What made me an author?

My first novel's manuscript was ready. I had dabbled in publishing before with non-fictional books and at the time I had approached traditional publishers and they told me that I need to have a public profile to back my writings. Therefore, at the time of the publication of the novel, I knew that I neither had the time nor the inclination to build a public profile. Hence, I went with self-publishing. 

This also happens, albeit too frequently than one would be comfortable with it, but I always make sure I do not lose out on the idea and jot it down for future reference and then continue to work on the current project until I hit a writer's block or it gets completed. However, sometimes the writer's block exists for years together so that makes my writing process very disorganized, chaotic and non-linear. I have an acquired taste to this chaos.

Writing is not just cathartic, it is like a guided tour through the rambling word of my own mind. The more I write, the better I get to know my own self and that in turn, improves my understanding of the people and of the sense that I make of the world. Writing has given me a world-view that has helped me see clearly through many of the cobwebs in my own mind. 

I feel like I have lived my entire life before I started to take writing seriously (I have been writing for a very long time, but took it seriously only some years ago), just so that I can start writing one day. My experiences, observations, interpersonal interactions are the greatest source of my writing apart from innate desires and repressed feelings seeping in through the porous borders between the conscious and the subconscious minds.

I do identify with my main character a lot, but the process is organic, unintentional and unconscientious. I realize it much later that the main character is very relatable.  

This book is about a person who is trapped in the rat race of the corporate world.

I wouldn't know. To me. all habits that lead me to write are usual ones. Maybe somebody else who observes me can point out something that may deem unusual to them.

I was once told to rewrite everything that I had written and it was very difficult to accept that. The most rewarding compliment has been that I express the simple things of life through my writings and that is why it is so relatable.

Writer's block are an inevitable unwelcome necessity of a writer's life and I am no exception to it. It happens more often than I would like to imagine or it be to my inkling but usually taking my mind off the topic of writing or changing the subject of writing and at times engaging in mundane tasks helps me overcome it.

Research is an ongoing process and an involuntary task as a writer. Everything that a writer sees, experiences, hears, reads, watches or comes to know about, can make its way to the research that may be used in current or future writings. For this particular book, titled as "Silver Lining of the Ninth Cloud", which is my second novel, not much research was required because the world is set in an industry in which I have workf experience of a decade.

The cover has been designed by me.

More novels and I have also made short films and am currently in the process of starting my first feature film as an auteur.

I did not have much scope of thinking what did I want to become as a child. Hailing from a middle class family in India, there was only one objective as a student, which was both imposed and imbibed, and that was to focus on studies, get good grades, get a professional degree so that the chances of getting a good job improve and that's what I did. It was not until I started to suffocate in the job that I realized that I was not cut out for it. It was too late by then to think of an alternative career but life created the necessary circumstances, though not all of them amenable, to ensure that I become an author. Only after becoming one, I realized that it was the thing I have always wanted to be.

I usually write at home or in a coffee shop.

I write in silence, mostly at nights. Sometimes I listen to light music but mostly if the flow is generated then I would not even know what's playing. 

My hobbies are reading, watching movies, traveling, listening to music and dancing.