Matthew Wiles Writing and Re-Writing
Matthew Wiles stares at the blue cursor pulsing on the 485 page Word Document, his fingers flexed over the keys. “I want to send it to publishers, but I don’t know if it’s good enough yet,” he explains, re-writing a sentence underlined in red.
For more than a year, Matthew’s been anxiously writing and re-writing sections of his new book. “It started as a basic story about murder but then it became a psychological analysis of myself,” he says.
Matthew’s novel follows a man forced to move into a massive apartment building with his widowed Aunt. Suddenly, his Aunt dies and people in different apartments are murdered, forcing Matthew’s protagonist to find the connection between them. “But it’s more than that,” Matthew adds. It verges into more abstract story-lines about life and the universe.
For Matthew, writing this book was almost a psychological experience. “I did a lot of walking so my brain would shut off,” he said. “I’d walk sometimes 15 miles.” He would listen to music while writing but the clack of the keys would move the music into his subconscious.
After re-writing and scanning through the Word Document, Matthew anxiously decided to contact publishers. “I can see myself being on the New York Times bestseller list. I can see myself being a Starbucks barista. I can see myself in ten or fifteen years getting an economic degree and working for some company and doing exactly the thing I don’t want to do,” he says. “But I don’t want to do that. Writing is everything to me.”
Angela Serwaa-Marfo • May 16, 2017 at 10:03 pm
A novel? I never knew he was doing that! Well power to him!