Novel

I’m still here! I’ve been busy with life in general and, of course, writing. I left you where I had finished ‘Daisy’ and was awaiting publishers’ replies. Whilst waiting I have continued to write and my latest novel, ‘A Beautiful Life’, is now sixty thousand words in. I will return to ‘Daisy’, as indeed I’ll return to Dixbury at some point; I enjoy having future goals and irons in fires.

Writing is a great journey, but I have to say that some days I feel like giving up and it’s only the desire to be a better writer that keeps me going. And I don’t mean in a comparative way. When the great ballet dancer, Baryshnikov, was asked if he wanted to be better than other dancers, he replied,

“I do not try to dance better than anyone else. I only try to to dance better than myself.”

I like that. That is exactly how I feel in both my writing and my dancing. I think it’s perfect to not enter into competition, but rather to just try to be a better writer/dancer (fill in the blank) than yourself.

Happy sunny days 🙂

So, where did I leave you? Yes, my latest novel, Daisy, is written. The final full stop has been committed and I am now in the literary agent’s metaphorical waiting room. I could, as I have with my first two books, self-publish on Amazon, but something stops me. Daisy isn’t an educational book – it’s chicklit with deaf characters (deaflit?) – but it draws on real life experiences and I hope it will resonate with deaf people. I also hope it will interest hearing people who have little or no connection with the deaf world. And more than anything else, I am really hoping a literary agent will be drawn into Daisy’s trials and tribulations and snap it up.

Agents can take anywhere between one day to six months to get in touch so it’s quite a wait. I have a designated email account for all things to do with my writing and every time I see an email there I actually take a deep breath and open it with a squint. At the moment, it’s all LinkedIn and Twitter notifications – but that won’t always be the case…

Holding tight and waiting.