I've wanted to blog about this for ages. In my writing room I have my writing notes, which probably go back about twenty years (I am amazed that I can say that!). They are a mix of hand scrawled pages of varying origins and sizes and printed work from a variety of different printers and typewriters. They are novels, dreams, started stories and ideas. Some are even poems. I've being meaning to digitise my notes for years and have never got around to it, so they are a disorganised mess. In the past month I have had recourse to turn to my old notes not once, but twice. The first time for back story on a fantasy story set in Reath that I was writing for a competition and the second time for the original notes on a story I had started years ago and had decided to resurrect for an anthology. Both times I failed to find what I was looking for (and therefore failed to finish the stories) but I did find a wealth of ideas that have been lying fallow for years including a romantic ghost story titled 'Relative' that I think is time for a revisit. I went looking for Relative this evening to help me with my 're imagining', so to speak, and couldn't find it! What is up with my stories going missing whenever I go looking for them, even though I can see the pages in my head? Anyway, I did find another story called 'The Good Son' that I wrote about four years ago and COMPLETELY forgot about, which is very strange as I can remember practically every other idea, scribble and note I've written since I first looked into the mysterious valley of imagination and started to bring back tales. The pages are liberally smeared with red pen, but I must never have finished editing it as I have no record of ever sending it anywhere. I must have just let it drop. It does need work, but reading through it I could see the gem of the idea and I enjoyed it, so even though I didn't find what I was looking for I found another piece of work that needs minimal re-writing before it can be submitted, which is a good thing. Of course, I still have to go searching for 'Relative'. I wonder what I'll find next time I go looking for it.
On another note, I got a thrill this evening when I checked my mails and found one from Douglas Preston (one half of The Relic fame) in my inbox. Had he finally decided to respond to my heart felt and well thought out treatise on how Ebola (for reference, you need to read Lincoln and Dougie's most recent Agent Pendergast books) should be killed? My thrill was short lived, however, as I realised it was merely a form email to promote his new book, 'The Monster of Florence'. How disappointing. Into the recycle bin with you, Mr Preston!
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4 comments:
If you get the chance, you should scan some of your old, old writing and post it, just for the novelty. I bet we'll all think it's cute as hell.
I still recall the stories I wrote as a kid, and they were TERRIBLE! But I was a stupid kid, that's no secret. But this is also before the computer days (for me), so my stories are riddled with arrows pointing into the margins.
That's a great idea Mal, I must do that! My old, old stories tend to ramble about the page, both in story and content, with lots of doodles. I'll pick out a few and post one over the next few days.
I'd love to see the treatsie on viola
Hi Anon, I don't have a copy but it set forth in great detail how horrible she was, why she was horrible and several ways on how she should be got rid of (focusing on killing her). It was very well written, they probably didn't reply because they were so jealous of my talent (the FMcM school of thought) :)
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