Unknown author... and proud to be !

Along with photography, History, reading, sketching and traveling, I do love writing. As far as I can remember, I’ve always loved writing. I learnt how to read and write at 3 with my grandparents’ help and kept on until now.

Writing was in my youth a terrific hobby. I was just writing the end of novels I read, films I saw or plays I attended to. I was keen on imagining “my end” of the story. One of my aunts was used to say, as I was writing all the time, “This little girl writes down her memories!”. It was a standard hobby for me. Writing has always been so effortless to me.  Even now, I don’t feel like a dumb in front of a blank page. Whatever I have to write, I just write it down. Sometimes, it takes more time that it should due to extra activities and my full-time job, but I do it.

So, very early in my life, I’ve been an author. I adored imagining stories, characters, drama, scenes and details. I was inspired by all I was feeding my mind about. I think that I wrote short stories very soon and developed them into novels, then books around my 15^th. I wrote articles too because I thought that being a journalist could suit me. Unfortunately, the only journalism, I would accept to be, would have been war reporter and it was too scary for my parents and not a “regular” job. Yet, I had in mind to be a forensic, or a fashion designer, or a photographer. Not logical way in this wishing list but Art is art, right ?

So, I made up my mind onto be an author totally unknown and to be able to write books up to 200 pages (at least) and to be a “regular” executive secretary and a photographer on the daylight.

Writing is not a hobby anymore, it is vital activity. I have to write. I don’t know how it comes, but I have to write daily. I do not write a chapter of my novel daily, but I do note down ideas, articles or whatever else. Sometimes, just a name of a character pops up and I am happy to get another connection to my inner world.

Apart from my monograph published back in 2008, I didn’t send any of my books yet. Untrue, I did once to a literature manager to get her opinion, but I didn’t have any news back from her. So I supposed that it was not good enough to be commented or she didn’t have the time to read it and forget it somewhere in her office. I don’t blame her, I blame ME !

When it comes to sell me as an author (or an artist), I am totally stupid! The fact is : I don’t know how  to advertise me !

Yet, my books, once finished, are at home waiting for nothing but a familiar reader to comment them. My first readers are my best friend Carol, who thinks I’m nuts not to send them away, and my “friendly agent” (joke), Natacha, whom promotes them the best she can in a very restricted circle of readers.

So far, I wrote 7 books. 190 pages each in the A4 format. So I supposed about 300 pages in the book format, at least. All different ! None is the same than the other. I can put words on sci-fi, thriller, anticipation, romance, or history drama. I don’t restrain my writing to a single matter. I don’t like that and my imagination is too productive to be controlled.

Of course, one of my books is my true favorites. My child if you do prefer. The one I don’t want to let go and I am very keen on. It is the only one which I don’t want to be criticized for. It is not a perfect novel but I put a lot of me in a character than I am quite afraid of being exposed. So far, none of my relatives who read it got the clue on the character. Some told me the name at last, but didn’t find it at once.

How do I write, some asked? It is simple. I habitually find my main character and her/his name, and then the others follow easily. The directive line comes effortlessly too and the story construction follows my pencil (Yes, I do write down, not type the story !). So I got the basic. The music (2 or 3 songs that I listen to until the end of the writing process, quite obsessive !), the attitude, the clothing and the atmosphere enter into the development and I have to make fashion sketches of the clothing.

Yet, I write it straight. Sometimes it takes me a month, sometimes two, never more than three. I stop, put it away and think about something else for a couple of weeks, listen others songs and watch at movies. Then, I can go back to the initial script and read it as a newcomer in my world. So far, I hardly change the main line. I did for some details but never for the major situations and characters.

Once, someone asked me why I didn’t send them away ? What was I afraid of ? I am not afraid of anything. I don’t need to. My purpose is not to be famous or, at least, well-known. My goal is to write and to be read by some people. My ambition is to write down the stories I imagine to please me. I don’t search for recognition or whatsoever; I just want to be happy with my writing, and I am.

If I ever get published for my books, I won’t be different from the author I am now. I would still write for my limited circle of readers who tease me for years !

Anyhow, welcome newcomers if you ever want to join the “reading club” !