I’ve had quite a few wannabe writers coming to me with that pin-up one-liner: “You know, I have a lot of ideas but I don’t know where to start.”
Or this: “I don’t know if my writing’s any good.”
I didn’t either, when I started out. I still don’t. And that’s what eggs us writers on. To better ourselves (and not to become another King, Rowling, or Hemingway).
Here are a few ways you could get off that butt and put actual words on paper.
An entrepreneur friend of mine from Delhi landed in Bangalore (where I live) the other week. Huffing and puffing, he barged in through the door and plonked himself on the couch, exhaling loudly as he ripped off the metal clamp that he had inserted his nose into.
I looked at my watch. He was a good five hours late. I was about to ask him the reason for the delay in his flight when he silenced me with a stinker. “Yaar, what the eff is wrong with your city?”
I asked him to relax, not knowing what the eff he was talking about.
The friend snorted, beckoning for a hand-held fan. “You know? It was easier to find Bangalore from the air earlier. It used to be a patch of friendly green when you looked down. Today, the pilot circled for two hours but couldn’t spot the darned city!”
Obviously, the three-hour flight plus the five-hour delay had somehow tickled him the wrong way (or in the wrong place). But Bangalore is still green, I protested.
Someone once asked me what writing was all about. I was tempted to answer in superlatives of prose – a fulfilling reverie, a cathartic epiphany, a literary orgasm that leaves you happily spent.
But, I bit back the momentary gush of verbiose. For writing is none of those glorified, intellectually rarefied and abstract moments of feathery flourish that people will have you believe.
No, writing is far messier. It’s about having your nose to the grindstone, not knowing when the grinding will stop. I remember laboring over one of my manuscripts for ten months. Yes, you read that right. TEN MONTHS. That’s like eons in writing years.
“Whoa! How the blazes did I land up here?”
Is that what you’re asking yourself? Relax. For those of you redirected here from the earlier WordPress address, this is still the official Aymaran Shadow book blog, except that the blog name’s changed a bit and is being merged into the author Hemanth Gorur’s official blog.
Read the previous post in the Behind The Scenes series: Top 10 Creepiest Paranormal Legends . . . #7
A man who refused to die by hanging. A woman buried alive giving her husband nightmares. A haunted prison with eerie paranormal activity. A family stalked by a vindictive specter. Grab the nearest table for support – you’ll need it when you read the next one.
The Frozen Living
Movies and tales abound in which people frozen to death are brought to the morgue only to resurrect themselves and walk away alive. The scientific impossibility of such occurrences relegate such tales to ludicrous spin-doctoring at worst and mild, if gory, entertainment at best.
What happened to Jean Hillard, a teenager from North Dakota in the US, in 1980 is enough to revive belief in unseen forces and the unseen hand of God, if not lend a whole new connotation to the phrase “frozen stiff”.
Following fervent interest by readers in the Indian sub-continent for a print version of Aymaran Shadow, the wait is over. The Indian Paperback Edition of Aymaran Shadow is now out in print. Now, feel the crispy freshness of the printed book as you read about Sanya’s nearly fatal and hair-raising confrontation with a sinister intruder from another world.
The 2013 bestselling novel now retails at INR 250 in paperback format on Amazon (India), Flipkart, Pothi and Infibeam. Readers can also purchase the book directly from the author Hemanth Gorur’s website at 20% OFF on MRP.
Its International Paperback Edition is currently available at all leading retailers in the US, UK and Europe, including Amazon which is offering a 13% customer discount at the time of this post.
As part of a LIMITED PERIOD OFFER, the book is available at 15% OFF if bought at the CreateSpace e-store. Use Discount Code QY6KHBCP. Offer closes 1st Aug 2014.
The Kindle Edition continues to be available at $2.99. However, purchasers of the Paperback Edition are eligible to buy the Kindle Edition at only $0.99 (66% OFF). It is also available for borrowing on Amazon’s KOLL, identifiable with an Amazon Prime badge as you search and browse for books on your Kindle device or on Amazon.com.
Aymaran Shadow
An ethnic concept. Several twists/turns, suspense filled, lots of mystery. No grammar errors, or out of story line sequence, easy to read/follow, Unique characters. Maybe movie material . . .
. . . The book did not wow me but I enjoyed reading it, it pulled together at the end. I changed my mind & rated it at 5 stars.
Tony R Parsons
Top Amazon Reviewer
Read the full review here: on Amazon.
