Author at Indireads
There’s a folder on my hard drive marked ‘incomplete’. It’s not a folder of design projects, it’s a folder of incomplete, half-baked ideas and blog posts for dearrumi.com. It’s a reminder to me, every time I sit down to write a post, that forcing it is not an option for my writing. That I’m not so … Continue reading Un-classify Me, Please
She’s not a fan of romance, but she liked my book!
I received a free copy of this book from IndiReads in exchange for a fair and honest review.
Mild Spoilers ahead.
Butterfly Season by Natasha Ahmed is a well written tale of what seems to be a simple love story on the surface, but is actually an introspection into societal mores and perceived rightness of conduct. Butterfly Season tells us the story of how Ahad and Rumi meet and fall in love against a backdrop of disapproving family members, familial honor, and conservatism.
From the first page (which contains some rather lovely lines of poetry by the Persian poet, Rumi) to the last one, I was drawn in by the easy to read language and by events that had me either shaking my fists or cheering on the characters.
I am not a fan of romance as a genre and I was a little wary of reading this book. In…
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Excellent tips for one of the most difficult aspects of selling your work.
A lot things go into telling a simple story
My least favorite type of writing has always been summarizing. Whether I was pitching a screenplay or a synopsis for a book, I got too concerned about what producers and publishers were looking for. I hated whatever I put on paper. It felt like I was cutting out the tastiest parts to make it palatable, misrepresenting the material by packaging it for mass appeal.
When my screenwriting professor videotaped the pitch for my first script, I ranted for twenty minutes. This was no elevator pitch. The lift for the tallest building in the world doesn’t take that long to get to the top. I had to lower my time to two minutes or less.
Since then I’ve learned the memorization techniques I needed to keep myself on task and how to select the parts of my story that were worth focusing…
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Rape culture is when I was six, and my brother punched my two front teeth out. Instead of reprimanding him, my mother said “Stefanie, what did you do to provoke him?” When my only defense was my mother whispering in my ear, “Honey, ignore him. Don’t rile him up. He just wants a reaction.” As if it was my sole purpose, the reason six-year-old me existed, was to not rile up my brother. It’s starts when we’re six, and ends when we grow up assuming the natural state of a man is a predator, and I must walk on eggshells, as to not “rile him up.” Right, mom?
Rape culture is when through casual dinner conversation, my father says that women who get raped are asking for it. He says, “I see them on the streets of New York City, with their short skirts and heavy makeup. Asking for it.”…
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It’s something that every first time author has heard: ‘write what you know’. Write about places you’ve been to, people you’ve met, spent time with, understood, situations you’ve experienced. And for a first book, that’s great advice, particular when it comes to creating characters. Characters react in different ways to different situations and an understanding … Continue reading Write What You Don’t Know
At a literary event earlier this year, I met a number of people I had gone to school with; people I knew in college, people I worked with and people I had randomly met at some time or the other. The event, held in the gardens of Mohatta Palace in Clifton, was a glittery, shining … Continue reading Separated by Bridges
About a month ago, I had a mishap with my laptop and was unplugged for almost a week. My old trusty MacBook Pro is on its last legs. Apparently the graphics card crashed and while the computer started up, the screen stayed black. And unlike older models, the graphics card on these macs is soldered … Continue reading Life Unplugged
"I belong to a nation whose children scare the life out of you. What a terrifying force you are, fighting with children..." The children of Army Public School returned to school this week. This is their tribute to their fallen classmates. Peshawar, December 16 2014.
A friend of mine is a perfectionist. For many years, I thought I was a perfectionist until I came across her. Last week, we worked on a design project together, creating a brochure for a non-profit organization that places orphans in adoptive homes. The brochure was to be delivered to the printer yesterday. She’s still … Continue reading In Pursuit of Imperfection
Over coffee with a friend, I mentioned that I spent a week of my vacation in the city of Peshawar, and the reaction, though expected, jarred me. His eyebrows climbed up his forehead and he asked with pure disbelief, “Why?” When I gave him a rundown of my trip, his eyebrows climbed higher. His jaw … Continue reading The Peshawar Cliché
Natasha Ahmed 