Hello, empty room.

It’s been more than two years since my last update. If you, occasional passer-by, thought that this website and associated projects were dead, you’ll be forgiven for thinking so. There was a time, last year, when I thought everything was dead. But that’s not the case. Let’s call it apparent death for all intents and purposes.

I’m starting to grow tired of the term Project

Today online everything seems to be a project. It’s become an umbrella term for anything, from artworks to app development, from business endeavours to, well, writing fiction.

Is Minigrooves a project? In the sense of proposed or planned undertaking, maybe it is. The original idea was to write a series of books of short stories. Minigrooves is a term I’ve used to refer to the series as a whole, but also to each story. Each short story with its particular mood and character, is a minigroove.

Minigrooves is also this website, which I originally created as a means to introduce prospective readers to my books and to myself as an author, keeping things separate from my main website, which is more technology-oriented.

In the Minigrooves series, I have published two volumes of short stories so far. The only updates one can reasonably expect on this front are related to a possible Volume 3. And about this, I have unfortunately little to say. At the moment, it’s all still in the ‘taking notes’ stage. I’ve considered the idea of giving Volume 3 an underlying theme, and writing a few short stories that follow this theme. I’ve written down a few ideas so far, and that’s it.

Writing is hard, especially when it’s not the only thing on your mind

I felt the need to clarify this, because over the past two years or so I’ve received the occasional email from people asking about ‘updates’ regarding Minigrooves as if it was something unfinished. Technically, it’s not. Minigrooves is not a blog that ‘needs updates’. It’s a series of books. Writing takes time. Maybe you’re thinking of certain prolific writers you know and love, writers who publish a novel every year, and so you can’t conceive it’s taking me more than 5 years to come up with a third volume of short stories.

Alas, I wish I could devote all my time to writing fiction. But I have a day job as freelance translator, and over the past two years it has become increasingly demanding. I spend a lot of time looking at a screen, reading and translating stuff I sometimes care little about (content-wise) but I must care about to carry out my job properly and professionally. It’s a process that drains a considerable amount of time and energies. So, when I finally have some free time, the idea of spending it looking at a screen, reading and writing — even if it’s something I deeply care about — makes me weary.

I thought I could take advantage of the first months of hard lockdown when the Covid-19 pandemic hit in the first quarter of 2020, but I ended up working more, and given the whole situation, to avoid a terrible burnout, I said to myself that all leisure time left at the end of a day or at the end of a week had to be spent relaxing. I was having a creative block anyway, so I decided to take it easy as a coping mechanism, to stay sane.

Sometimes a creative block works like insomnia. You cannot sleep, so you stay in bed, trying to sleep so hard, trying to shut down your brain so hard, that you end up even more awake and sleepless than before. Similarly, when you’re trying to write new material and the inspiration doesn’t come, forcing its hand is (in my experience) unwise. Often the result is just more frustration and a poor draft.

“Three years of creative block, man.”

It’s a drag, but since I started writing fiction 30 years ago, I’ve seen worse. This time, I’m doing my best to deal with this through a ‘zen’ approach. I’m trying not to overthink the whole situation. I’m waiting for inspiration to strike again. I just can’t write anything good when I’m uninspired — it’s as simple as that.

But in this state of wait, I’ve become crazily perceptive. Every time an idea worth noting comes to me, I quickly write it down. I have tactical paper notebooks for all my ongoing projects (sigh, that word again), and during this period of creative drought I kept adding notes to each and every one of them. There are signals. There is work going on in the background — this is the important thing — but it being in the background means that on the surface the landscape appears frozen and barren.

So, about the ongoing projects:

• Off the Grid series (What is Off the Grid?): I’m still working on Episode 06 – Exposed in the light, and have written about 60% of it so far. As I wrote in the previous entry on this site, I’ve definitely not abandoned the series, especially because of its connections with my main novel, Low Fidelity.
• The Ian Charles Winterman series: I’m still writing the fourth story, and my plan is to write at least two more stories and publish the series as an ebook.
• Low Fidelity: Currently writing Chapter 25 of the 32 I originally planned. I honestly don’t have an estimate on when the novel will be finished. I’d really love if I could finish it by the end of 2021. This is the work in progress that’s been in progress the longest, and it’s the one I care about the most. I want it to succeed, because I want to write other novels set in the world of Low Fidelity.

One more thing…

Perhaps some of you remember Vantage Point? It was a compact digital magazine I published on iOS between 2014 and 2016 that worked as supplement and extension of my main website, Morrick.me. The Vantage Point Magazine reference website is still online on Tumblr, if you want to have a look at how each issue was structured and read more about the magazine. (It may contain dead links, and definitely do not try to subscribe, as the magazine is not available anymore).

After ceasing publications in 2016, most of the articles I published on Vantage Point have not been republished elsewhere; it didn’t feel fair towards my few, loyal subscribers.

