MY PATH TO PUBLICATION
The debut author of The Funny Thing About Norman Foreman thought she was writing a different novel until this guy called Norman turned up...
Julietta Henderson
‘What makes a writer? To be a writer there’s really only one pre-requisite: you just have to write. Well that’s something I’ve definitely never had a problem with, because writing is my day job as well as my creative outlet.
‘Most of my “bread and butter” work comprises writing content and marketing material for websites, real estate copywriting, corporate work and (my favourite!) travel writing, so for years I never had enough time or energy to devote to writing a whole book. (Disclosure: that’s a damn lie, but it’s called procrastination and I’m excellent at it.) Because, as any freelancer will tell you, it’s very hard to say no to work when you have no idea where your next month’s income is coming from.
“After stop-starting on fragments of
a novel for years in the background, I
realised that what I was lacking wasn’t
really time, it was accountability.”
‘But after stop-starting on fragments of a novel for years in the background, I realised that what I was lacking wasn’t really time, it was accountability. I needed a push, so I applied for and was accepted on to the inaugural Curtis Brown three-month online writing course, on the basis of the first three chapters of my then novel-in-progress.