Saturday, July 11, 2015

My Free Upcoming Novelette: The Origin of Letters to God

Assalamualaikum and greetings dear Bits and Pieces readers,

We bound to feel intense emotion at some point in our life. The feeling of elation when we get married, outrage when we experience betrayal, or anguish when our most beloved pass away. These feelings lead to two extremes which is either intoxication or death. And Letters to God is mostly born from the latter extreme.

I sat quietly in my room one day, pondering on the gloomy events of my life. I'd imagine how much more severe things can turn out; and the choices I have if they indeed become reality. One of the few options that I have is to give up. But giving up itself has many definitions; walk away, sink into depression, ignore reality, or taking ones own life. However in my religion Islam, giving up is abhorred. And this is where ALLAH gave me an idea for a story.

      
Thus I began to ponder further. What pushes a person to the point where suicide was the only option left? For a religious person, how come s(he) was able to defy God by not valuing life and be thankful of it?

I come to realise that I'm stepping into the realm of psychology which I have zero knowledge in. Despite the fact that info dumping is taboo in the realm of fiction writing, adequate knowledge is still needed to make a story appear realistic. With almost all efforts used to finish my Doctoral degree on time, I am certain that I can't spare time for another research area. On top of that, studying all religions in existence can be overwhelming (in fact I have much to learn about Islam). Also to be honest, the story can be a bore if not written artfully.

I almost gave up on the story before ALLAH inspired me again. Instead of a novel, why not a novelette? This way, I can create a fast pace story and a surface knowledge of psychology is all that I need. Since I'm more familiar with the major religions in Malaysia, I decide to focus on that. One downfall is that the study of religions can take years. Therefore I must admit that Letters to God won't do justice to some religions.

I refuse to take that as a setback though. Besides, my story is fiction and no story is perfect. So I switched on my laptop and started writing. Now and then, I would pause and browse the internet for real suicide stories and religious talks on the issue.

At present however, Letters to God is at a stand still. I'm suffering from writer's block and due to my P.h.D requirements, I am forced to take a short break from writing fiction. But be sure, I am never going to give up...ever!



No comments:

Post a Comment