N. Alexsander Sidirov's Blog

So I had an epiphany today,

I realized that when you’re writing a book, right, you essentially have to world build. While you are world building ultimately you have an opportunity–through a concerted use of words, of syntax, of descriptions, and more–to comment on large scale environmental feelings. Atmosphere right. There’s something about environment in a book that offers the opportunity to speak on the zeitgeist in almost more abstract way. Let me break this down for you, let’s say you’re writing a book about a government that is constantly watching its people right? Well, then abstractly creating the feeling–the pure essence–of paranoia to essentially haunt your book is a wonderful way of hitting all of those buttons that legitimate paranoia hits. Perhaps, you could misuse certain words that seems intentional, or the events throughout the book, even the most extemporaneous, all subtly contribute to the overall feeling. Perhaps you wanna reflect the energy of a country or a place or a time, you can do so in a more abstract way than just re-telling history or reaching for specific examples. Being able to use this at your disposal means there’s an opportunity for literary alchemy, a chance to stir feelings within your readers either in conjunction with the rest of the book or even in contrast. This obviously might be something that a lot of people are already aware of, and I think atmosphere in books is definitely harped on, but I also think that utilizing atmosphere and understanding the way that it kind of permeates the overall experience by touching every word and enveloping the plot, is important. Atmosphere can offer a way of creating a more distilled version of whatever emotional transmission you are attempting with your novel.

So, I have been working on a novel the past eight days and will be working on it for the next eight. Let me start by saying I am currently on a hiatus from a coding bootcamp in Europe that has required most of my time. I only get a 16 day break so I decided that I would try and finish the entire first draft of my novel during that hiatus. So far I have 80 pages or 31,080 words. How did I manage this? Well despite having a full-time job I do get a one hour lunch break which during work days I use entirely for writing. Then on the weekends I either go to the library or a coffee shop down the street, where I sit for eight hours straight and write as much as I can. Luckily when the well runs dry I have friends who inspire me immensely and who I can bring my dead ends too, who help me figure out ways of writing around them or reimagining them completely. Since I am at the halfway mark and technically more than halfway done with the book, I am feeling really good. I had most of the plot imagined beforehand, actually years beforehand, so I don’t want to give the false impression that all of the work was done in sixteen days, all of the writing was done in sixteen days or as of now hopefully will be! I will keep you all posted and expect another blogpost in a little over a week. TTYL and STAY AMBITIOUS -N. Alexsander Sidirov

#writing #writer #novel

Writing a poetry collection is such an interesting experience. I found myself delving into memories I never thought I would revisit in order to procure emotions I did not even know I had. I was told by a friend who is a writer that when I published my book I would be incredibly surprised by who supported me and who didn’t. He had warned me that its a jarring experience. Thus far, I haven’t been disappointed much. I’ve been lucky because so many people came out to support me and my writing. I really poured my soul into this book and to have so many people see and appreciate that is incredible. I am truly feeling blessed.

There was Histrionic Laughter at the Clowns Cadaver can be purchased here.

CLICK ON THE IMAGE TO BE TAKEN TO THE PAGE! THIS IS MY DEBUT COLLECTION I AM SO IMMENSELY PROUD OF IT!

I re-read this and I actually really like it!

N. Alexsander Sidirov

Oh how I love all the rings,

what beautiful shapes

their vespertine shadows

relate by the fire

and I heard that dusty voice

bellow with pre-determined choice

but I tried my best not to bother

for the man and his sister

the wife and her mister

the bird and the blister

ing sky–that swallows our dreams

from the place that eats east

of hampshire

and the nametag filled with a blood sharpie’s

industrial filth

the name etched

pouring

s

l

o

w

l

y

I see the silhouette of “desire”

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This week I mostly felt overwhelmed. I think the prospect of publishing a book, working full-time, and being in school full-time resulted in me feeling somewhat overwhelmed. I think that during times of overwhelm its important to take breaks and also break everything off into bite-sized chunks. I am going to take a shower, clean my room and write a list of everything I need to do. Then I will be able to be productive. Creating an effective game plan usually relieves the majority of my stress because then I know how to effectively move forward.

