Kirstiekins Blogs: I have been published (sort of)

I have been working on a novel for the past year or so, and although I have written thousands of things before, this is one of the first things I have actually been confident about finishing. I am not going to go into too much detail about it, I don't want to bore you or anything, but I just wanted to share a little part of it with you. When I say a little part, I mean a quote.

Image © RiPPLE 2015

Due to the confidence I felt over the piece, I decided to enter one of the chapters into an anthology competition, where a team of people would read through all of the entries and decide on which ones that they wanted to publish. As the weeks went by I had let copious amounts of self doubt build up inside of me, so imagine shock when I received an email to say that they wanted to publish it. In fact, I almost deleted the email without even reading it, as I was sure it was going to be a rejection, lucky for me that I didn't.

The following was originally a Facebook post, but I am posting here because I feel that I summed up how I felt about it quite well, and because the three times I have tried to reword it, I have ended up sounding more pretentious than than the original post. I want to be proud of myself, (this is a wonderful moment for any writer, seeing their own words in print, in a book that is going to be sold to people in shops, not just printed from your printer and left in your desk draw) but part of me feels like I am rubbing it in others faces, or making a mountain out of a mole hill, and I know I shouldn't feel that way, or maybe I should, but I am going to allow myself to be a little excited for myself until you get to the end of this post, and then I'll get back to finishing the damn thing.

"I feel like I am being incredibly pretentious by doing this and making it seem like a bigger deal than what it is, but writing stories has always been something that I have been deeply passionate about. The fact that writers are able to take words and weave them into a particular order that creates meaning and can eventually become something bigger than their own existence, is inspiring to say the least. I am not saying this to declare my own greatness, but instead because I feel as if I have joined those that have come before me, in allowing the stories that have formed within their minds to become somewhat of a reality.

It may only be something small, but seeing my name, next to my writing, in a book that you can buy, with real money (not that monopoly stuff) is incredibly humbling. To know that someone that isn't related to me, or someone that has to say they like my writing because they're my friend, actually likes something I have written, has filled me with all kinds of self belief. And for that, I am incredibly grateful."

Although I have quite a while to go, I am hoping to finish writing it by the end of the year, but as well as working through my summer reading list and reviewing them on here, I want to be more open with the pieces I am working on, and perhaps start to share some of the things I have written on here, and not just on my super-secret tumblr, which the URL for will be taken to my grave. However, I might consider sharing it if you decide to buy me at least two Greggs sausage rolls.

I have always been secretive over the words I write, whether its a shopping list, or the what I have been scrawling in my journal. I feel as if I have a special connection with words, even typing this, creating text on a page, It's something I have done. It's something anyone can do, but it's also something I enjoy. I chose to put those words, in that order, to create this piece. Anyone can put words on a page, but it was me who strung them together in that specific order, to share the stories and characters that are running wild in my head. I'm not crazy, I promise.