Would I be welcome to discuss my non-fiction writing in here? It doesn't really fit the thread description. But I'm embarking upon the long, lonely life of an independent researcher and writer, including beginning work on a book. I see my non-fiction writing very much as a craft. Also, I'm from a writing family - my father is a published non-fiction writer and poet, while my stepmother writes fiction and is working on getting her first publication. So I know quite a lot about the whole, long, soul-sucking process...!
Currently, I'm trying to get past the appalling writer's block that is stopping me from writing up my dissertation. Then I'll be beginning the book process. Am debating whether to contact publishers with a proposal, or write some chapters first. I think it will depend on how far the associated research gets in the first couple of months.
Sure, Seska. We talk about all sorts of writing in here and I, for one, would love to hear more about what you're doing. I agree that non-fiction writing is a craft with its own rules and parameters as much as any fiction writing.
Seska, I would love to hear more about what you are writing as well.
Blink drabble:
It all begins with a champagne toast at midnight. You blink, and you are buying candy hearts and chocolates for your sweetheart. You blink, and you are coloring Easter Eggs. You blink, and the days get longer. You blink, and you are eating ice cream at the beach. You blink, and you are carving a pumpkin. You blink, and you are eating a turkey dinner with your family. You blink, and you are drinking cocoa while watching the snow fall. You blink, and you are once again holding a glass of champagne. You blink, and another year has gone by.
Oh, sj, I like that a lot. Definitely a neat interpretation of "in the blink of an eye."
Would I be welcome to discuss my non-fiction writing in here?
Only if it rhymes or if you are creating a non-fiction musical.
There was rain. I'm almost done with 19 and 20 and I'm finally entering what I consider the middle part of the story.
Barb, sj, thanks for the encouragement.
I write about disability from a social perspective, essentially. I've mostly written vaguely funny and observational stuff, e.g. for the BBC's disability website, in the past. Now I'm trying to make a shift to serious writing. My dissertation is about a particular section of the National Health Service and what their training on disability involves. I hope to turn parts of that into an academic paper soon.
The book, though, has been my dream for years, and I'm actually moving towards writing it now, which is exciting. There has been very little written (or considered) on disability and the Christian Church in this country - or, indeed, in any other, but the UK will be my focus. As a liberal Christian involved in the inclusion movement in churches, this has been frustrating for me. I want to collect disabled church-goers' experiences of disability, faith and the responses of their church communities. There's a small tradition of sociological research informing popular-ish writing on new ideas that affect Christians, so there might be something of a market for my book. Especially given how little is written on the subject at the moment, and how many disabled Christians aren't having their stories told.
I work from an emancipatory research approach, with the aim that the stories and experiences of the participants are allowed to be much more than just academic fodder. I'll probably need to write an academic paper on the subject too, but I hope to be working towards the book from the beginning. So as soon as I've gathered together some participants - the task I'm currently working on - and got a sense of where they'd like this project to go, I'll try approaching publishers. I don't know whether I'll need sample chapters or just a proposal. I'll have to see how far I've got by that point, I think.
It's scary! I'm doing something that most people don't attempt without a Ph.D. But, given that it's my dream, and I have the time right now (for various complex reasons), I'm going to try it.
Only if it rhymes or if you are creating a non-fiction musical.
Don't give me ideas. (I might actually try, and entirely fail to hand in the dissertation, and The Girl would suspend my TV privileges for ever.)
I work from an emancipatory research approach, with the aim that the stories and experiences of the participants are allowed to be much more than just academic fodder.
Mind you, I don't know a thing about non-fiction writing and certainly not how it flies in the UK, but I suspect that what makes non-fiction most approachable to the "common man" as it were, is this very type of anecdotal approach. It's what makes books like Eat, Pray, Love and Marley & Me so affecting-- it touches something common in everyone who reads it.
As far as what you'd need for a proposal, again, I don't know about the UK, but in this country, a non-fiction proposal consists of a full table of contents, a few sample chapters, and perhaps most importantly, having a platform from which to promote the book, which, of course, you have in spades.
This sounds super exciting, Seska, and I'm jazzed to see how it develops.
