As a new writer, getting published was a lifelong dream. I suppose it’s the same for most writers starting out in their writing career.
On that note, kindly indulge me while I take you down memory lane to how I became a published writer, locally and internationally. For starters, I have always known that my writing was fit for a much larger audience than my family. Call it a sixth sense, but for the longest time, I knew that I had something to say. Something that the whole world needed to hear.
I still have fond memories of my first published piece of writing. A poem that took me a little over a week to write — all ten lines of it — and how I excitedly sent it off to the small poetry group in the community I was living in at the time. You see, this poetry group had called for applications for poems of any size and any topic of choice. I remember pondering on what to write for over a month before summoning the courage to sit down and put pen to paper. My excitement for the rest of that week reached an overflowing stage when I received the email that begins with that word every writer wants to see at some point: “Congratulations.” All of this was some seventeen years ago. And the rest like they say is history.
Not too long after that success, I started penning short stories because I realized that I expressed myself better in prose (my winning poem remains the only poem I’ve written to date). Moreover, my preference for reading novels after they began to affect my lyrical creative ability. And the more I read, the more I was eager to tell my own stories. There and then, a storyteller was born.
Another aha moment similar to my “poetic” success happened exactly 7 years later. I had written over a dozen short stories over the years, some published, and others not so good for publication. But this particular 2500-words short story had stayed with me for some time, and I had wanted to use it to “test” the waters on the international stage. So, I entered it for a continental short story competition. When it emerged the winning story out of over fifty other beautiful short stories across the continent, one thing was clear – I was ready for the world stage. Spurred on by this win as a sign of my readiness for international publishing, I developed the short story into a full novel manuscript. Thus, Born in a House of Glass was birthed.
So, what does it take to be an international writer? For me, it takes nothing more than authenticity and belief in your creative abilities enough to share what you know with the rest of the world. Because, trust me, the world might be big and wide, and made up of different people, yet we are somehow living the same lives. Every story matters.
Chinenye Emezie's short stories and essays have appeared in Africa Book Club, Kalahari Review, Book Lovers Hangout, and Opinion Nigeria. She is the 2013 winner of the Africa Book Club Short Story Competition. Born in a House of Glass is her first novel. Born in Nigeria, she currently resides in Richmond Hill, Ontario. Learn more here.