I’ve never received much feedback about Vantage Point, but after reading the post-mortem I published on my main website in November 2016, a couple of people reached out and told me that, in their opinion, I was closing shop too prematurely; that it was a cool project I should consider picking up again and/or repurposing down the road.

Believe it or not, this feedback has stayed in my mind as a ‘background process’ all this time, and I’ve finally decided to… do something about Vantage Point. I still don’t know exactly in what shape, form, or medium, but I want to relaunch the magazine, possibly involving other people this time. And that is all I have to say about it for the time being.

And that is all for this long-awaited, and possibly disappointing, update.

 

---

 

The usual friendly reminder

If you like what I write, if you’ve been enjoying what little I’ve published here for free, if you appreciate my more tech-oriented musings on my main website Morrick.me, or my explorations in vintage Macs and software at System Folder; or if you just like me and want to help, consider checking out my fiction and purchase my Minigrooves short stories, or send your contribution via PayPal. It’s truly appreciated.

“The year had been a year of terror”

2018 as a whole was a terrible year for my creative writing, and for my fiction projects. I already mentioned the general lack of updates on this place and the personal reasons behind my writing struggles in the previous post, written in June 2018.

Six months ago I also wrote that, despite such struggles, I was cautiously optimistic about resuming work on my novel Low Fidelity, my short stories and series. It turned out to be a temporary spark. The occasional rain in a desert region.

About Off the Grid (What is Off the Grid?), I wrote that at the time I was “working on Episode 06 – Exposed in the light. It should be published here soon”. At the moment, that Episode still needs to be finished. I’ve definitely not abandoned the series, especially because of its connections with my main novel.

About The Ian Charles Winterman series, I wrote that at the time I was “working on the fourth [story], and I plan to republish the series here and in a more portable ebook format”. Much like Off the Grid‘s Episode 06, that fourth story in the Ian Charles Winterman series is still in the making. Again, my plans about this project haven’t changed. They’re just delayed.

Everything’s been delayed.

The ghost pressure trap

Writing and publishing online, especially in recent years, tends to be an endeavour that’s riddled with performance anxiety. Often, the pressure to push new material out there is quite strong. Slow pace and periods of silence mean losing whatever little and fleeting attention you’ve managed to get so far. This is already a dreadful feeling when you’re, say, writing a tech blog. With creative projects it’s even worse.

I know what you’re thinking — long-term writing projects, such as a novel or a series of stories, inherently have a very different pace than a tech blog; one cannot be expected to be creative with the same effectiveness every day, nor is one expected to advance more complex projects like these on a daily basis and provide readers with new stuff every day. And it’s true, absolutely true. But things get complicated when you self-publish and when you do everything yourself — the writing, the editing, the proofreading, the book designing, the publishing, the advertising.

Gaining (and maintaining!) a readership in this scenario is hard, no matter how good or experienced a writer you are. You find yourself in a situation where you feel you’re expected to deliver something on a somewhat regular basis, but you can’t because your creative writing develops at a completely different pace in a completely different fashion than writing, say, tech articles. And when you simply can’t produce anything substantial — for lack of inspiration, concentration, energy, time — this ends up hurting with double the intensity.

You feel you’re going nowhere. You look at your unfinished writings and ask yourself What am I doing here? Where is this going? And what’s worse is that these very feelings of aimlessness and self-doubt create a vicious circle, in turn affecting your inspiration and creativity.

But this is also largely ‘ghost’ pressure. I describe it this way because what you perceive as ‘external pressure’ under these circumstances isn’t actually external. It comes from within, it’s something you create, which is totally unnecessary. Or rather, it could be useful as a sort of self-discipline mechanism (you have set your goals, you have made plans, now stick to them!), but guessing the right dose isn’t trivial at all. It gets toxic quickly. It can be paralysing. And it’s what has been happening to me these past months. And it’s what has also made me very angry with myself, because I should know better.

What’s next

My plan for this year is simple: to publish things when they are ready, and to make people more aware of what I have already produced while I’m preparing new materials. I also need to avoid the urge of making estimates when it comes to future releases. I’m just awful at it. Worse, I create expectations I might not fulfil, and that ultimately disappoints everybody.

I definitely need to escape the ghost pressure trap, even when I actually receive the occasional email from people who apparently urge me to publish ‘new stuff’ while bizarrely conceding they haven’t read much of what I have already published.

Another idea I’ve had for this space specifically is to use it not only to publish free-to-read pieces of fiction, but also to share the occasional writing-related musings or commentary.

As for my ongoing projects, while at the moment I honestly don’t know when I’ll manage to finish and publish Episode 06 of Off the Grid or the fourth Ian Charles Winterman story, I know that fully realising the nature of my creative rut has already helped me to calm down and collect my thoughts. Another recent happy accident while writing the latest chapter of Low Fidelity led to a truly eureka moment which had the very positive effect of painting a clearer picture of where the general narrative is going, while energising me in the process. This makes me hopeful, as similar moments in the past usually led to richer, more inspired, and therefore more prolific phases.

