and we all write a different speeds. I'm naturally a very fast, immersive writer--four or five weeks per book now I'm writing full time, and that's for all my novels, not just Star Wars -- and I already have contractual commitments to other publishers built around the Legacy schedule that mean I can't wait for someone to finish their book before I deliver mine. I have to turn it in on the due date and get on with the next book. That's where the real discipline of writing as a team comes in: you stick to the outline you agreed with Lucasfilm and Del Rey, and you let everyone know if you need to change stuff. No surprises. Of course, that can't possibly cover every single line in a book, so the editors are there playing long stop and fielding detail that might get missed. The creases get ironed out on revisions. The key to it is communicating throughout the process.
What other projects are you working on now?
I'm finishing the fifth book in my Wess'har series for HarperCollins, and then I'll be going back to Sacrifice, LOTF #5. At the moment my schedule means I'll probably switch to another series after that -- can't mention that one yet -- and then I'll go back to book six of the Wess'har arc, which is the final book in that six-part story. Then it's back to Legacy again. That takes me to March 1, 2007, but somehow in that period I also have to fit in short fiction and what I'll just call Other Projects at this stage...
If I had three wishes, they'd all be: "Get more sleep."
