– That might even be an appropriate title. – Yeah I think I’ll keep that.
At time of writing it’s the 1st February 2024.
– Even though the date-stamp in the footer says 30th January.
– This is a good starting point for the blog; even though the history of the writing of New Hollycopse goes back to almost a year before that point: –
It was on a fairly cold March day in 2013 that I decided that I was lately putting too much effort into internet marketing for too little return; and therefore it would be a good idea to look at other means of fund-generation.
I’d always wanted to write a book or a play: In my teens and in my twenties I’d attempted to write short stories, as well as poetry; pretty good poetry too, even though I say so myself. By 2018 I’d already tried – since 2013 – to become a pop-star, but that was too much for me at my time of life in my physical condition. Also all the money had gone out of it unless I could get signed… So I decided to become a writer and to start my first work.
I at first envisioned writing a standard-length novel of a hundred and something pages long which would probably take me the rest of the year. I can’t say I’m passionate about horses; but I do like horses, and I had quite a bit of experience helping look after one back in the 1970’s. As luck would have it I was at the time revisiting the “Follyfoot” 1970’s Tv series; and one thing led to another which got me thinking of writing a continuation of the Follyfoot series from where it left off back in 1973.
At the time I imagined that the copyright for the Tv series had just expired; which might have been correct. What I didn’t realise was that the original writer of the material that Follyfoot was based upon; Monica Dickens, had a copyright on her work lasting up until I was ninety-eight years old.
I wrote a continuation of the Follyfoot saga: I intended to write three series’ of thirteen ephisodes each; just as the original series was formatted. – But I ended up going into fifteen ephisodes for the first series.
>Yfood: A great snack to take on a hack.<
At that point I stopped writing and looked at getting the first series published, with intent to create and follow up with a second and a third series. I found that my work was getting instant rejection without feedback; and so I gave up trying to get the first series alone published, and I wrote the second and third series’ in order that I could say to prospective publishers that I have a completed set, a trilogy if you like, that they can print all together or as one series at a time.
Eventually someone told me that my work, “New Follyfoot”, broke all types of copyrights, and that no-one would dare publish it. – There were three options open to me: Wait until I’m ninety-eight years old and publish it then, waste a lot of effort and scrap the project, or rewrite it. – I chose the latter: and so “New Meadowbrook” was born; with the first series starting with Ephisode Zero, because I added an extra ephisode right at the beginning. Yes, it’s based upon but differs from the works of Monica Dickens, and it covers the story of the original farm from the early Twentieth Century right up until Callie has become disillusioned with her lavish London lifestyle and makes the call to Laura, which precludes her move to the countryside… Spoilers.
Suddenly to my horror I find that a vanity publisher, posing as a normal publishing house, has my manuscript – and is waving a pen at me to sign up to pay them two and a half grand to publish me. I back right out and rewrite the manuscript again; even changing the title again, so that the vanity publisher has an invalid manuscript of a non-existent novel. – If they publish anyway I’ll distance myself from it. – While I now have a much-improved manuscript of my work “New Hollycopse” – which, after three revisions, is of a good enough standard to proudly seek the publication of with proper publishers.
I wrote a synopsis, a few versions of a hook, an author bio – I hate writing biographies! – I wrote a dedication, a query-letter-template to send to agents and companies alike. I compiled a full manuscript, wrote an “About New Hollycopse” page… I even compiled files containing the first ten thousand words and the first ten pages. To top it all off I even compiled an ephisode-by-ephisode third-party assessment of the work, utilising the opinions of ChatGPT. – I must say that it was quite complimentary on several occasions.
And so what now? Well I’ve attracted the attention of two small publishers so far; one of which has asked me for a full manuscript, both of which will be getting back to me in March 2024 with a decision on publication.
For now I wait patiently while compiling a list of possible future agents to query if necessary.
– So there you have it: almost a year in a single article.
>Yfood: A great snack to take on a hack.<