Oh how I love all the rings,

what beautiful shapes

their vespertine shadows

relate by the fire

and I heard that dusty voice

bellow with pre-determined choice

but I tried my best not to bother

for the man and his sister

the wife and her mister

the bird and the blister

ing sky–that swallows our dreams

from the place that eats east

of hampshire

and the nametag filled with a blood sharpie’s

industrial filth

the name etched

pouring

s

l

o

w

l

y

I see the silhouette of “desire”

Deciding to self-publish my poetry book was definitely an arduous one. For months I flipped back and forth, back and forth between the options in my mind. Pinballing between the possibilities until finally I realized that autonomy with my work was ultimately the thing I valued most. Poetry as of today is both a vibrant, and mediocre art form. There are currently more poets writing poetry than there are people reading poetry and I cannot conclude much on that statistic other than that perhaps there are a lot of people on the outside looking in. Poetry for years seems to have been stuck in the 1960s. Never really arriving in the modern age. My thesis for why we seem bizarrely stuck in the past is because I surmise poetry never had a technological revolution. The closest we have come to it is Instagram poets which arguably hearkened a weakening of the art form. It represented a kind of brilliantly brief distillation of a single thought, and a fuck ton of negative space to convince the world it was profound. We as a community should have had a collective reckoning when Rupi Kaur became the voice of a generation, and in her own words was, “…the product of the ancestors getting together and deciding these stories needed to be told”…*SIGH* I don’t want to brand myself as a hater. I think that Rupi Kaur’s vulnerability is incredibly brave, what is disheartening perhaps is the declaration of profundity from insanely vague statements. If Rupi was seen as an iconoclast and left to exist in her own sphere it wouldn’t be a scourge within the literature community, but alas everyday a new poet pops up emblematic of the same style. A single sentence or singular thought and a fuck ton of negative space. Perhaps she is the Andy Warhol of literature or maybe just a tragic depiction of what happens when we don’t fund public schools in America; either way poetry has never been less relevant nor more divided. I think that the other problem that plagues the poetry community is the immense amount of gate-keeping. We as a community tend to turn our noses to others who cannot enjoy the dense MFA level allusions that frequent the pages of the New Yorker or The Kenyon Review. We act like its the worlds problem that poetry is not accessible instead of acknowledging that there is an immense amount of intellectual elitism rampant in the pages of every poetry journal. There is a marked lack of experimentation, people who are truly trying bizarre and weird things out with writing have no place to go. Instead they have to make creative sacrifices and force their writing to sound the way that all poetry sounds in the modern age. I find it disturbing that there is a poetic voice present in almost every published poem I read. To me, of course all of these thoughts are immensely biased, poetry should not have a collective voice. It should be almost impossible to relate one poet to the next. Poetry has the potential for more liberty than almost any other art form and yet its constrained by stupid rules that are collectively agreed on and taught in MFA programs and enforced through the locked gates of journals. If interesting things were happening in poetry, guess what, the most interesting people would be here. But, as it is, because we continue to run the same literature machine, the art form slowly dies into the murmurs of boredom and obscurity. We can and should do better. There are a lot of writers right now writing poems, people who will join MFA programs, but if the indoctrination continues as it is ultimately what will happen is the same thing that has been. They will join the ranks of every other beautiful but indistinct writer of the past, and the potential will have been squandered in an effort to uphold the status quo. So back to my original point, Why did I decide to Self-Publish? Well I decided to Self-Publish because I did not want to have to lick the boots of anyone. I knew that my message and my writing was valid and I wanted complete control over the entire process. Being an indie writer is perhaps the only way I can think of rebelling against the current system and I certainly hope that in the years that come I will be able to look back on this decision and smile knowing I made the right one.

Hey so I am N. Alexsander Sidirov. The N is short for Nikolai. I am writing this blog because I am in the process of self-publishing a poetry collection that I have been working on for a total of four years. I figured being transparent about the process is a great way of introducing myself to future readers and also opening up the curtain to others who might be considering doing it themselves. Poetry and writing in general is something I consider to be my calling. I have been writing since I was eight years old. I would write short stories for my mother and I would read them to her in her bed. Its an incredible feeling to be finishing up my first book and knowing that I will officially be able to call myself an author. There are a lot of things people ought to know when choosing the Indie route with your book. So I am going to write a myriad of blog posts here about the process and things to consider. Thank you to anyone who decides to join me in this journey I am excited for whats on the horizon.

It is October 25th and the time is 5:57 P.M.

I am in the process of publishing my poetry book, There was Histrionic Laughter at the Clown’s Cadaver. The final manuscript is almost entirely complete, I have to format a couple poems and adjust some things for Kindle Press. I still have not decided whether to give Kindle exclusive rights to my book for three months or try and get it to Nook as well. There are a lot of aspects of the press side of promoting your book that people do not tell you about.

In addition to all of that I am currently in a coding bootcamp in Europe so my weeks have been about 80 hour work weeks with 8 hours of class and 8 hours of work and me cramming all my publishing tasks in the lunch hours in between. Suffice to say its a bit chaotic. I definitely admit I feel overwhelmed but I know that if I keep my head down and I am able to continue to make steps to move forward it will ultimately turn out wonderfully. It always does.