What Happened on Our Sail Authors Discussion Panel

Last Tuesday, 6th of June 2015, we hosted a discussion panel event with our published authors:

• Alia Al Shamsi, author of the children illustrated book: Alayah
• Omar Al Busaidy, author of the business / self-help book: Just Read It
• Sarah Al Mulla, author of the poetry / short stories book: A Journey Within
• Mohammed Al Serkal, author of the fiction novelette: Shallow

In the panel, Sail authors discussed the ideas behind their books and what triggered them to start writing those books, from the circumstances they may have gone through to simply using writing as their only escape from life.

The authors then discussed how they sustained their writing process through out their books. Between Alia elaborating on the creative process creation with her book’s illustrator, to Sarah inspiring her writings from the life around her, Omar and his commitment towards writing during his unemployment, and finally Mohammed who wrote only when he felt the character of his book spoke to him. They also discussed how they handled writers’ block. One of the main suggestion came from Alia, to her it was about committing to writing regardless of what was going on, and no matter how uninspired she may have been.

The authors each read an excerpt from their books, to share with the audience a glimpse of what they’d get from reading their books. This was followed by an advice from each of them to the audience members who may be interested in writing their own books.

We concluded the event with questions & remarks from the audience to the authors. Questions varied between how did they endure the editing process, what plans they had for future books, and some more questions on the specifics of the books. A great comment came from the artist Noora AlSuwaidi, she suggested reading a book called “The Novel of The Future” by Anais Nin. The book explains that there are 3 categories of people, some who live only in the real world, some only in the imaginary world, and some, specifically the creative beings, they live between those two worlds, and that is how they can create their artworks, novels or whatever other creative works they may produce.

You will find all the event’s pictures on our Facebook page and on this link.

Our old friend Khalid Al Ameri, who was a columnist with us, and is one of our upcoming authors, joined us in the event and documented his experience along with his mission to get a signed autograph from our 4 authors on his snapchat account. He was kind enough to share it with us, and here it’s posted on our youtube channel:

We’ve periscoped the entire event as well, sadly the view missed out on Mohammed Al Serkal who was sitting in the far right angle, but the conversations are clear here, so you could listen to what you’ve missed.