So, you’ve written nearly half a million words, covered seven years of her life. 

She’s circled the globe from Ireland only to come back again. 

She’s fought in Sudan, had titanic struggles in India, and showdowns of cinematic extravagance in America. 

She’s fallen to near unimaginable levels of sadness, yet she’s bounced back from each fall.   

Prison walls could not contain her, nor the cruelty of men defeat her. 

Amy is five feet and two inches of flame haired resilience hailing from Dromahair in County Leitrim. 

She is passionate and fiercely determined to rebalance wrongs.

She gets knocked down, she suffers, she bleeds, but she learns her lessons, and learns them well. 

Hooded crows follow her, Celtic myth and legend flow through her.  She is the incarnation of the Mórrígan, she is Badb, and she is herself. 

The tree of life, butterflies and mystery reveal themselves during her dreams, some supportive, many merely cryptic in their interpretation. 

She has an appreciation for the creations of Messer’s Jamison and Powers, and occasionally indulges in the escape of narcotics. 

She is happy to watch uniformed magnificence march past, to shudder at such displays of proud manhood. 

Such masculinity is not how her breath is stolen; her back arches for an altogether fairer fayre…

But most of all, for those that wrong her, for those foolish enough to incur her wrath, a sword may be levelled towards them, maybe a pistol too, but the declaration is one they most definitely should heed for she is death, she is Amy Grace!

“Is bás mé, tá mé Amy Grace”.  

So the song goes (and it is a good song).

Who is it that inspired you, who fanned that creative and curious spark?

I love the whimsy of Terry Pratchett, the darkness of Stephen King, James Herbert and Clive Barker.  The easy-going action of Bernard Cornwell and his antihero Richard Sharpe.  I’d even offer up for praise the sheer pulp fiction brilliance of Jerry Ahern (look him up!). 

My all-time favourite book being Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath – such brilliant use of the everyday to create drama – genius. 

I’m not trying to list the great and the good, more I’m trying to demonstrate a breadth of inspiration and an appreciation for the numerous ways to tell a tall tale.

Styles come, fashions forever fickle, some stories are forever hip, some passing phases. 

Some writers and their tales hit me at the right time and make the impression just when it is needed.

Like many I went through a dystopian phase – Orwell/Atwood/Huxley et others.

Intertwined with this was a passion I hold for the long tale, for those who could make the telling of just one day in the life of someone an entire book.

I did my time reading some great Russian writers.  The social commentary that wove in and out of each tale, the mirrors that they held up to laugh at us and scold us in equal measure; Dostoevsky, Nabokov, Bulgakov, Zamyatin and of course Mr Solzhenitsyn. 

And in with all the greats namedropped, I make no claim for equivalence, no statement other than they inspire(d) me.

But if I were to steer you towards suitable references for my tall tales, if under duress I were obligated to offer up writers of skill that you would know, then only because the lives of small kittens were at stake I would I say imagine if Philip Pullman wrote the Victorian adventures of a young woman who had the grit and resilience of Lisbeth Salander from Stieg Larsson’s Millennium trilogy, and that this young woman lived in the dark and dangerous world of Caleb Carr’s Alienists – then I’d go yeah, that’s about right.   

But back to inspiration and heroes.

It is an adage, and it was the start of this missive.

The art that is created is what lasts, the lives mistakes and failings of the writers quickly forgotten.

Questionable people can create superb art.

Not too sure if I’ve lost my thread – possibly.

Such are the struggles of a one-sided conversation…

Whatever you are doing stay safe, remain sane and try your best to be happy!

If you are a writer, faith is the continual struggle.

I’m not talking about belief in lords spiritual.

Nope, I’m looking at the more temporal.

Belief in oneself.

Faith in the product of your labour.

It swings from the unshakeable bravado to the utter depths of despair.

We wilt quicker than an uncredited extra in Nosferatu as daylight floods the room…

At times we will take on allcomers and promote our project with the zeal of the true believer, and then as the wind blows, and before the cockerel has uttered his acknowledgement of the new day, we skulk away shame faced about our potato print offering…

Some call it ‘Imposter Syndrome,’ and some are right.

Some say it is the fragility of the flouncy shirt wearing overly dramatic artistic types, and again some are indeed right.

Creating anything worthy of note is an emotional investment.

Offering it for critique a true test of body confidence, your naked soul exposed for all to see.

Some will tell you what you want to hear, and some will tell the truth.

It’s then a matter of faith.

When tested will you remain true?

Will you deny your true self?

Have you got the faith to stay the course, finish the task, accept the burdens?

I hope you have; I hope I have too!

Stay safe – remain sane!

Yeah, we all know that one.  Muzzling oxen as they tread out the corn – labourers being worth of their hire and all that. 

In short what we purchase, what skills we need to procure, we must ensure that those providing them are paid; and paid a fair wage to boot. 

So, when we were creating our budget to self-publish, we did indeed make an error of some magnitude.

Our calculation, our proposal, it had numerous stages, capture of the pertinent was (we hoped) complete.

Indeed, the list of tasks remain unchanged – just our estimation of the coins required to complete them woefully negligent.

It is an oversight common in too many projects – and it is one that will cause a significant pause to be inserted into this one.

Money, despite political promises, doesn’t materialise because we want it to, and real folk must live within their means. 

Self-publishing starts on a deficit, a minus in the column that we accept because we assume that the payback will happen, or that the loss of investment can be endured.

Even if this is a project of extreme vanity, it cannot become a bejewelled white elephant. 

ATMs that are remote, isolated, easy dug out with my neighbour’s tractor and scoop are now of more interest than they ever were.  

Stay safe – remain sane!

I was going to call this little missive Mohamad and the Mountain, but the current title seems fair enough.

I’ve tried, I’ve been very trying, to get myself traditionally published.

It could be a timing issue, my sales pitch, or indeed the project just isn’t up to scratch.

It could be all the above.

Maybe it is just a few of those points?

Although I don’t think it’s the last one.

So, If I’ve real belief in my project why don’t I back myself and self-publish?

It’s a good question.

It’s a superb question.

It’s one I’ve attempted to rationalise away for years, and now I can no longer do that.

I MUST publish or indeed be dammed for eternity to never know if my work would ‘make it.’

I am aware that self-publishing is as fraught to the vagaries and whims of its traditional sibling. 

I know that my timing and delivery will be as susceptible to the whims of the gods as any traditional effort, but at least I’ll have tried.

So that is what I’m going to do.

I am seeking a professional editor to help me polish my script as best we can, and then I’ll seek out a professional to design a captivating book cover.

Coins have been counted; funds set aside.

December is my target.

Hopefully, my product will be successful, but if its not, if I fail, then I know that I will never be one of those who know neither victory nor defeat.

I am entering the arena.

A ride so long delayed is now starting with earnest.

Stay safe & remain sane!