MOST WRITERS of fiction don't come to the craft in their younger years.

They're too busy making their way in the world – added to which they need a certain bedrock of experience to provide the skills they need.

Writing fiction is writing of human nature and human weakness. Readers don't want to see the world portrayed as a bed of roses.

JK Rowling started to write about Harry Potter in a bistro with a cup of coffee. WJ Burley, of the Wycliffe detective novels, lived for many months on fish and spuds before getting into print.

Not that I'll ever be in their class. My beginnings were far more prosaic - a failed gas boiler in the middle of winter. I lived in Sussex at the time, working as a contract lecturer.

Jobs were getting thin on the ground when the engineer arrived, ran a few checks and announced “You need a new boiler”.

It was the end of a perfect day. I put my house on the market, planning a move to the north where properties were cheaper – and took up writing to relieve the boredom of waiting for the punters to arrive.

I made all the mistakes beginners make: inconsistent characters, creaking plots. You name it, I did it.

At length, finding a leaflet in a local library advertising the services of a literary consultancy, I took the plunge. A published writer reviewed my work, gave encouragement – and a deal of trenchant criticism – and got me back on course.

A move to West Yorkshire brought me into contact with the Airedale Writers' Circle, where I learned something of the art of the short story and even gained a runner-up prize.

From there it was no great distance to my first published work, the novella A Lonely Road. I now have a full-length novel A Cause To Mourn half-completed and, whilst writing remains hard work, I feel I'm achieving something.

Anyone turning to writing needs to be realistic.

The competition to have manuscripts accepted by mainstream publishers is ferocious, royalties even to successful authors have dwindled, and the disappearance of thousands of independent booksellers has turned most works of fiction into just another supermarket commodity.

For most of us the big time will never beckon. Yet there are still excellent writers about, all making their own way, often resorting to self-publishing to bring their works to the public.

They're not in it for the money – they're there to write, to say what they have to say. And if they can do it, so can anyone else. That's how we get to write.

The next meeting of the Airedale Writers' Circle will be at Sight Airedale, Scott Street, Keighley (behind the library) on July 14 at 7.30pm.

The Circle’s annual general meeting will be followed by a talk by literary agent Jan Michael. The talk itself is due to begin around 8pm. E-mail Peter Morrison on p634morrison@btinternet.com for further information.