8 Jul, 2024: Short stories and other stories

A blog post less than a week after the last? I'm unstoppable. Really, though, I just wanted to talk about a couple of things that happened this week regarding this website and my writing journey. Speaking of which, this blog is now split into two: Writer's Journey, which consists of these blogs, and Book Samples, which are... y'know. In the latter section, you'll find samples of each of my finished books, plus the short story I finished last week. I am pretty excited to be offering these samples, seeing I am a yet unknown author trying to get an audience, and so I have to throw out my hook to grab the attention of the publishing industry. If you haven't bought one of my books but want to know if they are worth a read, Book Samples is precisely where you should go to try them out.

In terms of my writing, I have actually decided I would like to try my hand at a couple more short stories, seeing as Highlighting Mundanity seems to have gone over well, and I have a few more ideas for stories too simple to make good novels but still fun enough to be worth writing. The new short story has a working title of "Undefeated" and is about a brand new hockey team that is having insane luck. It's based on my playing of EA NHL games on semi-pro. I know hockey is not the most popular sport, but that's sort of the beauty of a short story. If it isn't a hot seller, at least it wasn't a time sink.

Finally, I just finished reading a book I thought was amazing. It's too early to call it one of my top three favourites, but it's certainly up there. The title is Normal People by Sally Rooney, and it is a really psychologically stimulating story of two young people who have an almost magnetic attraction to one another yet are toxic to one another and often can't see eye to eye. It's hard for me to explain why I love it so much, but Rooney's writing style genuinely captivated me and made me read for hours of the night. If you haven't read it, you should. If you want more of my thoughts, I gave it a rating on GoodReads, which you can probably find if you are so inclined. 10/10, I would read it again. Anyway, I'll update the Excel file on my book ranking tab with the latest version.

Thank you for reading,

Zara