Writing a novel isn’t hard.

After being bullied into writing a novel by workmates I decided to give it a go.

I’d had an idea kicking around in my head for years after too long spent watching and consuming different kinds of fantasy and science fiction media.

I sat down one night, wrote the prologue and sent images of it to my colleagues. Over the next nine months I wrote the story without any real writers blocks. Sticking to a plan of 2000 words per chapter and 50 chapters I reached novel length easily enough.

What I found easy was making a cohesive story come together even when the original plot had been exhausted after the first ten chapters. I just thought of the situation as I saw it before me and imagined it on the screen. Maybe I’m a special case having a collection of DVDs that would shame a retailer but I was able to come up with a few different scenarios for each plot twist. All I had to do then was pick the one I wanted most.

I then edited the book as best I could, designed the cover and self published it on Kindle. There you go workmates, 9 months can make a child or write a novel, it wasn’t hard, it actually relieved a lot of work stress and opened my eyes to a new hobby.

The main problem comes next. Much like writing a blog the issue is getting people to read it.

In hindsight I should have paid some money to get it proofread, should have paid more money to get it advertised and paid yet more money to send it off to publishing houses. However this was very much against the spirit of the endeavour. So I submitted it to  a few websites and gave it away for free on the opening weekend. I ended up giving away around 500 copies and even got one review which liked it.

Do you know what? the friends who bullied me into writing it still haven’t read it.