To those who are still out there listening to what I have to say and reading my fiction, thank you. Thank you so much.

To conclude, the usual reminder

If you like what I write, if you’ve been enjoying what little I’ve published here for free, if you appreciate my more tech-oriented musings on my main website Morrick.me, or my explorations in vintage Macs and software at System Folder; or if you just like me and want to help, consider checking out my fiction and purchase my Minigrooves short stories, or send your contribution via PayPal. Or just spread the word. It helps a lot and I truly appreciate it. Thanks again!

A full year has passed since I last updated this place.

Not that it ever had this overwhelming crowd of regular visitors — this is certainly not the kind of site you check every day — but I thought it was time to write an update for the people out there who appreciate my writing and my fiction in particular.

It’s been a rough year

The loss of my father in November 2017 was devastating for me. Apart from an early period of intense prolificness, my creative inspiration and output have always been of an ebb-and-flow nature. In the months preceding my dad’s passing, this creative tide had already begun to ebb, and that terrible event just froze everything — I was unable to write a single line of fiction for a few months. Despite the physical distance between us, his presence contributed a lot to my internal balance as a person. Despite his worsening health, I kept feeling protected, in a sense. Like when you’re away on a mission, but you know someone trustworthy is holding the fort, literally and figuratively. So you can afford not to worry about a certain subset of things and can focus on other worries.

His passing created a huge void and had a generally destabilising effect on me. Now there was this pounding, pulsating grief for his loss; now there was this new set of things to take care of and worry about (helping my mother, first and foremost, since she isn’t in good shape either), on top of the usual everyday stuff that brings worry and stress.

In this picture, my inspiration basically flatlined — there was suddenly no time for creative writing, but more importantly no time to even think about something to write, ideas for short stories, ideas to move forward with Low Fidelity or any of my smaller series like Off the Grid or Ian Charles Winterman. According to a timeline I had drawn in early 2017, I should have already published Minigrooves Vol. 3. The truth is, I’ve only jotted down a rough draft of the first short story.

The flow returns

Little by little, in recent weeks, I’ve felt my creative juices come back. Nothing spectacular, but way better than nothing at all. I have tried to force my way back into my own different writing projects by re-reading a lot of previously-written material, to rekindle the connection with my works, revisit characters and plots, and situations left hanging.

Current projects: an overview

Low Fidelity — (What is Low Fidelity?) The first book of the series is almost over. I’m writing Chapter 25 of the planned 32, but it’s not a fixed number, and if the story reaches the point I want it to reach in fewer chapters, so be it. I’ve stopped trying to make predictions and promises, but hopefully the book will be published within the next months, and before the end of the year. My intention is to publish it on the Apple Books and Amazon platforms, like my Minigrooves short stories, but I would also like to produce a traditional paper edition. If you know of affordable online services for this kind of operation, do let me know.

Minigrooves Vol. 3 — I have no idea when it will come out. The short story is still my favourite, congenial format of creative writing, and when I’m inspired it typically doesn’t take too long for me to write a bunch of stories. Realistically, though, I don’t expect to publish Volume 3 before 2019. At this moment, my science fiction novel Low Fidelity has precedence. For Volume 3 I’m exploring the possibility of writing a series of short stories based on a common theme.

Off the Grid — (What is Off the Grid?) I’m currently working on Episode 06 – Exposed in the light. It should be published here soon.

The Ian Charles Winterman series — This is a series of short stories that focus on the character of Ian Charles Winterman, a consultant detective with a unique gift — a sort of heightened perceptiveness that allows him to have special insights and intuitions, and help the police force specifically in cases of abductions and missing persons.

Ian Charles Winterman is first introduced in a much shorter story, The Vanished, that appeared on Volume 2 of Minigrooves. I wrote The Vanished in March 2014, and initially it was just one of the different stories that would be included in the second volume of Minigrooves, but then I liked the premise and the characters, and started thinking about a whole series of cases involving Winterman. The first three stories were featured in ‘Single Special’ issues of my digital magazine, Vantage Point, which I produced between 2014 and 2016. I’m currently working on the fourth, and I plan to republish the series here and in a more portable ebook format.

Consider supporting my writing

This past year and a half has been a struggle, and morale has suffered. I know that today, unless you give frequent updates and showcase a generally prolific output, it doesn’t seem like you’re producing that much. But just because my first two books of short stories have been published in 2013 and 2016 respectively, it doesn’t mean they’re ‘old’. If you like what I write, if you’ve been enjoying what little I’ve published here for free, if you appreciate my more tech-oriented musings on my main website Morrick.me, or my explorations in vintage Macs and software at System Folder; or if you just like me and want to help, consider checking out my fiction and purchase my Minigrooves short stories, or send your contribution via PayPal. It’s truly appreciated.