William Meikle's Blog: Latest - Posts Tagged "writing"

I’ve been reflecting on my writing career so far as I rapidly approach my sixtieth birthday in January.

There have been many ups and downs over the years, but back when I started out in early 1992, if I’d been offered the publications I now have, I’d have sold my soul for them.

When I first started, all I wanted was to see my name in print. That was fine for a few years. I placed a whole shitload of stories in the small press for just a copy or two of the publications. I got quite cozy down there before I realized I wasn’t actually getting anywhere.

So then I wanted to get paid. Then I wanted a pro-rate story sale, then a novel sale, then a sale in a pro anthology, then a story collection…in hardcover… then I wanted to go full time… and lo and behold, it has all come to pass, and more, especially in the last 5 years. ( I also wanted to sell a film script to Hollywood – but let’s not go there. Okay? )

There’s still things I want to achieve – a story in one or more of the Year’s Best anthologies, a mass market book deal, a luxury yacht so I can just sail round the world all the time – that kind of thing. Some of them might even be achievable.

I recently sold my 80th pro-rate short story. Now I’m wondering whether 100 is feasible. Given that 25 years ago I was wondering whether 1 was feasible, I guess I’m doing something right.

But it’s in the nature of the beast that I’m never satisfied, always looking ahead to the next gold ring. ( I also get jealous of some of my fellow writers. Shush… don’t tell them.)

This past eighteen months has seen a necessary realignment for me with both Dark Renaissance and DarkFuse going out of business, bringing with that a load of stress I could have done without.

But the orphans are rehomed, and the new babies have also been adopted, so today I again decided to count my blessings and look at what I’ve achieved. I can’t quite say I’m content… but I’m happy.

For now, that’ll do.

In the meantime, I’ve got new and old works coming from Crossroad Press, a novella in the big I AM THE ABYSS antho from Dark Regions, a new collection, THE GHOST CLUB coming from Crystal Lake, a big bug novel, and another novel to write coming with Severed Press, I'm in discussions about a collection, and I’ve got a large secret project in the works that's two-thirds of the way done. So it looks like I’m busy for a while longer.

Onward and upwards.

To infinity and beyond.

William Meikle

Old stories, new words
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Newfoundland and Me
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I'm back...

Late last summer I didn't feel well, took myself to the docs... and later that day found myself in hospital. I had a gall stone, a big, nasty one.

But that's not the subject of this horror story...

While treating me for the stone, they also discovered I had liver cancer... a tumor, a huge tumor, on over half of my liver. I had an op to try to remove the gall stone. That failed. Another op a few days later also failed so they decided the stone would have to stay where it was and I needed a bile duct bypass. I also needed something done about the liver...

Three weeks after being admitted I was sent home with a bile-drain in to wait for a date for the big surgery...

Finally got that arranged and on 16th November went in for surgery.

I was on the table for over ten hours (the surgeon was knackered by the end of it). They cut me open from between my nipples down to above my right hip and got to work. They cut out fifty percent of my liver and bypassed my bile duct. When I came to I had a lot of pain and an enormous scar, but was told I was on the mend. After a week recovering I was sent home.

Ten days later I felt ill again. Back to the docs, and got rushed to ER...the surgical wound had got infected. They drained 3 pints of noxious puss out of my body, pumped me full of antibiotics, left a drain in to keep the puss from building up... and again I started recovering.

Another week later I got home, in time for a quiet Xmas.

It's been slow going since then but I'm now a lot better. Had a chat with the surgeon last week, the puss-drain finally came out, and a CAT Scan showed they I'm all clear... they got all the tumor and my liver is healing nicely.

All of which is a long winded way of saying I haven't been doing any writing for the past six months, but this week I got back in the chair.

The only way is up...

A short reading from THE PLASM by me

https://lnkd.in/egXiw87Q

Just completed an overhaul of the site... a lot of back end stuff. There's new graphics for all my book / headers adverts to complement new covers for all the chapbook collection, and a general tidying up of things throughout.

The site is coming up for 30 years old soon and has seen nearly as many changes as I have myself over the time :-)

https://www.williammeikle.com





William Meikle

Featured Book of the Month: BERSERKER

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Berserker