Tuesday 16 February 2016

Going Goth!

It’s wonderful to be able to share the following good news with you all. My soon to be published novella, The Diary of V. Frankenstein (approx 30,000 words), has been given some high praise.

It all began about a month ago when I saw an event posted on Facebook. The event is called ‘Re-imagining the Gothic 2016: Monsters and Monstrosities’ and takes place in Sheffield. It will be held in May (details can be found via the link at the bottom of this update).

I saw that they showcase re-imaginings of Gothic tales at the event. The Diary of V. Frankenstein is a re-imagining of Mary Shelly’s classic so it seemed to fit the criteria. I emailed the event organisers and asked if they would like to read the story and showcase it. They said they would read it and I waited with nervous excitement.

Yesterday I got a nice email from Lauren, one of the event organisers. Here is part of that email,

‘I've discussed The Diary of V. Frankenstein with Kathleen, who leads Sheffield Gothic with me, and we'd like to include it in our showcase; it certainly fits very well with this years theme! I felt on reading that you'd manage to capture something of the original text whilst also creating something new- that you'd carefully considered Shelley's style and themes, working to recreate but also 'reimagine' (sorry, had to get the buzzword in there haha) the text to expand on it.

We're planning on having scheduled talks, multimedia presentations and performances throughout the showcase, so what we would like to do is feature you as one of these speakers. It would be 20 to 25 minutes, and it would be wonderful if you could speak about your creative process and what monstrousness means to you as a writer in this context. This could potentially also include a short reading, maybe 5 minutes, of an extract from your novella. If you'd like, we'd set you up with a stall/stand…’ (for selling copies)- ‘…some presenters will be putting up posters, mood boards, extracts of their prose or poetry blown up onto A3 so that visitors throughout the day can look at their work and their processes.’

To receive such words and be invited to the event is humbling and a great confidence boost. After a really tough week I can’t tell you how much I needed that confidence boost. I’m beyond excited to be a part of this! I’m totally nervous, but so so excited to have The Diary of V. Frankenstein published and be able to present it at this event.

The original short-story (approx 8,000 words) can be found in the Charity Anthology ‘Strange Tales from the Scriptorian Vaults.’ Here is the link to it:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Strange-Tales-Scriptorian-Vaults-Sammy-ebook/dp/B00DQUC0UY/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1455639997&sr=8-1&keywords=strange+tales+of+the+scriptorian+vaults

As I often do, I’ll end with some thank-yous as I really do appreciate people acknowledging my writing. It’s important to remember this is a tough industry and with so many authors out there looking for people’s time and reviews etc I appreciate the time people do give. It then allows them to read awesome stories *cringes as I can’t do self-praise*, so it’s a win-win, but I like to remember my ‘pleases’ and ‘thank-yous.’

So first up, thank you Lauren and Kathleen for inviting me to this event. It’s going to be a lot of fun! Thank you to my publisher’s Kristell-Ink for believing in me and putting so much time and effort into helping me with my stories- Thank you Sammy and Zoe! Another thank you must go to Daniel Chipperfield at my local paper, The Gloucestershire Citizen. He contacted me yesterday and another article about my writing, and the writing/social group I’ve started in the area, was featured today.

Lastly, thank you to all of you for supporting me through this journey. Thank you for your kind words and encouragement. Thank you for all your feedback on my writing as it is so wonderful to know what you think of my stories.

Keep your eyes open for further updates,

Steven

http://sheffieldgothicreadinggroup.blogspot.co.uk/p/reimagining-gothic-showcase-and.html