This is where I’ll be at 3pm on Friday 25 August. It’s the Spiegeltent at the Edinburgh International Book Festival and I’ll be reading my short story, The Priest and the Snow Bear.
Each day during the book festival a different emerging writer reads a story as part of Story Shop, a showcase organised by Edinburgh City of Literature.
I wasn’t sure about the word emerging. After all, I’ve been here (or hereabouts) for nearly 59 years, and I’ve been writing for 14 of those years. However, when I looked up the definition I changed my mind. Emerging means:
become known, become apparent, become evident, be revealed, come to light, come out, come to the fore, enter the picture, unfold
I like those!
Story Shop feels like the beginning of something; it’s the first time since I started sending out submissions that I’ve got an acceptance. It’s a great confidence boost.
And it’s a lovely process – two social events, a workshop with a professional voice coach and text and audio recording of the stories on the City of Literature Website.
Lots of people have said they’ll come along to hear me read, which is also lovely, and another confidence boost.
Now just let’s hope the voice coach can teach me to speak like a bear…
Rookie Author 