My writing odyssey has been fraught, like that of most would-be writers I suppose, with many fits and starts, dead ends and rabbit-holes and ventures where angels might fear to tread. Where too-eager fools rush in. My science fiction effort has maundered into oblivion, and I do not have the heart to try to reinvigorate the three lovely volumes. Let them lie, quiet and circumspect — they were a labour of love and they’re done, another component of what I’m increasingly calling an apprenticeship of my late adulthood.
But with that experience under my writer’s belt, I’ve developed my romantic historical fiction effort up to some 53k words now, and the first draft is over half finished. The narrative is roughed out ahead of me. When I do finish that draft, perhaps sometime later this autumn, and if there are sufficient funds, I’m pretty sure that (i) I shall join the Alliance of Independent Authors; (ii) I shall avail myself of a package of manuscript appraisal and submission package assessment at Adventures in Fiction; with a view to (iii) searching anew for an agent to represent that ms, and me, to a likely publisher.
While I continue on this more long-term adventure, I’m having some joy working on the poetry side of creative writing. I’ve collated a set of pamphlets of the past four years of my poetic effort, for private circulation to family and friends. It’s satisfying to see that work collated together, as a kind of tangible collection. Although I’ve had some joy in publication, by independent online presses (see my Writing Archive), I really don’t see myself as anything other than an itinerant poet trying to figure out and express the conflicting emotions that beset someone like me at this point in their life. But that’s been wonderful, a very enlightening experience, and I wouldn’t want to have missed it.
Meanwhile, when competitions arise, and I have sufficient willpower and energy, I might, or I might not, submit an entry. Short stories are definitely not my forté, but sometimes I’ve indulged. It was great to be shortlisted, as one of the few runners-up in a recent Globe Soup drabble competition, for example. [Drabble: a flash fiction short story of precisely 100 words]. Just as my effort, Nuliajuk’s Warning, proved to be something of a delight when it reached the longlist of this year’s Commonwealth Prize. So this year has seen a bit of a clamber onto the early rungs of the ladder that might yet lead to public exposure.
But with regret, I’ve decided the time has come to relinquish my participation in a writer’s group that has sustained my efforts for the past four years. In particular, having been burned yet again on my submissions to a national writers group members competition, I’ve resolved to back out and pursue my own way. I do think that one has to find their best path for their work to blossom, and part of the search for the path must inevitably be a discarding of the trails that lead into a cul-de-sac.
And finally, for my sins, although nobody seems to be reading or caring about these efforts (in dramatic comparison with my previous work on AllendaleDiary.org), I am continuing, slowly and steadily, to work on the social history blog describing the past twenty years of the life of the Allendale Lions Club. This effort is meant to be finished by February, 2024, the 20th anniversary of the club’s charter. I’ll be so glad to have that finished and out of my hair!
Biome NE47 