Sunday 24 February 2013

Write to Express...Not Impress.

Getting down to writing is the most challenging part.  To look for the right idea, the right inspiration, the right supportive system, and lot more that pushes one to pick up pen and paper and write the first sentence. And we are sure that today's boot camp for the aspiring authors was full of quaint energy one could feel around in the room as 50 odd young and not-so-young sat glued to their seats for two hours to interact with a publisher, and an author.
RJ turned publisher, Hardeep Chandpuri, did an apt reality check on the business of writing and then getting it published.  It is tough to write, he said, and the tougher to find the publisher and get your work published. But the toughest is to distribute your book and reach out to the diverse reader, he added. 
Sharing his disturbing brush with some of the publishers and even a literary agent, made him wonder at his writing but more than anything else, helped him start a new publishing venture, 'Ferntree' and 'Writeway Literary Facilitators' to help and mentor the budding authors. 
Though ebook is already challenging the brick and mortar publishers, India would continue to be haven for the traditional publishing as large number of readers with no access to digital domain would love to hold, feel and rejoice at the smell printer's ink emanating from the 'real' book, explained Hardeep.
Books continue to however excite and there is no match to the experience of finding  copies of one's book adorning the book shops...as the author of debut best-seller, 'Move on Bunny', Vivek Atray, shared the elation he experienced in  finding 'Bunny' staring at him on a book stall on Haridwar railway station, or in the book store of a remote city. 

Preeti Singh, whose crime thriller 'Flirting with Fate' has caught readers' attention and has won her two awards too, shared the journey of five years she undertook in writing it and getting it published, involving writing and rewriting, numerous revisions, and of course, the pleasure of adding a few real-life characters that infact, generated quite a curiosity amongst them to get hold of the book once it is published.

"My aim as a debut writer had been just to reach out to the maximum number of people", and having sold a sizable number of the book with her own marketing pitches to the book sellers, she said, she feels contented in having done so.

Her advice to the budding authors had been not to use verbose language and instead make it simple and straightforward which a common man can understand.

"Do not write to impress...but to express," she said.

There had been interesting interaction with the participating wanting to know about the real travails of getting published, dealing with the publishers, and reaching out to the readers. 

CLS President Sumita Misra affirmed that one should get published on the book's merit and not by finding any short-cuts. Numerous publishers would use different ploys to undervalue the author and their work, but one should be firm and continue to look around for more options.

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