The Inevitable Substack debut

A declaration

As a writer I’ve been quiet, ironically since publishing my book on writing: Idle Thoughts of an Idle Writer in 2021. Maybe I’d said all I wanted to, or perhaps I’d had enough of the futility of firing fireworks into the daylight.

In 2016 my debut novel the Life Assistance Agency novel was published and in 2019 its follow-up Unfinished Business. It was a dream come true, if dreams entail writing, rewriting, editing and deleting.

So, why a reemergence? The clamouring public have moved on, if they were ever there in the first place. Instead there’s a need to be creative and unmet it chisels away at your sense of being until you lose your silhouette. All the best bands had a manifesto: ABC, Pet Shop Boys, the KLF, and mine is simple. To be real. To not edit, or hold back; to not be reticent, but instead charge in pike first.

I shall be posting film reviews, album reviews, thoughts on books and diversions into mental health, aging and modern life. I shall report on the writing and research for a new novel based in Poland, a country I have never visited, much like the era in which it is set: the late 1930s. There will be honest updates involving the progress of the novel, which as you can see is already facing delays due to this new substack intention. Writing is a muscle and its time to pump some weights, only your personal trainer is yourself.

They say anyone can write a novel, and maybe they can, but it involves time and commitment and a strange compulsion that never really lets you go; ultimately you write for yourself, but its the readers that shout reassurances back from the void, at least that’s the hope. Perhaps it only hope we ever have, which means it’s ever-important to not let go .

And I hope to see you along for the ride. We are awake. We are open and with our noses to the ground. And let us not forget: the lockdowns changed everything.

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