Some good—no, great—news on the writing front: I’ve been awarded a writing grant by the Manitoba Arts Council.
The project I’ll be working on is a novella, titled “Palimpsests”[1]Working title; I’m also considering “Dried Flowers”, about a woman living in a library where all the books are slowly erasing themselves. She has a companion who tries their best to rewrite the erased works, with varying levels of success. She’s also haunted by strange dreams.
Eight works are featured in the story, some based on real-world books[2]Not quite a roman à clef, but perhaps a roman de romans à clef, hein?, others wholly invented.
I’d been working on the project back in the summer—it was one of the pieces I was dealing with during my writing retreat—but when I submitted the grant paperwork in mid-October, I quite deliberately pushed it to the back of the queue.
Now it’s come back to the front, of course. I got word on Friday afternoon about the grant, and as I write this—Saturday evening—I’ve got the 8 palimpsests selected, with thumbnail notes about the new text. I’ve had some inspirations about the rest of the story too, the world June (the hero) has left, the world she’s living in now, and the world she visits in her dreams.
I’m excited. This has the potential to be a very good story. It won’t be easy to write, and I don’t intend to make it easy to read. Good luck to us all.
In other good writin’ news: The good stuff is now available in my province. In my city, in fact.
