Some folks have expressed interest in my writing process, so I'll talk a little about it here.
I use a lot of software engineering process to plan and create my novels. Source control, branching and merging, bug trackers, function contracts, even some "unit tests".
(I'll be heading a panel on this process at CONfinement in Lebanon, TN on March 1-3, so lots of details available there.)
In more general terms, I am an architect writer, rather than a discovery writer or "gardener". I generally write about 25-35K words of outlines, notes, and summaries before the first actual reader-facing words are written.
I write from general to specific, proceeding from large scale outlines to section outlines to chapter and scene summaries. By the time I write an actual scene, the only decisions left for me to make are the exact wording of dialog and descriptions. All events, beats, and outcomes are preplanned.
This approach leaves me with no need at all to write scenes in order. I work in whatever section of the book I have ideas about on any given day.
I test extensively. My first line of testing, a sort of pre-alpha test, is my wives. When I have the text of a scene complete, I read it aloud to them. This helps me catch my own mistakes and shortcomings, as well as gauging their emotional reactions. They are under strict instructions to make no suggestions at all, only to describe their thoughts and feelings about what they heard. This process really help identify bits that are just "okay", and don't have that vivid immediacy of purpose, description, and experience. Sometime I rewrite a scene four or five times based on this.
When a manuscript is complete, it goes out to beta readers and my cover artist. This is what most writers would call a first draft, but the term doesn't really apply so well here, because my planning-heavy process tends to mean that "first drafts", while VERY slow to appear, are also very polished compared to what most would consider a first draft.
I use a LOT of beta readers.
My first line is a single alpha reader, who can be relied upon to finish in two or three days. She is a mother of two, who lives in Kansas and drives a school bus. Her feedback is invaluable.
Next come my beta readers. I use about 10-15, and if anyone doesn't finish in two weeks, they are out. That doesn't sound like a lot of time, but since my time to finish a manuscript is about nine months, and I hope to be able to turn out one novel a year, once that manuscript is done, every day counts.
I do video call interviews with all my beta readers, and the moment feedback starts coming in, I am busily editing away.
Only once the post-beta structural work is done is it time for my professional editor. I don't get structural or story-flow feedback from her; that comes from beta reader feedback. She is laser-focused on line by line word choice, sentence structure, description and flow.
While I am waiting for her, I'm working with my cover artist, and @AnEriksenWife is beginning to work up layout and interior design.
Once editing notes are back, it's all hands on deck. I have to go over notes and decide how, or if, to incorporate each one, final layout has to happen, and proofreading (the bane of everyone's existence), and a thousand other tiny tasks that make the difference between polished volume and indie shovelware.
I review and sign off on the final version of all decisions. Everyone who touches one of my novels works for, and answers to, me. Everything is carefully curated to match a single artistic vision.
If you noticed sense of meticulous detail in Theft of Fire, it was not the result of some singular magical genius or inspiration, but rather of a tiresome obsession with detail, and an author who is a razor-tongued, hot-tempered control freak.
Tradpub can't do that because authors simply don't have that kind of control. I've had fellow authors complain to me about the horrible cover art they were "given". Meanwhile, I'm issuing precise instructions about the angle of an illustrated character's eyebrows.
Hopefully, this gives you a sense of how the whole process flows. I'm not an inspired genius accepting transmissions from the grand muse of the universe. I'm an obsessive, purpose-driven craftsman with a master plan and no chill whatsoever.
I hope you enjoy the results, and I hope this clears up a little bit about what's happening behind the curtain.