Today, I'm very fortunate to host on my blog a terrific and talented author Kim Ross who would like to tell us a little about her own personal writing journey.
As Indie Authors, we're all on a different point in our journeys, but what we see is we all experience many of the same joys, triumphs, disappointments and frustrations as each other. We are a community of like-minded people all trying to express ourselves, in the best way we know how - through the written word.
So, without further ado, I'll just hand it over to Kim.
As Indie Authors, we're all on a different point in our journeys, but what we see is we all experience many of the same joys, triumphs, disappointments and frustrations as each other. We are a community of like-minded people all trying to express ourselves, in the best way we know how - through the written word.
So, without further ado, I'll just hand it over to Kim.
K. M. ROSS:
My writing journey began way back as a child, I used to 'make up stuff' about places I'd gone, people we'd met. For instance, we went on a holiday to Sydney, and Luna Park was on the to-do list. Dad took my older brother and me on the ghost train. I told everyone a witch lived in there. But I really saw magical pictures of this witch flying through the tunnel and zapping us as we went through. She was ugly with a green face, orange hair and a hooked nose. I don't think anyone believed me; I was six.
Anyway, as a teenager I decided I was going to be a Mills & Boon novelist. I began writing love stories in the back of my home science book, but they were more like Charlies Angels with a paranormal twist. Then life got in the way. In my twenties I worked as a lab research assistant, went to TAFE and I was a member of the Society for Creative Anachronism, a medieval re-enactment club. And there were boys, clubbing, and booze (but isn't that's what your twenties are for). However, a story was madly brewin' inside my head, and after a nasty breakup, it suddenly emerged in a dream. I was determined to get it out of my head until — life got in the way, again! There was a new lab job, a new man, followed by marriage and children (three boys all up).
Writing was well and truly on the backburner ... but the story kept evolving.
By the time my baby started school, I was just about ready. It all began one sunny afternoon in March 2005, the push to put words onto paper came oddly through my optometrist, he said, "What are you waiting for?" So when the opportunity arrived, I enrolled in Creative Writing and Writing for Publication. I had missed midyear intakes, but there was a course later in the year at the Hunter WEA. In the meantime, I read a maximum of six books per month along with a solid six months worth of historical research for a story about reincarnation. I planned to write a duality, by Christmas 2005, I had written two chapters of the first book; I was well on the way. Both books were finished, though not edited, by the end of February 2007. I was also in a writing group and a member of the Hunter Writers' Centre (HWC).
Then somehow I realised the word count in both novels were too long, so the duality grew into a trilogy that I named the Netherrealm series, Book 1, Heed the Darkness, Book 2, Plunge into Darkness, Book 3, Castdown Darkness, they're a combination of spec-fic-romance-paranormal and historical-contemporary, and it will be published sometime in Jun/July 2017 by Invisible Elephant Press.
I had my first short story published in the Hunter Writers' Dec-Jan 2008/09 edition, and since then I've had several small press publications and two reviews. In 2010, I received high praise from Brian Joyce, former director of the HWC, Peter Bishop and Helen Barnes-Bully of Varuna, regarding my synopsis for 'Netherrealm', and I qualified for a LitLink Mentorship with award winning speculative fiction writer and poet Jenny Blackford.
I have had other writing achievements. I won 2013 NaNoWriMo for a paranormal romance romp 'Death: It's Complicated', and I'm still working through edits. I've written heaps of short stories, and started several other romance/historical/contemporary novels (and yes, they're yet to be finished). Though, the Netherrealm trilogy will be published sometime in Jun/July 2017. In the meantime I've had short stories and flash fiction pieces published in seven anthologies, but the best moment was seeing my YA dystopian story appear in Novascapes, Vol 1, the Inaugural Hunter Speculative Fiction Anthology, and seeing my name in the company of Margo Lanagan, Krystin McDermott, Janeen Webb, Russell Blackford to name but a few (not that I'm name-dropping).
Plus I've had four flash pieces in Three Drops from a Cauldron, Web Journal. I'm also part of Newcastle Speculative Fiction Writer, 52 Weeks of Flash Fiction facebook writing group, and I'm a regular volunteer for the Newcastle Writers Festivals.
Though my writing journey has a long way to go, along the way I've met some amazing writers that have shaped and enhanced my writing skills. Best of all, I'm honoured to have widely published and talented writers in my life that are not merely like-minded people or simply peers, but have become valuable friends.
