As I write this, I’m kind of hoping that atleast a few of my friends on the blogosphere might have, over the course of the previous month (Nov), wondered briefly, as to where I’d vanished.
Friends, fellow bloggers and bloggerati , a few words of caution – What follows is a somewhat long winded explanation of my disappearing act.
First of all, this happened…
Which led to the launch of the book ,”Write India Stories“, and marked my debut as a published author!
And then , BAM, comes this ….
That was my second time being published!
And just when I thought, my cup of happiness was brimming over and couldn’t hold another drop, comes THIS!
I could actually depart for heaven today and not be bothered too much about it! For that is how elated I am right now!
The WRITE INDIA FINALE:
The culmination of WRITE INDIA Season I – a year long, Nationwide Short Story competition, organised by the Times Of India group, was nothing short of SPECTACULAR! It was only to be expected, for this initiative was the first of its kind, where 11 of India’s Bestselling Authors came together in an attempt to discover new writing talent. The idea itself, the brainchild of Ms Vinita Nangia (Associate Editor TOI & Write India Director) was flawlessly executed by her enthusiastic team ( Gunjan Verma, Kalpana Sharma and Surabhi Rawat) and elicited an amazing response.
With over 30000 entries pouring in over a period of 11 months, I can only imagine the kind of hours the Write India Team would have put in sorting, reading, re-reading and shortlisting the winning entries! And such was the success of the Write India campaign that people were actually left high and dry when it ended, and couldn’t wait for the second season to be launched! I don’t think anything this phenomenal has happened to the Indian writing community in ages!
And if winning Season I wasn’t reason enough for me to rejoice, there was this very interesting Write India Workshop and a star-studded , dazzling Grand finale in Mumbai, that had me struck dumb…
The Write India workshop was great fun with interactive sessions dissecting the very art of story telling – the actual processes involved, the technical aspects of structuring a story, fleshing out of characters, language, narrative styles and other nuances. The sessions were deftly handled by Mr.Dipankar Mukherji ( of Readomania fame) , with Ms Madhuri Bannerji (Best selling author and columnist) , Mr.Mahendra Jakhar ( Author of ‘The Butcher of Benares’ and Screenplay writer) and finally, the Man, the Bankster – Mr.Ravi Subramaniam, himself giving us valuable insights into the writing and publishing world.
Mr.Ravi Subramaniam’s session really stood out as he painted a vivid picture of the publishing industry, sprinkled with liberal doses of juicy anecdotes! We really couldn’t get enough of him!! . Rather than glossing over the facts (which would have been easier) he chose to give us honest facts, figures and numbers. The facts , although a tad grim, made us ‘newbies’ more aware of the stark realities of the industry.
The workshop in addition to being extremely rewarding made me realise a couple of things:
-That an author, even a Bestselling one at that , could be warm and down-to-earth . Mr.Ravi Subramaniam, totally shattered the preconceived notions that many of us had about Bestselling authors, as such.
-That friendship that starts online can evolve offline. People who had been mere names and photographs on Facebook and Social media, after the workshop, suddenly turned out to be remarkable real-life friends with whom I found that I shared much in common. So happy to have connected with the other winners and co-authors… The very fact that we continue to be regularly in touch over our Whatsapp group, ‘The Write India Family’, as we fondly call it, goes on to prove that online friendship can actually evolve into ‘real’ friendship!
The Grand Finale was held at the spectacular St Regis Mumbai.( I think I need to write an entire blog post on how gorgeous the place looked!) It was a splendid affair, one of its kind, really, with 9 of the 11 Bestselling authors flying down especially for the Book Launch.
With so many celebrity authors in the same room as me, just a few feet away, talking,laughing and interacting with one and all; It wasn’t at all surprising that I was hyperventilating ,for most part of the event!
It was especially gratifying to meet Jaishri Misra Ma’am, who chose my story as the winning entry for her passage . A down-to-earth,warm person, who had a lot of encouraging words to say about my story. (I really couldn’t have asked for a better mentor!)
