Live in the moment

A couple of days ago i posted the first half of a chapter written specially for this blog. i was very conscious that it was probably going to be read (presuming there are people out there and my stats page isn't recording me every time i visit my own blog) fairly shortly after it was written and before i had a chance to hone and polish it.

So it was written with the immediate future in mind and i'm not sure it benefited from that.

I also posted a prequel piece that i wrote as part of the creative writing course. At the time i thought it was pretty good and, as it was only 500 words, i'd tried to choose each one carefully. When i read it again (after i'd posted it) i didn't like it so much. i think i'd tried to be too detailed rather than leaving it to the readers' imagination.

So, never look forward, never look back. just write!

The book itself (Have i mentioned i've written a book and i'm going to publish on amazon kindle next month?) was never really meant to be read and that gave it a lot of freedom. When i read i tend to gloss over the descriptive parts and i've tried to do that in my own writing (although i know there are sections where i've failed miserably) as i can see the places that everything's happening in my head. i'd like to think that it moves apace, and that it's populated with characters that aren't two dimensional (apart from the very minor people, mentioned in passing who, obviously, are).

What can i conclude? i'm starting to worry that its all rubbish. Apart from the piece i posted under the title I don't just do science fiction. Only 100 words, each one lovingly selected and put in place. SPOILER ALERT. The original draft was over 200 words and i had to ditch more than half of it. i particularly miss the oak trees where the old man is buried but they added words without actually adding to the story.

100 word stories are a lot of fun, but not as satisfying as a whole novel and won't sell particularly well on Kindle - that's not hugely important, but it would be nice to break even although i'm fairly hopeful as the cover wasn't expensive. Cathy Helms from Avalon Graphics did a great job - don't know if she'll still drop by the blog now that i've paid the bill :-)

i've just had a quick read of another piece i did and i'm feeling more positive again.This was a re-imagining of the Snow White story and i still like it. I'll post that in the next day or so. i'd be interested in your comments.

Is there anybody out there?