Welcome

Welcome to The Guy Who Wrote That Thing, the blog of Alva J. Roberts.

I have been writing on and off (mostly off) for a long time. I kept writing a novel. Not more than one, the same novel over and over. The farthest I ever got was Chapter 3.

But then in the summer of 2008 I decided I would write and just keep writing until it was finished. It was finished in May of 2009, it was horrible. But I hear most first novels are, and I am hoping some major editing down the road might make it a little better. (Notice that I don't say that it will make it good, at this point I think that might be impossible)

I began writing another novel almost immedately. I had set myself a writing schedule (the last 2 hours of the day before bed), and found that I was having trouble sleeping if I didn't write.

I found that some nights I just don't want to write in my novel. It was one of these nights that I found a short story I had written, for the Writer's Digest annual fiction contest. At the time it was the only short story I had. I decided to send it in to a publisher.

That was when I discovered Duotrope's Digest. I sent in that story, Goblin Errant and it was rejected(until I sent it Bards & Sages) , but I also found various themed anthologies.The idea of themed anthologies was great. They were like a writing prompt.

Now just a few months later I have seven stories accepted for publication, ten I am waiting for a response on and 52,000 words of a novel.