NIPAWIN — Nipawin author Doreen M. Bleich has self-published her second fiction novel alj@thirtysomething.ca.
“The book is basically the story about a woman who is quite content with her life and her one goal is to become a freelance writer,” Bleich said. ”Over the course of one of these assignments she does an interview with a fella she happens to fall in love with.”
While there is romance, Bleich said the Saskatchewan story is really more of a contemporary fiction with a romantic element.
“This is a story that I started several years ago, and it started out as a short story, but as stories have a way of doing their own thing it just got bigger and bigger.”
Bleich said alj@thirtysomething.ca wasn’t her first pick to name the book, with her previous title being Second Chances.
“One of my editors said to me, ‘You really need to find a different title, one that hasn’t been so overused,’” she said.
“Second Chances really does aptly apply to this story because it’s second chances in lots of ways – for relationships, for family situations. It was the perfect title, I thought.”
In response, Bleich made a list of four more titles.
“They all had been used between four and seven times I could find just on Amazon. So I thought, ‘Now what do I do, where do I find a title for this thing?’”
It was then that a friend pointed out to her that she could use a phrase that was written in the book, such as the character’s fictional email address.
Since publishing the book, Bleich said she finds it amazing how many comments she’s been getting about the unusual title.
“The thing of it is, you want a title that will catch peoples eye, make them wonder, make them question it. It does do that.”
Bleich said her journey to self-publish wasn’t difficult, since she had experience through the Tisdale Writer’s Group.
“In the group, we have published lots of books over the years since I have been a member. We have come to the point where we can get a book ready to print. We do the editing, we do the proofreading, we do all the things that need to be done.”
For people who are new to writing, Bleich’s advice is just “sit down and do it.”
“There’s just no other way around it,” she said.
“We’ve had people come to the group over the years that regard writing as kind of a little hobby. That’s okay if that’s how you feel about it, but I have to say that most of the writers who belong to our writer’s group are very committed to improving their writing and to becoming better writers and in many cases becoming published authors.”
Other titles written by Bleich include her fiction Ready or Not; two cookbooks which include Cooking Country Style and Seasons of Plenty – Celebrating the Holidays; as well as a book of short stories, Mishaps and Misfortunes.
Copies of alj@thirtysomething.ca can be purchased at Art on Main in Nipawin.
