Subbing

Well, the thing is I only sub things about once in a while when I really feel the urge. Everything I have ever submitted anywhere has found a place - more or less. Which begs a question - why do I not submit more? Am I a procrastinator? No, I don't think so? Do I feel my work is not good enough to submit unless it's perfect? No.

Do I not write enough? No, that's not the case either.

I think it's because I don't want to submit things just for the sake of seeing them published somewhere. I want to write things that mean somethng and move someone. If they don't move me, then why bother?

There's also a heck of a lot of places to submit to, whether online or traditional print mags and there-in lies another compelling problem? Have I read enough to know what's good or not yet?

Definitely not.

The other problem is I don't actually LIKE reading any literary fiction whatsoever. I like critiquing - that's never an issue - God, I love hating something, but I actually don't like reading stuff that's been made up. I like facts, documents, reality. So, that leaves me with a dilemma...and a deep question to ask myself which is "what kind of a writer am I?"

I've asked a fellow writer this and hope he'll answer but I will have to incubate the question for a while. I thnk it's why I am more and more drawn to writing an account of my father's migration, but also because facts are always tangible and can be checked and be made certain. With fiction, there's all kinds of level of disbelief one has to suspend and I can't do it - most writing just isn't good enough to do that. The only time I can do it is with Sci-fi and that's because you already know from the outset it's going to be a world so made-up that you just have ride along with all the beautiful made-upness, the gadgets, the weirdly contorted views of the world we know or worlds we don't know.

I will cogitate on this and see what happens.

Asheka Troberg

Well, I can't talk about Brooklyn Voice and not mention one of its founding editors, Asheka Troberg, right?

Here's a letter she wrote to the http://www.theDailyStar.net about the Bangladeshi community in Brooklyn:
http://www.thedailystar.net/story.php?nid=34700

I'd quite like her to join the Fiction Workhouse if she gets enough time away from her hectic schedule at the BV. But I think you'll agree, that there is certainly a difference in attitude in writing style between US SE Asian writers and UK SE Asian writers. I'd love to explore those differences with her but in the meantime, enjoy her letter.

Brooklyn Voice

The Brooklyn Voice is a site with a penchant for a rather quirky approach to being a magazine for the thoughtful consumer of literature, music and the arts in general. It also has a vibe about it with South East Asian roots but equally firmly with its feet in the US. The humour is American but its soul is from the East.

I'm going to keep a good eye on this site because even though aesthetically, it won't please everyone (not yet, anyway), the articles, reviews and ethos of the production team are worthwhile. Please take a look.

I also think they will be moving quite a pace forward in linking in with a number of interesting writers. Catch them on facebook too.

Novels

So, I started two novels.

One is just utter pants and it's been shelved for about 5 years and it makes me cringe to even look at it.

The other is more like a good idea but without the necessary personal effort required to write it. I will write it.

However, I've come upon another idea. Not really a novel this time but more or less a living documentary and I actually do think it's worth doing. I recently found a whole load of old papers and documents belonging to my late father, documents which explain his journey to the UK and help me build up a picture of his lonely steps to a cold Britain over 40 years ago. It's also opened my eyes about some of the family history too - both personal, emotional and financial. It's filling in a few of those gaps for me and I have even figured out my sister's actually a year older than I thought. It's those bits of certainty that compells me to actually write this thing.

I have a structure in my head about how I want to put it together - but I also want it do something for a generation of people under 25 - and that is to given them a glimpse of what their parents and grandparents went through during that period of pre-Enoch migration. I want them to understand that they can aspire to something and actually, to be a tiny bit grateful for those lonely journeys.

I am thinking of collaborating on this as a project perhaps with one or two other writers of my generation with migrant routes.

But you know, this idea, it's got a bit of passion behind it - and it has facts, truth as well as that ordinary mystique you get with folk-tales and handed down oral tradition. I can make those early "pioneers" into heroes, legends, and who knows, their descendents might let them live on in their own actions. They might understand how important it all is.