Introducing Icy…

In writing this, I feel like I should be standing up, scraping a plastic form-moulded chair across a lino floor in the process, clutching a cup of bad coffee and announcing my name to Writers Anonymous. Don’t worry, I’m not about to go all Tyler Durden on you. I’m just, in a roundabout kind of way, trying to introduce myself.

I’m Icy. 27, Pisces, English. I’ve been writing for as long as I can remember, and it’s so ingrained in me that not writing isn’t something I’ve ever considered. I learned to write, and your typical child’s stories followed (including one memorable piece in which I described the great flood of Newcastle upon Tyne in a fake newspaper report, highlighting even at the age of nine an interest in historical fiction). I finally took a creative writing class at 16 at the suggestion of an English teacher, and decided this writing lark was something I wanted to try as an actual pursuit.

So I guess I’ve been writing seriously for almost twelve years now. I started my online writing endeavours on a now-defunct writing community almost four years ago, which introduced me to the concept of flash fiction. Contacts were made, and I ended up getting a few pieces published online. The community changed focus, and somehow I stumbled across Write Anything. I began doing their Fiction Friday challenges, got to know Paul and Jodi, and wound up working with them on last year’s Chinese Whisperings project. All such a far cry from the little girl sat writing on a spare typewriter in her mother’s office if snow forced her school to close for the day.

I hate having to define what genre I think I am, as I like to write whatever tickles my fancy, but I am drawn to the ‘adventure’ style of writing – my Parrots & Piracy series about a pirate and his telepathic parrot all began with a Fiction Friday prompt, and my vaguely steampunk serial set in the fictional city of Vertigo has given rise to new stories and adventures. I occasionally dabble in horror or ill-defined puddles of fantasy, but I mostly enjoy writing historical fiction.

Goals for 2011 involve the usual writing and submission of stories to magazines, but the biggest projects include another jaunt with Annie Evett’s Choose Your Online Adventures project, a Parrots & Piracy e-book, and finally getting on with editing my supernatural YA novel!