Questions and Answers

Hi everyone, while browsing the web, always looking for something about books or some writer's blog, I saw this question: have you ever felt paralyzed when faced with this question: what is your book about? 😶 Allow me to make a personal reflection; I don't know, perhaps it was the place or context in which a person asks the author this question. For example, a book presentation in front of a hundred or more people can make a person go into crisis. I'm just guessing because the hardest thing for me was having to explain it to three people, and it was very easy also because, if I, who created the book, don't know, who should know? It's obvious: I have my say on how I see the book structured. Let me give you an example: my novel. You'll say: but which novel? 😋 You're right, I'm talking about "Extraordinarily Parallel Lives." I can say it in two words: about family and love. It seems obvious to me that I can't say it's about war and hate. While in the introduction I was more vague, because I like the reader to discover things little by little. Now I'm not talking to you about a question asked to me personally, but about a reflection that Alessandro, a friend of mine, had on my writing. He said: but how does Paolo know syntax? To be honest, you'll have to excuse me, but I didn't remember what the word meant. 😒 So I found this short article on the web to read it in a few words: (Syntax is the branch of linguistics and grammar that studies the rules for structuring sentences and clauses, determining how words combine to form complete units of meaning). There, it's clearer that way. 😕 Now, I've already said it several times and I've also already written about it on the blog, in the post "My writing: where it all began." Here I am to repeat it: at the moment I'm still not able to insert the correct punctuation or even some words. In fact, when I had the novel corrected, they replaced some words, inserting new ones but with the same meaning, thus giving an extra boost to the sentences and consequently to the whole novel. I'm not one to hide,🫣 and here on the blog I certainly won't let you believe that I am something I'm not. Another question that many people have asked me is this: how did you choose the characters' names? Well, this is easy: in this novel the protagonist for me is only one, Alessandro, and everything revolves around him. And besides being a beautiful name, it is also the name of my nephew.🤓 Not having children, it came naturally to me to put him at the center of the novel, while for the other names I inserted a few cameos, with gratitude and much affection. And then there is also a gem, but it's still too early to tell. To tell the truth, there are more names in my first manuscript; I really enjoyed writing it there. Who knows if that fantastic period will ever return. I also like the next question because it tells you how I write: when writing a manuscript, do you plan ahead or do you write in one go? My first story, as I've already said, started with an image buzzing around in my head, and then everything else came to me right then and there, without knowing anything, without knowing where I'd end up or how I'd get there. And I'll never tire of saying it: it was all beautiful. I'd write a few lines, then go back and reread what I'd just written, replacing sentences, characters' moods, and it all flowed beautifully. I remind you that the first story, in length, is a third of "Extraordinarily Parallel Lives," while when writing the novel I just mentioned, I already knew what I wanted to write, but I only knew how to begin and what the end would be. There too, when I started, the words all came to me right then and there, even though there were many deletions and rewrites. But the desire to write was so great that even the novel was a pleasure to write, also because I already knew what I wanted to write. I didn't know how the story would unfold, I didn't know the words, the lines to make you smile, but then when I was there I don't know how it could have happened, I wrote this fairy tale, or at least that's what I think. 😝 So I'd say I write in one go. The next question for me is a sore point: 😔 what are your next projects? The conditional is a must here. The first story of the trilogy should be released in 2027; I also took some time to understand if I should combine them into a single manuscript. But I don't like the idea, also because they are structured in a certain way and, if they come out like that, you will understand too. Second reason: I also wanted to see how the novel was going. Then there is another manuscript already started and already halfway through the story, but interrupted for over a year. Because, even if in my head I know what I should do, what I should write, I never get around to writing again. I don't know what to do.What happened to me? What I can tell you is that I've lost the joy of writing, which was vital to me. What is the manuscript about? All right, I'll leave you an excerpt from the beginning here, still to be corrected, and I can already hear those of you saying to me: how many characters do you always put in there? Can't you make them only children? Two days earlier, just outside the village, in a green meadow bordered by a stream with a very deep bank, four teenagers between eleven and fifteen were playing with a Frisbee. They were two boys and two girls. In front of them, two women sitting on the grass were talking to each other, and near these two women, a girl of four or five was playing with a ball. She was slowly moving away from the two women and getting ever more dangerously close to the bank. In an instant, with a strange leap, the ball began to roll down the bank. The little girl... there are more questions, but for now I'll stop here, giving you a virtual hug and seeing you in the next post. Bye bye.🤗

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