Digital Book Nook recently caught up with Nigel Howse, author of “The Vibrating Pond.” We are excited to share this insightful interview with our readers today.
When did you first discover that you enjoy writing and wanted to become a published author?
When my father got me to draw using white chalk on a black slate I got keen as it’s like learning a pictorial code: dots and dashes, messing-about attempts until form occurs and one sees something representative and realness begins. Word-crafting is similar and narratives are ways of communicating with people. Poetry is about finding one’s unique and individual voice. After writing many poems and with friends also publishing their collections, I got to share them more widely.
What is your favorite and the most challenging aspect of writing?
Recently, up to the onset of Covid, I got a lot of enjoyment joining in with a creative writing class. We read out our stories to each other, and having new topics, with deadlines to work to, it opened up new topics and encouraged sharpened focus. Under pressure, working on one’s own focus, the sketches do get underway, it’s just difficult until one applies applied ideas and willingness to establish constructive results. So, figuring stories out can be addictive and transformational.
Tell us about your latest release.
Well, my new book features forty-five ‘works’ of my own writings, consisting of a medley of prose, poems, but mainly short story narratives. My style is poetic, in the genre of ‘magical realism.’ Each story isn’t so long in length, but I feel it captures the reader’s attention right to the end! There are one hundred and thirty-two pages and hard bound measuring 9 x 11 inches-s available in soft & as an ebook all available now at Amazon books!
How did you come up with the title of your book?
Quite a few have American themes like the stories : Helium Lift Off, Pink Ears, and Black Cayman Egwah. As I mentioned, I quoted from a poem titled, ‘Slow Silences’, that is included in my poetry book titled, The Hammer Bird. The phases ‘Soft Pond’ and’ The Pond’ are connected in common idioms for the Atlantic ocean. The imagination is a flexible, most fluid resource we all have. The book is published in America by AuthorHouse, now termed The Universal Breakthrough. So when I decided to get my book published, this simultaneous connection worked!
What do you hope readers are able to get from reading your story?
My stories are designed to be read as poetic journeys, both visual and imaginative like films. As I write , ideas arise from places, themes and current events that I then recompose into imaginative and arresting stories. In this collection titled, ‘The Vibrant Pond’ the overall theme is transformation through poetic awareness’. In these stories, I attempt to depict experiences imaginatively in order to capture and encourage the reader’s interest, inspiration and enjoyment.
Who are some of your favorite authors?
Thomas Hardy, Samuel Beckett, Seamus Heaney, Ivor Cutler, James Joyce, Richard Jefferies, Gerald Manley Hopkins, Robert Macfarlane, William Blake.
Do you have any advice for writers looking to get published?
‘Writer’s write!’ I’d recommend anyone who wants to get into writing fiction or nonfiction writing, to read everything. I’m still trying to decipher lyrics as they sound on songs! Seriously, being an effective communicator of words is all about being an appreciator for what one likes, and developing a taste of and for what appeals to oneself.
In being avid and valuing texts and language, this approach enables oneself to gain an inner life and a resolve, with the confidence then in its applied usage and meaning. After all, writing is a craft to apply and with this activated, one can then set out a vision and viewpoints all one’s own!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Nigel Howse is an artist and writer of fiction and poetry. He lives in Mid-Suffolk, in the United Kingdom. He has published several books including: The Hammer Bird, (1985) Passion Pieces, (2005) and two editions of his book titled The Vibrating Pond (2017). This book is now going into reprint, a second and enlarged edition 2022. This comprises mainly a collection of short stories, with some of his poems.
Follow Nigel: Facebook
The Vibrating Pond is available at Amazon on Kindle, hardcover, and in paper back.
Digital Book Nook 