Iskander: Blog

Warning: some early chapter spoilers in this post

In Through my Eyes. Again. the protagonist, Will, has been physically abused by his father since he was six years old. It is clear that whilst not approving of the violence, Will's mother is compliant for some complex of reasons. The story depicts only one more such abusive incident, when Will's father slaps him so hard he is thrown across the kitchen. Will's reaction to this causes his mother to move to stop the abuse, but Will's fear and distrust naturally remains and colours his actions into the future.

As is common for first novels, there are elements of autobiography in Will's story, but these are more seeds, starting places from which the story grew. My relationship with my father is one of those seeds and I have certainly had my own struggles arising from childhood stuff over the years as a result.

There is no tag for 'child abuse' at SOL and in writing my story I did not think about how that content might affect people who have been victims of child abuse - and it is clear that my story is stirring things up for some people. I was aware that the story elements involving suicide could well be problematic for some readers and so I explicitly warned about these.

But I did not think through what drove Will towards suicide and how that alone could be difficult for some people.

Authors inevitably deal with difficult subjects - to some extent, this is part of the remit of storytelling: to bring dark subjects into the light and to subject them to examination through the medium of a story. I certainly did not have this as an aim when I started writing, but now see I have blundered into this.

I hope that Will's story is helpful to those people who had had abusive childhoods and perhaps also to people now close to them.

If my story causes difficult thoughts, please seek professional help.

So - should I have warned about the child abuse? I don't know - perhaps the 'blurb' should have included a warning about this element. But one of the wondrous things about a story is that each person reading it reads a different version, coloured by their lives and their experiences which they bring to the words on the paper (or screen).

And that makes content warnings hard.

This weekend I posted chapter 7 of TMEA here on SOL (with chapter 8 on my Patreon), so I thought, as we approach half-way, I might update people on the progress of the entire story.

Chapter 15 is complete with chapter 16 about 50% complete. At this stage, I'm not quite sure if the story will be 17 or 18 chapters long. I have everything sketched, but as the fine detail is added to these bones things can happen - that's author-speak for the characters grabbing the story and twisting things.

That said, I am hoping to finish the writing this month - only two months behind my original schedule, which is amazing as at one point in chapter 11 I was blocked with no visible way to get to where I thought I was going. However, after re-reading things and a bit of judicious editing of one character's back story I was able to move forward.

So, please keep reading and voting - and thank you for the comments and emails that have been interesting and at times very humbling to read.

A reader enjoying TMEA emailed me, musing on whether a story with minimal sex belonged on SOL. In order to explain why TMEA is here, I need to cover a bit of ground - so please bear with me.

As readers of this blog know, this is my first 'public' attempt at storytelling - I have been toying with writing ideas for most of my life (including my childhood). But there was always something else more important in my life and, to be truthful, I was never satisfied with what I wrote - particularly the dialogue. So, many horribly executed ideas died, writhing on the floor.

I have talked about writing on many occasions with my daughter (a published author of fiction) and she has encouraged me to try writing many times. Finally last year, inspired in part by reading the first draft of my daughter's latest novel, I started writing Through my Eyes. Again.

I had a first scene, a couple of (I hoped interesting) 'hooks' and an ending. This left a yawning chasm in the middle that I hoped would become clearer as I wrote. I had read how one author here on SOL whose work I deeply respect had started what turned out to be a brilliant trilogy with almost no plan - so whilst I was uneasy, I pressed on.

As I wrote, I was also considering what, if any, sexual/erotic content would be right for the story. The protagonist and storyteller is a strange amalgam of a teen with all the knowledge and experience of a seventy-year-old layered on top of the hormonal surges and almost-adult rebellion and struggles of teendom. The story is also set in middle-class England in the early 1960s - which was far more sexually constrained than you may have read. So, I decided that minimal sex was probably where this story belonged.

So why is TMEA here on SOL?

You may have gathered that I am a bit insecure about my writing: I really needed feedback so that I had some measure of its merit or otherwise and perhaps some constructive criticism. Thinking about what I have read here on SOL, the stories that have appealed most to me generally have limited (or no) sexual content and yet those stories have been highly rated by the readers here. So I knew that stories with minimal sex could do well here - in other words, if I posted TMEA here and it received a low rating I would know my writing sucked, hopefully also with some comments that would provided guidance should I make another attempt.

So, there you have it.

Finally, thank you to all of you who are reading, providing feedback by voting and for the occasional comments: it seems that my writing does not suck, but is some distance from the level of the authors here on SOL that I respect. Please continue reading and please provide as much constructive criticism as you have time for - or just vote!

It's been pointed out that chapter 4, posted earlier this weekend, is rather short. Coming in at only 2500 words, it is the shortest chapter in the book and about half the size of most chapters.

I must admit that I don't watch chapter size as I write, rather it is the story that drives chapter length. Looking at the chapters to come, it seems that there is a definite trend for chapter size to increase as the book progresses - one chapter is nearly 7000 words.

I think that 'even chapter sizes' may have become the norm as a result of stories being published as serials in magazines. For example, The Sherlock Holmes stories were published as a serial in the Strand (monthly) magazine.

Be that as it may, TMEA chapters vary somewhat in length.

Following the recent posting of Chapter 3 of Through my Eyes. Again. it was pointed out to me that the profile link to my Discord discussion channel was not working. I have fixed this problem - the new link in my profile will not expire, so I hope to see you there if you want to provide me with feedback. Apologies.