Their story, in their words…
17000 words and many hours later, my short book, ‘Against the Odds’ has been completed.
To put the lack of time I had at my disposal into perspective, I began writing 250 words per day, a small enough amount, but perfect for allocating my time with other activities. However, one problem with this was that I subconsciously broke up the book into sections meaning that I sometimes forgot the details of what I had written a few days prior.
It was this, coupled with a multitude of days away (preventing me from completing my 250 daily words) that led to the beginning of 500 word being written per day. This phase was relatively short as my deadline was approaching swiftly and so I moved on to writing 1000 words per day. Even ‘borrowing’ my sibling’s laptop to continue writing when I was away from my workstation, unwilling to lose any more time to outings. During this period, I also had coursework, my personal statement, revision and work experience to complete, truly making this a challenge, bonus with the surprise visit or journey that kept me away from writing the book.
Funnily enough, after I met my goal, I continued to write, unbound by a set number of pages I had to complete, demonstrating that creativity comes easier when you let it free of all parameters. Through the process, names were painstakingly changed, minor details as well as major, were corrected, until I was finally ready to move ahead. As I wrote the book, I flitted between typing and writing, as per Margaret’s advice, initially on a notepad but promptly transferred to a mirror with a whiteboard marker (I couldn’t find a whiteboard). I still preferred writing directly onto word rather than transcribing, as that’s the way I normally write essays for my subjects, unless asked to do otherwise.
Problems also arose after the writing was finished, chasing up the illustrator, having them redo the cover at times, barraging the book printing company with several emails and replacing my cover manuscript to accommodate last-minute changes made it seem like the self-publishing process was never going to end. But after I was finally satisfied with what I had received and learned, I uploaded the necessary documents and a week later I had my first tangible copy.
Overall, I enjoyed the process of making my own reality using little gimmicks I had been itching to use since secondary school. My thirst to write a book has been sated and I’m ecstatic to finally be an author – a massive thank you to the Mark Evison Foundation for helping this book materialise.
