So, welcome to my new blog. My name is Amy, formerly known (and continuing to be known) as the Literary Onion. Only now, I’m not just the Literary Onion, food creator and book lover, but I’m also my second blog ‘Literary Scribbles’. I know, I know, I really don’t have to mention that, if you’re reading this you’re already here. You already know me as Literary Scribbles. Oh well, a little bit of context can go a long way, because we want a good relationship you and I. If you’re going to read my painstakingly and lovingly creative works of art (apologies for the sarcasm) and sit there and take in any lessons about writing I can give you to help you write your own masterpieces, I want you and I to get off on the right foot.
Okay to start off, I have been writing since, I believe even before I could. As a child I was a little attention seeker who was afraid of every single thing in this big, bad world: the dark, heights, dentists, doctors, small spaces, large spaces, thugs, thieves and murderers. My imagination was rife with dangers and, thankfully, also rife with friends. Together with my real-life human friends I would lead them into stories unknown, create characters unlike they’d ever heard of (many of them with more dangers than I care to admit… Children’s imaginations are darker than I think anyone would ever dare say).
I wrote my first proper story at, I assume perhaps the age of six or seven based on the legibility of the writing and my friend’s drawing skills. It was titled ‘Snowy’s Adventures’ and detailed my teddy dog, Snowy’s, believe it or not ‘adventures’. All I can really recall about those events where that a very-kind woman who worked at the Nursery (where it was written) stuck the pages together with a staple-gun in the wrong order and by the way I reacted you’d think that she’d destroyed Snowy teddy herself.
Since then I’ve started many projects, finished a small handful, self-published a monstrosity written at eleven-years-old at fourteen-years-old (regretted, but I truly only wanted a copy for myself) and achieved a degree in English Literature and Creative Writing (along with many other, not-important-to-this-situation qualifications).
I’ve worked a handful of jobs, all very distracting to my writing. I’ve seen many therapists etc. about my constant anxiety and fear of, although less than I was a child, still a considerable number of things. And now, my wonderful and supportive parents, putting up with me in the way that only parents can, have decided to help support my dreams of moving to France to open a Writers’ Retreat, far away from the outside world.
It was a big step, a terrifying step, but also a much needed one. My anxiety, although focused on other things, has died down. I feel a considerable amount better and I’m taking the steps to actually do something I’ve always been afraid of—sharing my beauties, my babies, with other people. You see, that’s what a novel or short story or poem is to a writer. Non-writers wouldn’t understand that because, well, it’s weird to be so attached to a piece of paper. But you can’t tell me that Dickens didn’t sit there after spending so long on Hard Times and think, ‘Wow, this is amazing. I love this. I’m so proud of how it’s grown from a little idea to a novel all its own’.
To all the authors and writers out there, consider that the first lesson I’ll teach you on this blog, if you don’t love what you’re writing—alla Conan-Doyle and Sherlock Holmes—then stop writing it. Move onto something that does make you happy, something that makes you excited again. Trust me, one day you’ll feel that pull again and you’ll move back to it, but a work without love is like an artist without paint—it’ll be blank, dull, without life.
Alright, alright, I think I’ve talked long enough for my first blog post. This was only meant to be a getting to know me segment, after all. I hope you enjoy all that’s to come: poetry, plays, short stories and serial stories; along with weekly posts to help you with your own writing: how to create characters, ‘show, don’t tell’ and editing old pieces, to name a few.
I hope you’re enjoying National Novel Writing Month, if you’re taking part and I look forward to taking part in it next year. A Bientot, mes amis.
Non.
A Bientot, les ecrivians.
The Literary Onion 