Good afternoon, Arrowheads! I’ve got another Flash Fiction post for y’all on this lovely Friday, entitled A Writer’s Paradox. The idea sprang from a writing prompt I found on Pinterest (click here for source). Hope you enjoy it!

The novel sat quietly, gathering dust. Everyday, she passed by the bookshelf in a hurry, her mind in a constant uproar. Thoughts such as I need to find more reviewers, or, If I don’t plan the launch now, this book will never sell haunted her. Throwing her jacket over her shoulder, she leaves the house without so much glancing at the first product of her efforts.

While at work, she bites her nails to the quick, marketing efforts stirring on her mind as she completes her real job duties. Oh how she longs for the day when her efforts in writing books–her true passion–would support her financially! For then she could kiss this until then job goodbye and at last be satisfied with her life.

Success in her field of dreams, though, is hard to come by. Scurrying to get home, she logs into her laptop. At last, making time for her dreams! She keys up the month’s blog posts, responds to a trail of emails, checks her sales stats and closes out the browser. The clock strikes eleven, and she forces her exhausted mind from the couch and on to the bed, never thinking to visit her latest story.

She lay awake, her mind flitting through every possible thing she can do to expand her career. Drifting off to sleep around 2 a.m., her last waking thought is seeing her name on the bestselling authors list.

Yet, the novel sat quietly on the bookshelf, gathering dust. The dream, it seems, has proved to be futile. In all her efforts to become an author, she’s lost the faintest idea of who she’s always been… a writer.

© Copyright 2018, Allyson Kennedy. All rights reserved.

Talk to Me, Arrowheads!

I feel like every writer goes through this “paradox” after they get published, and it has been especially true for me lately. By diving back into Flash Fiction recently, I’m rediscovering my true love: writing, not marketing.

Have you experienced this “paradox”? Feel free to share! 🙂

For more Flash Fiction stories, click here!

Aim high, stay strong, and always hit your mark.

-Allyson 😀