Writing is a self-indulgent, ego pandering, pastime.  You can write whatever you want, create whatever scenario your imagination can conjure – except sometimes you can’t…

It’s often said that ‘it’s not the critic that counts…’ and there is a genuine truth in that.  But, without feedback, without a reaction to what you’ve typed, what are you doing it for?  Without external validation, you could sit all day typing ‘all work and no play makes jack a dull boy’ and nobody would know – or indeed care!   

So, your fragile bloom sends out scripts for review.  You are lucky, you have people you trust, folk who will be honest, so that flattery, if given, will be meaningful, but, also, that if criticised, that it too will have merit.

Flattery is always nice, to be told that someone enjoyed your scribbles, that it took them on an enjoyable page-turning adventure is the best you can hope for.  But, when you fail, when the quality isn’t what it should be, then you need to be honest enough to genuinely accept it! 

The story in my head doesn’t always make it into print – at times I miss out sections, assume I’ve made myself clear, so, when it’s pointed out that the ‘flow’ just isn’t there, then I need to correct the errors – shoot the script writer, not the critic!

As hobbies go this one is kind of consuming. 

Talk to people who play golf, and once a week (maybe) they trundle out and hit a little ball with expensive sticks; or indeed talk to people who follow football, and once a week they sit and worship at the altar of whatever team they follow…

And then there’s me. 

Every day. 

Every day, without fail or respite, I’m typing away. 

Pushing a story forward. 

But doing this ‘every day’!!! 

I’m either very committed, or very much in need of committal – and at times, I’m not too sure which one is correct! 

I cannot even absentmindedly stare into space – because even when looking out of the window, drool dripping down my chin, I’m thinking about plot lines, rewriting existing passages…

And to what end?

Why am I doing it?

I’m plodding along for two reasons, the main and overriding one being that I’m happy typing away, telling tall tales, seeing where my imagination can take me, and the secondary, is that at some point in the future, ‘others’ will share my enjoyment.

So, until the ‘others’ arrive, I’ll keep plodding along, typing words of peril and words of adventure.

After all, everyone needs a hobby…

Who is Amy?

She’s Tank Girl meets Lisbeth Salander.

Well that was the intent.

She was intended to have the irreverence and anarchy of Tank Girl, with the vulnerability and grit of Lisbeth Salander, all be it in a quasi steampunk setting.

Did she become the intended hybrid, or did she develop into something else, something more? I’m not attempting to claim any equivalence (or endorsement) with these two female icons, but I am attempting to point people towards pop-culture reference points, from which they can start to create an understanding of young Miss Grace.

I wanted to create a no nonsense strong female lead, a character that wasn’t all heaving bosom, fainting and being rescued by square jawed men.

So, that is the genesis of young Miss Amy Grace, maybe it’s a good and reliable steer, maybe I missed the target by miles – guess you’ll have to spend the £19.99 for the limited hardback folio edition to see if I achieved my aim…

I was reading the blog from another writer – do I name drop? If I do, will it mean anything, after all I was only reading their blog, it’s not as if I’d be saying something like ‘George, oh, yes me and George (Clooney) are hip’ – which we’re not, never met the bloke, his wife, or indeed any of his entourage, never even met a look-a-like…

Anyway, the blog I was reading, the writer was trying to explain the attachment they had to their characters, the connection that was somehow almost real, something very personal, akin to a friendship, and it struck a very real chord with me. I got where they were coming from, be their character a despicable axe murderer with a penchant for dressing in the skin of their victims, or a lifesaving saviour for mankind, the attachment is still the same.

I’ve been typing about young Miss Amy Grace for a few years now, and I’ve put her through some near intolerable situations, she has suffered some unspeakable pains, and all at my hand. I’ve typed darkness that has been beyond black, yet she has emerged time and again, and continued to move forward, never been stopped, never beaten.

If I met her would I like her, would she indeed like me, or would she cut off my hands so that she could stop the suffering that I keep piling upon her tiny frame? Academic, I know because she’s only a character in my imagination, a person who exists on page and paper, but sometimes I sit and I wonder what would Amy do…?

When (eventually) she becomes part of someone else’s imagination, when somebody else gets to read about her trials tribulations, her loves and her losses, will I feel jealous, that a relationship that was for so long just the two of us, is now a shared story? Or, will I be the proud parent, watching the little bicycle, without its stabilisers, trundle off down the lane?

I hope I feel the latter, I hope that when others encounter young Amy Grace, that they too feel warmth towards her, sympathy for her plight, and genuine hope that lasting happiness is just around the corner.

She is my character, I like her, and I hope when you meet her, that you like her too, because she has earnt it, she genuinely has!