My journey with Write India is something that I shall cherish forever. At the risk of sounding clichéd, let me say this – Even if I hadn’t hit jackpot with any of my stories , I still would have been pretty much pleased with myself, for Write India taught me that I cared about the art of writing a lot more than winning.
So winning or losing wouldn’t have made much of a difference, because by the end of those eleven months, I was so neck-deep into writing, that I simply couldn’t stop!
Then came the second book launch of the month – “Mock,Stalk&Quarrel“ – This was yet again a crowd sourced collection of satirical short stories, that emanated from a nationwide short story completion by Readomania. 29 voices – indulgent, tolerant, amusing, sarcastic and witty – form a part of this collection. You really should check it out sometime.
My confidence at having my stories published in two brilliant anthologies, made me a bit ambitious . I had at some point decided that that buckling down to pen a full fledged novel wasn’t exactly my cup of tea. But then it struck me, what is life if you didn’t challenge yourself? How long can someone possibly bask in the aftermath of achieving a milestone? Shouldn’t one be moving forward and tackling newer challenges?
I had succeeded in taking the leap from being an amateur writer to a published author, so why not go on to the next level and see if there was much more than a couple of stories in me?
And so, I took the NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) plunge and attempted to bring out that first draft of the novel that I’d been wanting to write forever, but never had the courage or conviction to do so.. And I’m so glad I did. Although today, my novel is far from complete and might even end up getting nowhere, it shall remain a testimony to the fact that I tried… And that means a lot to me.
In the words of Paulo Coelho, “When you really want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.” .
Well, It happened with me and I’m sure it WILL happen to you.
Let me just sign off on that parting note, before I get all emotional.
Over and out.
Great Ramya. I thought I was aware why you were absent from the blogosphere. But I knew of only one reason. But you had a Triple Jackpot. 🙂
Hearty congratulations for achieving so many things in such a short span of time. I am sure, this would be a month to remember and I am also sure that this is only a start for bigger things to come.
All the best for your journey. 🙂
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Thank you so much Rajaram.. It has indeed been an eventful month! Hoping to get back to blogging pretty soon…
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Ramya, this is awesome ! I remember you telling me about the Novel when we met ! Heartiest congratulations and all the very best for your future endeavors ! I can’t stop smiling 🙂
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Thank you so much Vasanthi.. I was just thinking about you the other day and what fun it was meeting and interacting with the celebrity authors and other acquaintances who were up until then, just FB profiles and pics!! It was a memorable evening indeed!
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Such a happy post. Congratulations on all the well deserved victories and experiences. Hoping to read your books soon 🙂
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Thank you so much Preeti!!
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Congrats on winning. So happy for you.
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Thank you, Jean! I’m hoping that you will try and read the book sometime… It really is a brilliant collection of short stories,that I’m sure you will love 🙂
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So so so so sooooooo proud of you, but you already know that! 🙂
Privileged to have known you and shared this dream of yours much much before the rest of the world knew about it 😉 ❤
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Also, can I ask you you to please sign the copies I will buy? 🙂
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Wow Ramya! 👏 👏 👏 A hat trick 🙂 Super cool!!! Congratulations and all the very best for your novel as well. Strike while the iron is hot! I was wondering where you were and knew about the Write India jig of course but this is superrr se bhi bahut bahut upar 😀 Keep up the good work – look forward to reading the anthology. I tried searching for it on Amazon but didnt manage to get it. What’s the name of the book?
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Thank you so much Dahlia! I have added a hyperlink to Amazon in the name of the book and it’s picture in the above post… Do let me know if it isn’t working for you… Shall resend the link..
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Got it thanks – but i think i will wait for the kindle edition. I hope they are planning to release that soon as well?
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Oh yeah I’m sure they will.. But it might be a while… Will keep you posted, for sure 🙂
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🙂
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