Quote from Iain CM Gray on January 14, 2022, 4:53 pm
Dear Authors Lounge,
I am 53 years old and am a part time writer. I only really started to write seriously about 4 or 5 years ago, but I have always had a creative spirit and was a musician for years (busking mainly).
I was inspired to write after reading Lonely Boy by Steve Jones (ex Sex Pistols guitarist). Lonely Boy is his autobiography in which he states that through a painful process of trial and failure he concluded that success and critical acclaim are not good motivations to create, and that the best motivation to create is purely for the love of being involved in a creative process. Reading this I had a light bulb moment and knew this was true for me. I am simply a happier being when I am creating.
This led me to try to combine two of my great loves, Russian literature and Zombies, and I tried to write a zombie book in the style of a Russian classic. This was of course an absolute, abject failure. I did however manage to produce a book that I am very proud of, and while there is probably little of the Russian classic left in it, there are indeed still a lot of Zombies.
My book is called Zombies Wha Hae after the Robert Burns poem Scots Wha Hae. It is about what happens to my hometown of Greenock when it is caught up in the start of a British zombie apocalypse. The zombies are caused by a virus being inadvertently introduced to the water. The book follows a bunch of characters that are typical of my hometown. There are drug addicts, alcoholics, ordinary families and victims of domestic violence. The book is about the characters and what happens to them. Read it if you want to find out more.
I made the decision at the start to go straight to self-publish. I have read many self-published writers and have enjoyed their work, so I thought why not me. So, I have never really had a strategy or target market. I just wanted to put my work out there so friends could read it and hoped to make some pocket money (to but cigars with). But it does appear that others are reading my work. Zombies Wha Hae is being read in Japan, Australia, USA and the UK. I live in the UK. One of my American writers said they have “read thousands of zombie tales and yours was at the very top”. That others might enjoy my work is as much as I hoped for really.
After I finished Zombies Wha Hae I rattled out a collection of short stories called The Ruined Road. This is a collection of 10 short stories that are connected. The question asked at the end is what connects them. This is something I’m not telling. I also added a plus 1 short story at the end just because I liked it.
I have always been a big reader, my mail love is the classics, but I will read pretty much anything that grabs my attention.
You will find me on Twitter @iaincmgray. I resisted social media for years, me being an old man and all. But I succumbed to see if I could increase my readership that way. I remain to be convinced whether this will work or not, but what it has done is it has gotten me in contact with people like Author’s Lounge and I was also interviewed by my hometown local newspaper as a result of being on Twitter. So, for that I am grateful.
Lang may yir lumbs reek, (It’s Scottish, look it up).
I am 53 years old and am a part time writer. I only really started to write seriously about 4 or 5 years ago, but I have always had a creative spirit and was a musician for years (busking mainly).
I was inspired to write after reading Lonely Boy by Steve Jones (ex Sex Pistols guitarist). Lonely Boy is his autobiography in which he states that through a painful process of trial and failure he concluded that success and critical acclaim are not good motivations to create, and that the best motivation to create is purely for the love of being involved in a creative process. Reading this I had a light bulb moment and knew this was true for me. I am simply a happier being when I am creating.
This led me to try to combine two of my great loves, Russian literature and Zombies, and I tried to write a zombie book in the style of a Russian classic. This was of course an absolute, abject failure. I did however manage to produce a book that I am very proud of, and while there is probably little of the Russian classic left in it, there are indeed still a lot of Zombies.
My book is called Zombies Wha Hae after the Robert Burns poem Scots Wha Hae. It is about what happens to my hometown of Greenock when it is caught up in the start of a British zombie apocalypse. The zombies are caused by a virus being inadvertently introduced to the water. The book follows a bunch of characters that are typical of my hometown. There are drug addicts, alcoholics, ordinary families and victims of domestic violence. The book is about the characters and what happens to them. Read it if you want to find out more.
I made the decision at the start to go straight to self-publish. I have read many self-published writers and have enjoyed their work, so I thought why not me. So, I have never really had a strategy or target market. I just wanted to put my work out there so friends could read it and hoped to make some pocket money (to but cigars with). But it does appear that others are reading my work. Zombies Wha Hae is being read in Japan, Australia, USA and the UK. I live in the UK. One of my American writers said they have “read thousands of zombie tales and yours was at the very top”. That others might enjoy my work is as much as I hoped for really.
After I finished Zombies Wha Hae I rattled out a collection of short stories called The Ruined Road. This is a collection of 10 short stories that are connected. The question asked at the end is what connects them. This is something I’m not telling. I also added a plus 1 short story at the end just because I liked it.
I have always been a big reader, my mail love is the classics, but I will read pretty much anything that grabs my attention.
You will find me on Twitter @iaincmgray. I resisted social media for years, me being an old man and all. But I succumbed to see if I could increase my readership that way. I remain to be convinced whether this will work or not, but what it has done is it has gotten me in contact with people like Author’s Lounge and I was also interviewed by my hometown local newspaper as a result of being on Twitter. So, for that I am grateful.
Lang may yir lumbs reek, (It’s Scottish, look it up).
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