The Sobriety Journey

‘First, the man takes the drink, then the drink takes the man.’

Old Irish Saying

The 17^th March marked eight years since I stopped drinking. Sobriety, dear reader, is very important to me. I quit alcohol for good in 2017 after 20 years of heavy drinking. I wouldn’t go so far as to say I was an alcoholic, but I certainly relied on booze at the end of the week and at weekends (sometimes even during the week). I used alcohol to unwind and wash away the dreary working days in the office. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with having one or two on a Friday night, but alcohol had become a way to soothe my disillusionment with office work and the direction my life was heading. 

And then there were the hangovers. I always had a great time when out on the lash with friends, but the repercussions began to spread over not just one day but two, and on some occasions, three! This became a real problem when we lived in Houston, Texas. The heat seemed to push my hangovers into overdrive, and I genuinely felt physically and mentally awful for days.

One evening (St. Patrick’s Day, of all days), I decided enough was enough and that it was time for a break. I told myself I would stop for a month and left it at that. Those four weeks passed quickly, and I felt fantastic. My mind was clear for the first time in many years. From there, I decided to extend the break to three months… then six months… and finally, for good! 

That was the best decision I’ve ever made, one that has genuinely transformed my life. With clarity came the motivation to do something meaningful with my life. After trying a few other things during those first few months of sobriety (to be fair, I mostly played PlayStation, but still), I began to explore writing after a friend had a book published. I’ve always been an avid reader, so it made sense. After much trial and error and a great deal of hard work, the rest, as they say, is history.

With all that in mind, I’m going to make a surprise segue to The Peculiar Journey of Cecil Tabiner… You didn’t think this was going to be just a blog about sobriety, did you!? HA!

The hapless hero of the novel, good old Cecil Tabiner, has recently become sober. It’s a new situation for him, placing him in that early stage where the struggle is real, where everyone he knows and doesn’t know drinks, and where every pub draws his eye like a moth to a flame. He’s near the start of his sobriety journey when we meet him in the story. You might wonder, why Cecil has quit drinking. That’s a secret you can discover if the book is ever published (more on this later).

But for now, all you need to know is that Cecil is sober. I poured all my own struggles into this character, and I genuinely believe people will relate to him. I’ve always believed in this book, and even though it has undergone many rewrites, edits, tense changes, and even an arduous shift in point of view, I firmly believe it’s a brilliant story.

And now back to publishing. I’m going to be brutally honest. I’m still shaken after my novel was cut by Northodox Press. I’ve tried to stay positive and sent the manuscript to numerous speculative fiction-friendly agents (some of them twice) and to a handful of genre indie publishers, but that was nearly three months ago, so it’s safe to assume it’s been rejected. I also asked Fly on the Wall Press, the home of New Gillion Street, but it’s not right for them. Isabelle wants climate and/or dystopia novels, and Journey is simply not that.

So, what now for my weird novel, the one I poured heart and soul into!?

And here is the issue. It’s been around the houses, so to speak, and I don’t have the energy or strength to keep sending it out, only to have it repeatedly rejected or ignored. I wrote this novel in 2019, and I just want to move on to the others in the series and to new stories in different universes. I don’t want to go through the slog of forging a relationship with another publisher and blowing what small amount of money I have on their books, only to be cast aside later (too bitter? HA!). Especially since I already do my best to support Fly on the Wall and other indies I like, which is difficult when you’re an unemployed student!

So that leaves one last avenue, one I’ve trodden before: self-publishing.

Of course, this has its own issues too. To get the book to readers, I’ll need money for reviews and ads, which, of course, is a problem without a job to fund it. So, if I’m going to do this, I must accept that the readership for The Peculiar Journey of Cecil Tabiner will be small and that, for it to do well eventually, I will need to grind away at it for years. I won’t make any money, but publishing isn’t the industry for making money anyway. At least the novel will EXIST, rather than languishing on my computer, where I’ll tinker with it endlessly. 

So, there we are, dear reader. I know this has been a slightly negative edge to this blog when it should have been a celebration, but I wanted to be honest about how I’m feeling about this novel I’ve spent countless hours on. I still believe in it, and I think it can and will succeed, but I’ve come to the conclusion that I might have to go it alone. It would be a roll of the dice, and sometimes, on rare occasions, chance can swing your way!

Watch this space for more info and my plans for my weird AF book, which I hope to make a confirmed decision on whether I’ll self-publish soon. If I do it’ll be in late summer or autumn. I might have done it sooner, but unfortunately, the “final” edit I received from my erstwhile publisher isn’t up to scratch (no surprise here, but I just wish I’d realised BEFORE I’d sent the manuscript to thirty agents and a competition). So, it’s back to editing in the summer after university finishes, and I’ll go from there. The alternative is to just dump it and move on, but that would be a shame.

Anyway, here’s to another year of sobriety!

Thanks for reading.

Elliot J Harper

Author of quirky SF novel, New Gillion Street, published by Fly on the Wall Press, the independently published weird horror short story collection, The Strange Tales of Gillion.