Writing, Publishing, Spreading

Chronicle of an Ordinary Imbalance

This summer, I decided to revive this blog at a reasonable pace: one post per week in French, then, the following week, the same text in English. Only one new piece to write every two weeks. I prepared a month in advance, just in case, and felt ready. A few months later, however, I miss publication deadlines (algorithms don’t like that) and hesitate at the last moment over which text to share.

Another source of stress — and disappointment — is the feeling that few people are interested. People don’t read anymore, I’m told. I partly believe it, yet I still hope to find, somewhere in the depths of the Internet, a handful of readers. Maybe not on Facebook or Instagram. Should I look toward YouTube instead and, as my daughter suggests, read my texts aloud and accompany them with pleasant images?

As if that weren’t enough, in this race to feed the social media monster, I started another blog (in French) — proof that experience doesn’t always teach caution — in an attempt to explain the political situation in Israel. If you are interested in this country or in the phenomenon of democratic erosion, I invite you to visit it. I show my face there (the horror) — not out of a taste for exposure, but out of necessity — and speak about topics I would rather avoid. Our government seems so harmful to me that I try, on my modest scale, to contribute to change in the next elections.

Meanwhile, I neglect what should remain central — fiction writing — and struggle to maintain my daily two-hour minimum quota. After a year of rejections from publishers, I have to self-publish the French version of my latest novel. The English version, however, is ready and currently available for pre-order on Amazon : https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0G46P1VRK

Thank you for staying with me through this long digression — or perhaps simply a status report. I think I will now aim for a more realistic monthly publication schedule.

And since you’re here, tell me… What do you prefer to read here? Stories? Or more personal texts about the author’s life, writing, its detours and its obstacles?

Until next time,

L. M. Rapp