Hema Macherla has overcome more hurdles than most writers in her quest for publication. Her novel Breeze From the River Manjeera, due to be published by Linen Press this month, was written in her second language.

‘My first language is Telugu, from southern India. When I first came to the UK, I couldn’t speak any English, but I started learning it by reading women’s magazines and children’s books with a dictionary on my side. Fortunately I made some English friends, and talking to them improved my English.

‘It was the biggest challenge in my life to write a novel in English. I found it very difficult. I had to gather so much courage to go to my local creative writing class, but that helped me enormously. My major problem was, and still is, my grammar, especially English tenses.’

Breeze From the River Manjeera tells the story of a young Indian girl who comes to the UK and finds herself trapped in an abusive arranged marriage. The novel was placed 26th out of 44,000 books in the Richard and Judy Book Club competition. Hema is now working on a second novel and plans to co-write a third book with a friend.

Breeze From the River Manjeera, published on 30 October is available from Linen Press: website: www.linenpressbooks.co.uk

Source : http://www.writersnews.co.uk

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