As you know, my debut book, “Waves of Heart: An Anthology of Short Stories,” came out a year ago in December 2020. As the years pass, the more I find myself looking back at the writing journey that made me what I am today and brought me here.
I’ve always anticipated becoming a writer (Shakespeare was the first poet who intrigued me while reading his works). Now that I’m a writer, I write various kinds of things: love stories, love letters, poetry, short stories, blogs (technical and non-technical), inspirational speeches, promotional sales copies, and a lot more.
It turns out my book is written at a different level. If you need some tips on writing, read this post.
The more I wrote down my thoughts, the more I discovered about myself.
Below are a few that I want to share with you.
Writing a book isn’t easy. Like, not a bed of roses.
I understand what comes to your mind. “Maybe”. It’s not exactly what I expected. but a huge responsibility after all.
When I sit down to write a poem, it’s simply a huge emotion that I try to put into words and finish with my readers in mind. At first, the enormity of my thought paralyzed me.
I’ve been very much interested in penning down my abstract ideas. They are unique in a way, and the readers can easily understand them with simple words. But writing a book with a poetry collection is a bit different, I suppose.
Break it down.
The one thing that made progress visible was breaking the book into several parts. I made sections with different categories of poems that have a similar theme or describe a similar thing.
That way, instead of sitting and struggling for the order of poems and emotional strength in their vocabulary, I just made the poetry categories, which every poem can genuinely fit into.
Everything felt much more manageable this way, and I ended up managing the list into groups.
The hardest part is the acknowledgment.
Perhaps for most writers who want to include people who loved, supported, and helped them get to where they are today. I had an immense fear that I might forget someone important and hurt them during this process, accidentally. I’m not sure I mentioned everyone’s name in the list.
The best part is finishing the manuscript.
The moment I sent my manuscript document to my publisher, I felt lighter, and my tense mind felt calm for the first time in months. I wrote poems for more than six years. There are more than a hundred in total.
At first, I wanted to publish my book before my marriage. But it was delayed for various reasons. But later on, I felt guilt hanging over my heart while trying to lead a normal life. I tried to give the writer in me a chance to meet the world. So, I started writing again.
Once I prepared the manuscript, I was almost free.
After sending it, my freedom knew no bounds for some days.
I want to thank the people who helped me publish this book. The people about whom I wrote in it were all my inspirations for the poems. Thank you all.
Finishing the manuscript was just the beginning.
Long live the days spent in freedom! Because after finishing the manuscript, a new chapter in the life of my book began: editing and revision.
It turns out that editing is even harder. The reality is that one needs to understand when to step up editing, and some revisions are hard to make. Some lines are messy and need a change of words. I tried to be perfect, or as close to perfect as I could. During this stage, I made a few things clear in my head: you can always revise, update, edit, cut, or swap even a perfectly worded poem.
It turns out that writing a book is never really finished. I wanted to set it free and see what it could become.
So, that is what my book taught me before coming into the world. These are the links where you can order it: Amazon – Flipkart. If you have a story to share, feel free to send an email to info@wavesofheart.com.
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