If you are reading this, I have a ask from you. But let's come to that in a moment. Let me first tell you the story of how my first novella came into being - The Eleventh Hour (if you don't know it already).
So, I never intend to write a long form story. It started back in 2012 (when the world was about to end). I was a newly minted writer exploring different forms of writing mediums. I started writing a few scenes and describing them as a series of post. I initially intended to write about my experience of living in Hyderabad and adjoining cities. As I was living alone for the first time in my life outside of my own city, it was an experience worth capturing.
As I wrote a few posts, people liked it on social media (I used to be an FB user then). They inquired where I was taking this story. I had no idea at all. I was so clueless, the title of the story remained "Untitled"! I was just writing it for the heck of it, improvising on the way. So, then I came back to my hometown after a few months and enthusiasm for it went down (as it usually happens with me). I left it in between after a few posts and didn't return to it for a long time.
But then buoyed by the reminders and constant encouragement from a few friends, I decided to finish it and turn it into a novel. That took sometime, I had to figure out what would happen at the end and how to make my story from the point it stood to the end I desired. I winged and raced it to completion. It was a lot of hard work but in a way fun as well. As it was my story, I could mold it in any way I want (I even wrote the end scene of the story in the middle!). Once the draft was ready, I took help of a few friends who edited, proof read and even made graphics for it. I am still thankful to them for me turned something that I started as joke, into a product that I am still proud of having created.
So, it didn't happen in a day or even in a year, but it happened, even while going through all the wears and turbulence of life.
Through stories are how we progress as a society. If you think about it, gossips are also just stories (sometimes exaggerated) about a third person or a situation. Have you ever noticed we naturally tend to gravitate towards people who always have interesting anecdotes to tell.
Writing blogs is a great way to express myself, bringing out whatever is going inside onto the paper. But I still think they aren't the most creative mediums. Deep inside, I want to write more poetry, long and short form fiction, and even satire. That's what I feel is a true form of creativity.
Today I read back one of my old stories. I liked what I read, although I could feel it's not really story with too many arcs, but just a short scene. But I was impressed with the way I made the story a medium of self-expression through the views expressed by the protagonists, even though the story had nothing to do with me.
But here's a problem for this fiction writer. I am not a natural . Writing stories takes a lot out of me, because you have to imagine scenarios and invent characters. That's the reason, I could never write another novella.
I have been carrying a bunch of story ideas in my head for years now, but I haven't gotten around writing any of them. Because it's one thing to have an idea and it's totally different to be able to develop it into something worth writing and then reading. A story has a beginning, a middle and an end and I usually have only a portion of it figured out.
Anyways, the point of this blog is not to complain about my inability to write fiction. It's to spur myself into at least starting something new.
So, here is the ask : If you are reading this, just go through some of my old stories embedded in the links in this post (if you haven't read them already or have forgotten them). Please let me know if you like them, and would like to read more of them. Who knows with sufficient encouragement I might be able to overcome my inertia. Never hurts to take help of friends ;)
So, I never intend to write a long form story. It started back in 2012 (when the world was about to end). I was a newly minted writer exploring different forms of writing mediums. I started writing a few scenes and describing them as a series of post. I initially intended to write about my experience of living in Hyderabad and adjoining cities. As I was living alone for the first time in my life outside of my own city, it was an experience worth capturing.
As I wrote a few posts, people liked it on social media (I used to be an FB user then). They inquired where I was taking this story. I had no idea at all. I was so clueless, the title of the story remained "Untitled"! I was just writing it for the heck of it, improvising on the way. So, then I came back to my hometown after a few months and enthusiasm for it went down (as it usually happens with me). I left it in between after a few posts and didn't return to it for a long time.
But then buoyed by the reminders and constant encouragement from a few friends, I decided to finish it and turn it into a novel. That took sometime, I had to figure out what would happen at the end and how to make my story from the point it stood to the end I desired. I winged and raced it to completion. It was a lot of hard work but in a way fun as well. As it was my story, I could mold it in any way I want (I even wrote the end scene of the story in the middle!). Once the draft was ready, I took help of a few friends who edited, proof read and even made graphics for it. I am still thankful to them for me turned something that I started as joke, into a product that I am still proud of having created.
So, it didn't happen in a day or even in a year, but it happened, even while going through all the wears and turbulence of life.
Through stories are how we progress as a society. If you think about it, gossips are also just stories (sometimes exaggerated) about a third person or a situation. Have you ever noticed we naturally tend to gravitate towards people who always have interesting anecdotes to tell.
Writing blogs is a great way to express myself, bringing out whatever is going inside onto the paper. But I still think they aren't the most creative mediums. Deep inside, I want to write more poetry, long and short form fiction, and even satire. That's what I feel is a true form of creativity.
Today I read back one of my old stories. I liked what I read, although I could feel it's not really story with too many arcs, but just a short scene. But I was impressed with the way I made the story a medium of self-expression through the views expressed by the protagonists, even though the story had nothing to do with me.
But here's a problem for this fiction writer. I am not a natural . Writing stories takes a lot out of me, because you have to imagine scenarios and invent characters. That's the reason, I could never write another novella.
I have been carrying a bunch of story ideas in my head for years now, but I haven't gotten around writing any of them. Because it's one thing to have an idea and it's totally different to be able to develop it into something worth writing and then reading. A story has a beginning, a middle and an end and I usually have only a portion of it figured out.
Anyways, the point of this blog is not to complain about my inability to write fiction. It's to spur myself into at least starting something new.
So, here is the ask : If you are reading this, just go through some of my old stories embedded in the links in this post (if you haven't read them already or have forgotten them). Please let me know if you like them, and would like to read more of them. Who knows with sufficient encouragement I might be able to overcome my inertia. Never hurts to take help of friends ;)
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