SARAH ELLIOTT
WRITING FOR LIGHT
Allow me to introduce myself!
Hey, thanks for stopping by! I'm Sarah, a Nottingham born creative. I claim all of the titles below:
Writer
Poet
Self-published author
Spoken word artist
If you want to know my 'credentials' I guess this covers it:Sarah Elliott is a writer, spoken word artist, poet and self-published author (Warrior Wisdom Sun 2022, United Under One Sun 2023). Sarah regularly hosts workshops and writing hours with the London Writers’ Salon. Her articles and author interviews can be found on The Horror Tree website and her work has been published in Red Rose Thorns magazine, Writing in Community anthology and Hope is a Group Project. Sarah is currently writing a tarot-inspired collection of flash fiction, short prose and poetry. The Substack newsletter titled A Writer’s Life chronicles Sarah’s writing journey. Sarah is the interviews coordinator for the Horror Tree website and an editor for Trembling With Fear (Horror Tree magazine).
In my own words
How I claimed the mantle of a writer!
Just do it! The well known phrase from Nike probably trying to encourage you to just buy their merchandise. I’ve always been a bit more of an Adidas fan myself; my feet never really fit into Nike shoes. My feet, like me never really fit. Never really fit into my existence; the expectations, the programmes, the persona and the image. Today I’m taking the phrase ‘just do it’ to apply to my writing. I am actually sitting down to write what will be the first of many blogs, articles, stories, poems — whatever. It has taken me forever to get to this stage.I am a writer and I always have been; since I was a child. Nobody told me I was a writer, I didn’t tell myself and the option was never really out there. I loved writing in school and I still have some of my English books from secondary school up in the loft. One of my English teachers read a piece of my work and commented in red pen (as teachers did back then) that I could earn money writing like this! How? Becoming an author never occurred to me and the only occupation I could think of where you earned money writing was being a journalist. That was my exposure.I remember doing work experience at a local newspaper. I got to shadow a journalist and write a tiny article. I can’t even remember what it was about but I remember that it didn’t really light me up. Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t expecting to be the next Lois Lane (my only example of a journalist and she was white so that role couldn’t apply to me) but whilst I enjoyed being in a real newspaper office, I didn’t find it particularly creative. And I didn’t fit.
I think I stopped writing creatively when I left secondary school and went to Sixth Form. I didn’t study English at A level so in my head that was it. I didn’t write because I never thought to do it for fun and because I didn’t write, I no longer felt I really could. Until not too long ago.Remember how I mentioned that my feet never really fit into Nikes? Well I tried to make them fit. I tried to make my feet small, I tried lots of different sizes, different styles, tried to stretch them out with newspaper and they still didn’t feel comfortable. At times they were bearable but hardly that perfect Cinderella fit.Reflects my life really and decisions I’ve made. My mum was a nurse and when I was little I wanted to be a nurse. I adored my mum and wanted to be like her and be loved by everyone the way she was. I was really clever at school though. I could read before I’d started school, read every single book in the whole school before I finished the Infants (aged seven) and in the Juniors I was in a class with children two years older than me.But as Uncle Ben warned, with great powers come great responsibility. And with great intelligence comes great expectations. So being a nurse wasn’t good enough. I wanted to be a doctor; a paediatrician in fact because I was pretty good with children. This fit beautifully with the programme; the image the family wanted to present. Unfortunately, attending a comprehensive school didn’t allow for such high expectations. I wasn’t allowed to take the three sciences needed to pursue a career in medicine because we could only pick one or two from each column for our options (rigid much?).And, that was it. That was the end of that idea. Career advice was shocking back then and to be honest no one expected a black girl from a working class council estate to amount to much, despite having consistently great grades. I never thought to pick up the extra GCSE at college. So I downgraded and aspired to become a pharmacist (no offence). That was still medicine, right? I was still kind of fitting the mould. It was only like going from Air Jordans to Air Max. But Nike doesn’t fit me!So, during Sixth Form, I changed career aspirations again; a teacher, a respectable vocation and one that stuck. My toes were still a bit tight though. But no wriggle room because in my late teens it happened. The single game changer that stumped me. Flatlined. Like a finger snap from Thanos. And so my writing abandoned me or I abandoned it because to be honest, after what happened, it was all I could do to breathe in and out — anything else was a bonus.Nothing prepared me for that single event that halted my authentic expression. Nothing prepares you for a bereavement and this was a major one. I’m not quite ready to write about it yet but one day I will be. I am one step closer because I have chosen to write.
I have my Adidas now, quite a few pairs actually. And I’ve found where I fit, comfortably. Not too comfortably because change is both natural and certain and change is growth: transformation.That is what my first self-published book is about. The battles we go through. We're still standing though, right?
Curious to know more?
Check out my writing!
I keep myself busy being creative. I write speculative fiction - I love a touch of the supernatural. I also flex my fingers with some regular journalistic work at the Horror Tree website. Here are some of my favourite articles and author interviews:
- How do you start and maintain a writing habit?
- Saving Endangered Fantastical Creatures
- Interview with Matt Micheli - author of The White
I have no plans to write a novel but I would love to publish a book of short stories. I enjoy writing flash fiction. Here's drabble (story with exactly 100 words) that was published online:
(You may have to do some serious scrolling to find it, but the website has some great content so it won't be a chore!)And if you're curious as to how I was drawn to all things spec fic and supernatural, this goes some way to explaining it:
Just one more thing...
And finally!
Well, I guess that's me. The creative part of me anyway. You can catch me hosting on a weekly basis at London Writers' Salon. It's a great community. If I don't see you at Writers' Hour, maybe I'll see you at an open mic event! Stay creative! Stay joyful!Oh, and why Writing for Light? Because my writing is my joy and it keeps me in the light. I write for:
Love
Intuition
Growth
Honesty
TruthI love to connect with other creatives and I'm open to writing opportunities and collaborations. You know where to find me!