When did I start writing?
Before I put pen to paper, on long car journeys with the family, I used to make stories up in my head . They were often so real to me that coming back was, well, boring. What I lacked in ability to read and write (I was very dyslexic) I made up for in imaginative games and role playing. My great love, for many years, was theatre and acting. I was cast in a variety of roles that ranged from a Circus Ringmaster in Pinocchio, to Helen of Troy in The Trojan Women, to Woman 1, a head in an urn, in Beckett’s, Play.
I was then lucky enough to spend a few years performing professionally for Pandemonium Theatre Company, where I learned how to improvise my way through a freely developing script and to get lost down snow covered lanes and perform at the wrong venue! I loved it, my dreams of being of no fixed abode and a wandering minstrel, or in my case, actor, had begun. For another couple of years I worked for The Open Road Theatre Company, as an actor and a bit of everything else in our family run creative enterprise.
The years between then and now have seen me take varied employment roles, lecturer and therapist, Newquay Zoo education officer, self-employment adviser, ah! the list goes on...
In the midst I had two children, a boy and then, a girl. We also played imaginative games, mainly involving faeries, dragons and other fantasy characters and worlds. Then they grew up, became artists in their own right, and I longed for my creative world again. Oh, such longing. However, it wasn’t easy to slip back into the world of acting and apart from my undergraduate degree in English and Drama, my only other creative certificate was a failed art O level, and my writing was just snippets and lost words. So I checked out lots of options: studying for an MA as a radio journalist, I also took an Art AS level and got... distinction, thought about a BA in Art, scribbled some poems, considered journalism, penned some short stories, looked at an MA in Acting, and finally took a summer course in writing with Falmouth University taught by Karen King, http://www.karenking.net/ and I have much to thank Karen for. Her encouragement and inspiring words steered my course of direction.
It took another life change, much risk and foolishness, a half written children’s book, a visit to the Wi******er Writer’s Festival, http://writersfestival.co.uk/ before I eventually took an MA in Professional Writing https://www.falmouth.ac.uk/professionalwriting I put my children’s book to one side and wrote... half an adult fantasy fiction, The Brochen Blade, a proposal for a non-fiction book, Glee Maidens, from Burlesque to Sacred, learned to conquer Aristotelian Essays, and, despite this dyslexic brain, achieved a Distinction! Since then you can see on my page my more recent achievements, and these include my art and my acting abilities.
When I write it’s great, I love it, and when I got paid to write the Lucky Stars books, well, that was a double joy, writing and paid!!! It’s tough, often writing isn’t paid and then there’s employed jobs to focus on in order to keep the wolf from the door, (though in my case I’d probably invite him in and write a dark faerie tale about him). Sometimes it’s so tough I want to stop. Want the characters to slip away into the darkness, the gorgeous witch child, Gilly Nettle and her wacky friend, Jackie, holding hands, waving goodbye; I want the ideas to stop pouring into my head, the one about the child whose name is so strange she knows it isn’t hers; I want the scripts that topple in, to stop toppling, the one about a granddaughter seeking her Bal Maiden great-grandmother’s secret. Yes, sometimes I imagine a quiet mind, having a life full enough from what already inhabits it. But then they creep back, Gilly, with her frizzy red hair, clasping the kitten she has to prevent disappearing, Jackie by her side, a small wizened faerie following behind them; a postcard of Bal Maidens drops into my hands and Where the River Runs Red sings its song to me. And I can’t. I can’t give up.
So, if you asked me what would be my main advice to a writer, I’d say, ‘never give up’, because once you do, it’s all over: the possible book deal, the script coming alive on stage, not to mention the film offer for you book! Being a writer is great. So keep going, don’t give up, you never know, the next best seller, theatre award, or simply a regular writer’s income, may well be yours. I’m hoping it’s going to be mine, so watch this space and see where my story goes next...
Thank you for reading this snippet of my life.
Maria
