Conventional wisdom is that a rôle model should be aspirational, and in choosing Jeff Lebowski I've gone with convention. I only mention this because if you're someone who can find nothing that resonates in The Big Lebowski you're probably wasting your time on my blog. Of course, 'I'm my own person' but it's a guide.
Fresh into 2011, with optimism seasonally renewed, I determined that this would be the year when doing would win its epic struggle with talking about doing. As I have always believed and sometimes known, doing is so much more troublesome. But creative ideas chalked on the kitchen blackboard have returned to dust and getting organised has required more than buying new stationery. Casting around for a different approach, I became ensnared by an e-world I found more addictive than any drug I have ever tried and my grand plan suddenly unrolled like a red carpet in front of me. Why labour over formatting printed manuscripts and invest emotional energy in the hope of a positive response from an agent or publisher when I can publish what I write online?
My grand plan is really only grand considering where I'm coming from, which is from nowhere. Write 50 short stories in 50 weeks, post them and charge 50 pence for each download. In a primitive rush 50-50s has been fumblingly conceived and prematurely delivered; but if I had known beforehand of the difficulties imposed by my lack of e-skills and the inherently silo construction of Google, PayPal and download hosts, I may never have started. So, for once my ignorance has had a benefit. Apart from the fact that I risk making £bugger-all after third-party cuts, my one-click buy idea doesn't appear to be a goer in the way I envisaged - simple, uncluttered access to 50 new stories, each for less than the cost of a daily newspaper.
But along with the New Year's optimism has come an assured understanding that for me, it is better to be read for free than to not be read at all. Go to Stories from nowhere for nothing to download my stories in epub, mobi or pdf formats for your readers, kindles and whatevers.
Week one for this venture begins Saturday 15th January, which by my reckoning should give me the remaining 50 weeks of 2011 to achieve fame, glory, happiness and riches, though not necessarily in that order. Until then, keep well.
Muncaster Monkey
