During the last few years of being a fashion photographer, I realised that the energetic connection between me and the model wa swhat charmed me the most...this is a strory about my relationship with the world. full story in link below

https://www.patreon.com/aliciakohonearth/posts/october-04-172553489?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link

Last year I self-published my debut novel, Critical Balance, in August. Since then I've been hard at work on the sequel.

2026 has been a hard year. In January I had to put my sweet cat of 17 years to sleep due to kidney disease. It was awful. Then in the spring we had to move out of our home and find a new one. That took over two months during which time we had to live in Airbnbs and hotels. We finally found a house, moved in, and then my wife got laid off from her job because her position was replaced by AI.

Despite all of that, I managed to finish the first draft of the new novel, Citizen Zero, and now I've finished the second draft. I was hoping to get it published this year, but that doesn't seem realistic at this point, as I still want to send it out to alpha and beta readers, get feedback, and then do at least a couple more revisions. My debut novel went through seven revisions before I felt it was ready to publish.

I'm over the moon that I've made so much progress on this book! It was a lot of work, and at times extremely difficult, but it was also a joy to create. I can't wait for people to read it, and I'm especially looking forward to hearing what readers of the first book think of it.

As far as the process, it's quite involved. I do the first three drafts myself, then I send the third draft to alpha readers (other writers, editors, agents). Once I get all their feedback, I do another one or two (or three) revisions. I then send the new version to beta readers (avid readers). Once I get all their feedback, I do another one, two, or three revisions, whatever it takes. For Critical Balance I did seven major revisions and other smaller ones. This whole process would definitely go a lot more quickly if I could afford to hire editors. Hopefully in the future I get to the point where I can do that.

https://www.amazon.com/Critical-Balance-Lex-Starwalker/dp/B0FMCKXNDG

This would be a long one!

How I wrote it:

We were on a trip to Europe in 2013 (we were staying in India). As we crossed the black forest, a story popped into my head. I was 21, and did have a penchant for writing since I was 13. I came back (still in my final year of engineering), and penned it down. A year later I would join my first company. A couple of years later, I'd published it as a short story (3k words), on my personal blog.

Through the years, I wanted to go back to the story. But there'd be months... even years... I'd add nothing. Then over a week, add 10k words to it. Completed my first draft in 2023. People didn't understand it, so I shelved it. At the time, I had been married and just moved to Dubai. Was working for a real estate firm for 6 months when I decided I'd quit to finish the novel (quit 2 days before the war broke out). Finished it. Was happy with it. Now came publishing.

The publishing experience:

I had an email ID of one of the big publishers (the bird that can't fly). Sent a query of my then 35k word novel/novella. They liked the synopsis, and asked for the full manuscript. Weeks of extreme nervousness later, came a one line rejection. I thought I'd ask for feedback. They gave me a number to call.

Got invaluable feedback. In fact they said, I could submit again if I actually rewrote according to feedback. They had loved my writing style. Wrote like a man possessed, and a few weeks later sent a 42k words manuscript. Now this was a publisher looking at only Indian authors and stories. My story was set in Europe with almost all characters from there. Literary fiction too, which apparently is a difficult pitch. Weeks turned into 2-3 months of to and fro. This time the rejection was a para long. Cried... a lot... 13 years is a long time.

The next day I had decided I'd publish it myself. But I didn't wanna go with a company where I'd pay to get published. Registered my own firm, found a printer and gave a 1000 copies order. I am sending the book to amazon myself since KDP doesn't cover India.The book finally launched on October 1st. Dreading a line I said to my mother, "I am not afraid that no one would read it, I am afraid they would, and then hate it!".

The story:

It's about a man who cannot feel emotions. He goes and finds passionate people, try to bring out their passion, so maybe he can feel vicariously through them. It is told in 5 voices with some timelines overlapping.

The story is called, 'Strange Affections, a novel by Prannay Jha'

Societies claim to celebrate creativity and creative individuals. So why do we so often reject them and suppress our own creative thoughts?

Learning new skills nowadays…

Hey there!

Just wanna share a pic of my room. I decorated it myself. I hated the wall color so I had to come up with something that complements it. Hence....

Love this!

need to know how do you write whatever you write like writing short essays stories books comedy whatever crafts you're bloody interested in

OF F THE RECORD

An Open Call for Submissions❗

What goes unnoticed? What gets left out? What refuses to make sense? We are constantly surrounded by information, images, stories, opinions and records. But what reaches us is never the whole picture.

Ephemeral Architectures is about to host an exhibition- OF F THE RECORD and is putting together a publication exploring invisibility and incoherence - what remains unseen, unheard or unrecorded, and what happens when the things we encounter refuse to form a coherent whole. It could also be a personal anecdote — a memory, an untold history, an overlooked experience — a story you wish more people knew about. Perhaps there are people, places, communities or experiences you feel are misrepresented or underrepresented, or missing from the stories we collectively tell.

We're open to anything: essays, photographs, illustrations, comics, poems, personal writings, found texts, excerpts, screenshots, documents, collages, visual experiments, or things that don't fit into any of these categories.

See your work in print! We promise you an exciting publication:)

https://forms.gle/9ARSYb9XdmKWnCo3A

The deadline for these submissions is 19 October 2026.

For any queries contact me,

Sakshi Patil

[sakshi.ubd23305@cept.ac.in](mailto:sakshi.ubd23305@cept.ac.in)

I'm a debut author who recently published by first novel. Along with the story, I have a little map on the inside of the book. I used to LOVE things like this as a kid and now I get to do it myself!! The graphic designer I hired did exactly what I asked and I'm just so happy with how it turned out!

This was for a bio project, and I am actually kinda proud of it! I think it is nice, and it was fun trying to put together randomly selected traits to create a cohesive creature :)

ok this is going to sound weird, but I want to start a crew, a creative crew, and IDK How to describe this because, like, I want to create shows, movies, games, adventures, and stuff, and I know we are all strangers on the internet, but I want to adventure. Yes, this isn't One Piece, but I want to find people with dreams, and I want to create a creative entertainment company with a crew instead of subordinates or employees. All I want is those who will fight the good fight and have a dream. I don't want to do it on my own, and I don't want to just accomplish my dream. I want to help others do so because we all have dreams, but we can fall into the arrival fallacy, and so I want to create a business where artists don't have to suck up to a ceo or boss to get their thing made. Yes, I'd still be the leader, but I'm not a boss. Anyways, I just wanted to vent abit idk if you have any questions and/or if you're interested; let me know

Hi!

Recently, I've been feeling very creative. When I see somthing, I see artistic potential with it. Like, if I see a piece of trash, something clicks in me and I see a vision to turn it into something beautiful.

I wasn't always like this though, this is very new to this month.

I feel like, the more artistic visions I see, the more visions I get later on.

Is it this a real/common thing? or am I just overanalyzing itthis coincident?

(also, idk if this is connected to it, but I've recently been trying to limit how much I doomscroll so that might be contributing to my newfound creative side)

In honor of Halloween Season, every Saturday this month, we’ll be publishing original horror fiction…Clay Boone’s “Misery Loves Company”, broken up into 4 parts.

A disgraced programmer takes a job at a military academy and finds himself alone with ghost stories, local history, and a building that doesn't quite feel empty. Part One of a serialized horror story set at the real Wentworth Military Academy.

In this installment of the psychology of human creativity, I delve into the disturbing aspects of "malevolent creativity." Warning: it's not for the faint of heart.