Scott Andrew Fack

Bad news: One Story, one of the hardest journals to get published in, declined my short story.

Good news: They wrote, “We were very impressed by your writing. We hope that you will feel encouraged by this short note and send us something else. We look forward to reading more.”

And so I did. Fingers crossed.

Last week of Tuesday morning writing with Word by Word Canterbury at Spreydon Library for me for a few months. I get a bit of writing done in this space when I’m with this amazing group of writers.

I was one of the 10 RAWA writers fellowship recipients for this year’s Readers and Writers Akaroa festival for 2024. My fellow author Luba Roth, who’s in my writing group and is working on her autobiography, and I attended the festival and the gala dinner as 2 of the fellowship recipients. It was an amazing writers’ festival full of amazing speakers; I highly recommend it!

This morning, I finished reading the massive A Little Life. For the second time ever in my life, I cried at the end of the book (the first being Beloved by Toni Morrison). This novel is such a heartbreakingly devastating story that is amazingly written. Haunting yet so beautiful. I highly recommend it, but it's not for the faint of heart.

Wow. 2022 has been quite the year.

I not only did got paid for the first time for a short story but also was awarded a full mentorship through the New Zealand Society of Authors for my novel-in-progress Plague (I have a new title for it, I think: to be announced later).

I managed to finish the first full draft of my novel at around 134,000 words -- a lot of editing and rewriting to still be done -- and received a lot of great input and feedback from my NZSA mentor Judy L Mohr and my tutor / editor Andrew Salomon. (Another achievement there: gaining a distinction in the Advanced Write a Novel course.)

All this has really improved my outlook in my writing, and while I understand I have a long way to go before this current work of mine is to a publishable level, I am excited to see what next year brings for me and my writing.

Happy New Year to you all, and I wish you and your loved ones a happy, healthy, safe, and bright 2023.