I remember when I was 5 years old and I told my mom that I wanted to be the first African American, female president. Then, by the time I was 10 or 11, I wanted to be an aerospace engineer. I never wanted to be a writer from the time I was young, but I was always a dreamer. A dreamer of imaginary places and imaginary people.
I wrote for a little while in the 3rd grade, but ultimately my sister was the one who was the writer, and she was good at it. She used to tell me stories as a kid and I loved each and every one. We always joke about how she wrote FanFic before FanFic was cool. I got to be friends with Harry Potter or have powers like the X-Men and I think that’s where it started.
Even though I didn’t always write, I loved to read, I’m pretty sure that it was a prerequisite in my family, but I never minded. I read books of Greek Gods, spies, and kids with wings. By the time I’d gotten to high school, the public school system had already instilled the “wonders” of academic writing and I hated it. It took forever for me to realize that creative and academic writing are two different arenas.
I finally started writing again 2 years ago around the time I started college and I loved it! The more I wrote the happier I was. Yes, sometimes it was frustrating and daunting, but it never compared to the feeling I got from creating something and watching it take form.
So here I am, a junior in college, plagued by the question “Who are you?” That question I couldn’t really answer for a while because I couldn’t really say I was writer could I? Wrong. I don’t consider myself and author, but I do consider myself a writer. I’m still trying to figure out where I fall, but I know that I am Jordan, writer, dreamer, future author. Who are you?
Interesting post… I’m a medical student, a potential doctor, a writer, a potential author, a poet, a person, a human. I’ve followed, I’d love it if you took the time to check out my small blog. Atm its mainly short stories and a bit of poetry, but I’m working on a novel (Prologue is on my blog). Feel free to check it out, keep blogging and have a good day 🙂
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Cool can I call you Dr. Kasim? Just kidding! And I love short stories! I followed your blog so I guess I’ll be doing a bit of reading today 🙂
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Well legally speaking I have to say you arent allowed to call me that yet lol… Another 4 years til that :’) Great! If you’ve got any feedback, good or bad, I’d love to hear it (especially if it has to do with my novels prologue)
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Darn it lol. What genre of stories do you like to write. I’m going through some of your posts, but I still wanted to ask.
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Good question… Not really fixed to one genre,but the novel I’m currently writing is a fantasy (demons, post apocalyptic type deal).
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That’s really cool. I am writing a fantasy novel at the moment, but it’s coming along very, VERY slowly
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Tell me about it lol… I keep telling myself I’m gonna sit down and write 5k words today, but I never get round to it. Have you got a prologue/excerpt available? Would be interested in checking it out
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I have two different openings because I couldn’t figure out what my character wanted to do with her life.
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Have you tried planning out the novel? The entire thing? I find it really helps
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I’ve done a bit of outlining, but not much. My mind changes too often to keep one idea
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I’d say try to get a core plot, that you stop yourself from changing too much would help?
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That sounds like a great idea, I think I’m just trying too come up with a plot that doesn’t sound like something out of hunger games or divergent
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Tbh my plot idea came while writing a short story, maybe that would help?
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Sounds good. That’s how one of the stories, on my blog came about
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I admire your fresh perspective. And more than that, I envy you for realizing that you are a writer as a Junior in college. No, you may not be an author…YET, but you are 100% right, that does not mean you cannot be a WRITER! Don’t give up on your dreams, part of being a good writer, and even a great writer I’d wager, is the ability to continue dreaming even when it is hard to so do.
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Thank you so much for your kind words. Even realizing it in college makes me feel a bit behind the rest of the writers in the world but I’m catching up. I saw that you’re working on a novel, I can’t wait to be able to read it. I like to believe that anyone that works at it can get published
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You are so welcome. I know what it is like to feel ostracized from the other ‘writers’ in college. I never seemed to really fit in with my peers because while they were busy quoting the greats of old literature, I was looking forward to the modern successes of our day, which as messed up as this is made me feel like less of a writer. As long as you write you are a writer. I think a tag-along to that is read. As long as you read and you write you are a writer. It doesn’t really matter the genre we read, but it is important in developing own own writing to read because it exposes us to new styles, methods and techniques in writing.
Thank you for your kind words about my WIP! I have been slugging away at it since March and am going through a massive revision changing the entire MS from third-person past to first person present, which is kicking my ass in many ways because entire scenes are being rewritten (as they should be) but a huge plus is that the process is making me fall in love with the book all over again.
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I love reading. And oh my gosh you are saying everything I feel! And that’s great to hear. I finally started my first draft back in February but hadn’t touched it again until last month. Now I’m giving myself until Dec 31st to finish my first draft.
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Even if you don’t finish by Dec 31st don’t be too hard on yourself. Keep chucking away at it day by day. Also I just read an awesome post by an author who said that in the first draft its okay to write crap, because the real story comes out in revision. I can honestly say that this is true even though I am not published. Looking at my book now from draft one to what I am on now which is what, draft nine, draft ten? The book/characters/voice/everything has changed and improved so so much from that first draft. So just finish it, don’t torture yourself over one scene or some crappy dialogue (this is my own personal issue, so I’m not at all saying you have crappy dialogue, lol) and think to yourself, that’s fine it’s not the best but I’ll fix it later. Let me see if I can find that post.
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That’s definitely my problem, I’ll definitely try to get past that.
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I found the post, here is the link. https://randyribay.wordpress.com/2015/07/20/real-writing-is-revising/
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Thanks so much!
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No problem! Aspiring authors stick together! 😉
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Please don’t hesitate to contact me. I’d love to keep up with you
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Same here! I’m following your blog now so you’ll be hearing from me when you post!
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Great! If there’s anything you ever want to talk about privately there’s an email form on my about page that you can use to contact me
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Sweet, I’ll do that!
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