My writing journey began way back as a child, I used to 'make up stuff' about places I'd gone, people we'd met. For instance, we went on a holiday to Sydney, and Luna Park was on the to-do list. Dad took my older brother and me on the ghost train. I told everyone a witch lived in there. But I really saw magical pictures of this witch flying through the tunnel and zapping us as we went through. She was ugly with a green face, orange hair and a hooked nose. I don't think anyone believed me; I was six.
Anyway, as a teenager I decided I was going to be a Mills & Boon novelist. I began writing love stories in the back of my home science book, but they were more like Charlies Angels with a paranormal twist. Then life got in the way. In my twenties I worked as a lab research assistant, went to TAFE and I was a member of the Society for Creative Anachronism, a medieval re-enactment club. And there were boys, clubbing, and booze (but isn't that's what your twenties are for). However, a story was madly brewin' inside my head, and after a nasty breakup, it suddenly emerged in a dream. I was determined to get it out of my head until — life got in the way, again! There was a new lab job, a new man, followed by marriage and children (three boys all up).
Writing was well and truly on the backburner ... but the story kept evolving.
By the time my baby started school, I was just about ready. It all began one sunny afternoon in March 2005, the push to put words onto paper came oddly through my optometrist, he said, "What are you waiting for?" So when the opportunity arrived, I enrolled in Creative Writing and Writing for Publication. I had missed midyear intakes, but there was a course later in the year at the Hunter WEA. In the meantime, I read a maximum of six books per month along with a solid six months worth of historical research for a story about reincarnation. I planned to write a duality, by Christmas 2005, I had written two chapters of the first book; I was well on the way. Both books were finished, though not edited, by the end of February 2007. I was also in a writing group and a member of the Hunter Writers' Centre (HWC).
Then somehow I realised the word count in both novels were too long, so the duality grew into a trilogy that I named the Netherrealm series, Book 1, Heed the Darkness, Book 2, Plunge into Darkness, Book 3, Castdown Darkness, they're a combination of spec-fic-romance-paranormal and historical-contemporary, and it will be published sometime in Jun/July 2017 by Invisible Elephant Press.
I had my first short story published in the Hunter Writers' Dec-Jan 2008/09 edition, and since then I've had several small press publications and two reviews. In 2010, I received high praise from Brian Joyce, former director of the HWC, Peter Bishop and Helen Barnes-Bully of Varuna, regarding my synopsis for 'Netherrealm', and I qualified for a LitLink Mentorship with award winning speculative fiction writer and poet Jenny Blackford.
I have had other writing achievements. I won 2013 NaNoWriMo for a paranormal romance romp 'Death: It's Complicated', and I'm still working through edits. I've written heaps of short stories, and started several other romance/historical/contemporary novels (and yes, they're yet to be finished). Though, the Netherrealm trilogy will be published sometime in Jun/July 2017. In the meantime I've had short stories and flash fiction pieces published in seven anthologies, but the best moment was seeing my YA dystopian story appear in Novascapes, Vol 1, the Inaugural Hunter Speculative Fiction Anthology, and seeing my name in the company of Margo Lanagan, Krystin McDermott, Janeen Webb, Russell Blackford to name but a few (not that I'm name-dropping).
Plus I've had four flash pieces in Three Drops from a Cauldron, Web Journal. I'm also part of Newcastle Speculative Fiction Writer, 52 Weeks of Flash Fiction facebook writing group, and I'm a regular volunteer for the Newcastle Writers Festivals.
Though my writing journey has a long way to go, along the way I've met some amazing writers that have shaped and enhanced my writing skills. Best of all, I'm honoured to have widely published and talented writers in my life that are not merely like-minded people or simply peers, but have become valuable friends.
I'd just like to thank Kim for sharing that with us today. We all learn and grow from sharing our experiences. It certainly sounds as if Kim has an absolute wealth of material begging to be published and I'm sure we'll all look forward to the trilogy when it is published next year.
Thanks Kim!
Thanks Kim!
Till next time, have a wonderful, peace-filled day!
CHOOSE TO BE HAPPY!
EMBRACE THE OPPORTUNITIES LIFE PRESENTS TO YOU AND ALWAYS, ALWAYS FOLLOW YOUR DREAMS!
HAVE A GREAT LIFE AND SPREAD THE LOVE!
CHANGING THE WORLD – ONE READER AT A TIME
EMBRACE THE OPPORTUNITIES LIFE PRESENTS TO YOU AND ALWAYS, ALWAYS FOLLOW YOUR DREAMS!
HAVE A GREAT LIFE AND SPREAD THE LOVE!
CHANGING THE WORLD – ONE READER AT A TIME
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