19 Comments

Hi all, looking forward to your introductions! I’m based in the California bay area. I was drawn to Substack as a way to find a creative community. I’m also interested in building an “author platform” to help me someday find a book agent and get my novel published. The creative things I’m working on outside of my sci fi novel are: personal essays for Write on Track, poetry and short stories. Your turn!

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I launched my Substack as a cultural magazine, and I post essays on different topics and poetry.

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CLE till I die peacefully in my sleep at the age of 86.

I gain more happiness from generating book covers and putting it to music than I do in actually writing. I’m realizing this right now for the first time as I swype this.

***

But before I die

Peacefully in my sleep

At the age of 86

I must get this out of my head

Into the world

Before my father

Age 78-79

Dies peacefully in his sleep

At the age of 90

That’s a better timeline.

The Empress of Hindostan vs. The Daughter of the Mountain

The History Herstory Ourstory

Songs of the Subcontinent

*******

While reading Wikipedia entries

About all the various intertwinings

That occurred

In between the Pilgrims and the Revolution

The “dead spot” in American History

This time period

Was the most alive period

In the history of the subcontinent

And I yearned

When I realized

That one could take a sentence

From one of these Wikipedia entries

And turn it into a movie

I wanted to be the one

To write about this

To bring it to life

It’s such a beautiful history

When you see how it’s all connected

Few know the history

And fewer still see the connection

*****

It begins with the birth

Of the one that would become

your namesake

Somewhere in between

Isfahan & Agra

Left to die

For the parents were refugees

With 3 other kids

And had just been robbed

There was no food

A child sold into slavery

By his parents

In East Africa

But it was a different kind of slavery

A man meditating

Near the Ellora caves

Long before it became UNESCO

*******

These 3 people

And their lineages

Will come together

Culminating

******

I rarely attend weddings

But on August 24th

My father’s friend’s daughter

And the next week

My brother’s wife’s sister

The last name of the former

And the first name of the latter

Combine

To create the name

Of the heroine

The final scene

Is going to be

This name

Slowly turning into the real life statue

While a song plays

The final song in the soundtrack

And the lyrics

Of this 1,000+ year old song

When translated

Start with

“O

Daughter of the Mountain

******

If I could finish

By August 23

It would be

A Great Wedding gift.

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Wow thanks for gracing us with poetry for your intro! I totally get the Cleveland devotion btw, I grew up in Columbus, Ohio so I understand the Ohio love.

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I’m living in NC. I was drawn to Substack because it reminds me of my childhood and having a Xanga blog. Plus writing is my preferred method of social media. I’m actively querying. But debating on trad vs self publishing right now.

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Best of luck on the query process! I hope you share how it goes in your writing, I’d love to follow along in your journey. Self pub could be v cool too.

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I will be providing an update once it’s a bit further along. Querying is not a fast process at all!

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Hi from Australia! I was initially drawn to Substack for Bri Lee's News & Reviews newsletter, but have since found a healthy dose of writing inspiration here. Creative things I'm working on are freelance writing for an adventure blog, developing my writing skills on Substack and to start writing a novel for funsies.

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Similar to you Noor. Writing my first novel and developing a substack. Based in uk with family in san diego, san fransisco.

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I’ve been hopping around Europe, from sipping espresso in Italy to getting my nose frozen solid in Estonia.

As for how I ended up on Substack... probably a Google rabbit hole, but honestly, I can't remeber! Anyway, I’m here happily stuck since day one.

I’m working on my first novel. I’m also writing some short crime stories and diving into the fascinating world of forensics. (No worries, it’s all for research. Mostly!)

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So glad you’re here Simone! I alway get super pumped to meet other novelists.

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I'm based in California, joined substack because it had writers I liked :) and commenting on this so that my awesome avatar is on your post 😁

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Love everything about this comment except the avatar :)

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Hi Noor! I'm writing from Madison, Wisconsin, where I live with my family. I'm writing a memoir about lessons I learned through medical training. Drawn to Substack because it gives me a chance to read like-minded people's work and a chance for me to practice writing essays outside of memoir writing.

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Very challenging! But Paris is Paris…

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Hi Noor! I also left Big Law for writing. I have worked as a lawyer and legislative advisor in Buenos Aires for almost 30 years. In 2022, I quit my job, fed up with the system, and moved to Paris to live my own literary adventure!

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Omg amazing, welcome to the club! Also I love that you moved to Paris for this adventure, it has always been my secret fantasy to write novels from Paris cafes. Sounds so lovely.

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I'm based in the greater Boston area. I'm a writer and English teacher. I'm using Substack as an outlet to write - while teaching, I'm always cooking across ideas regarding literature that I don't get to fully flesh out, but this is the exact platform that will let me do so. And eventually I'm hopeful it will help spring board me back into fiction writing.

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I am a singer. I do gospel music particularly. I have a YouTube channel for my music (youtube.com/channel/UC-czIUoCkZe7Ut46NNoxUPQ?sub_confirmation=1). The reason I started this Substack profile was to have a newsletter for my subscribers (and potential ones). Since joining Substack, it's been a beautiful experience of learning a whole lot from great people like you.

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