There’s a special kind of torture reserved for writers. Oh we strive for it. We write it and rewrite it in our heads. Editing it with each new burst of writing hope and energy. The author bio.

Today I was unexpectedly but quite happily asked to provide an author bio and a photo, and a website link if I have one. Hahaha, a website. No, just me, here, alone, echoing into the void. Because, drum roll please, the previously mentioned short story is indeed going into the promised collection. A series of short stories entered into a competition and where mine was one of the chosen ones. (Imagine cherubic and beautiful sounding hallelujahs – I do).

One hundred words in the third person is the brief. Sounds simple enough. Except now I’ve spent half the afternoon rearranging the same four or five pieces of information about myself into legible sentences, questioning my personality and wondering if I sound vaguely thoughtful and writerish or like I should be on a watchlist.

The short story is mildly amusing SF. My previous publication is poetry. The manuscripts in the file on my laptop span a literary type psychological thriller (The Black Book), a YA time travelling romp in the manner of general standard YA, then there’s the YA dystopian zombie apocalypse -again very much of it’s genre. A rom-com chick-lit comedy madness, a slightly Hallmarky romance with a vague streak of amusement and two terribly serious therapy-based non-fictions, one of which is fairly authoritative. The other might suffer a serious brush with the delete button, I remain unsure.
There’s a few partial beginnings of ideas in notebooks and files and as of two days ago the first three chapters of the follow up to The Black Book, The White Room. Back to the dark literary psychology.
So what genre am I? Some variant on Nora Roberts? A twist of Matt Haig? A hotch-potch and mish-mash of the ideas which gallop around in my head like feral calliope horses.
I can’t write that in a bio. Then I’d just sound weird.

And then there’s the photo.
Oh, the photo.

I have perused many author photos in my years of reading. The first I remember is Jayne Fisher who wrote The Garden Gang. She was nine when she started writing those books and I was in awe. This seemed the ideal thing for a child to be doing. For me to be doing.
I was inspired by this child who had her own author picture on the back of her books. Later I would see Stephen King as he matured through his years and many other authors. I took pictures for my mum when she too needed some serious and professional ish pictures.

But, it’s Tuesday and the agent wants it by Friday. Do I have time to do my roots? Maybe get a mild facelift before Friday? Because that’s realistic, right? Does everyone have this existential crises of “that’s what I’ll look like on there forever”. But then also be pleased because WOW – there’s a reason to have a picture and what an amazing dilemma to have. But still a dilemma.

There’s also the ethical question of filters. I refuse them, on the grounds of authenticity. I would hate to be unrecognisable if I was to have reason to be known. But then I bet Stephen King occasionally wishes his pictures didn’t look like him so he could have a moments peace.
But I did, absolutely, turn the picture black and white because that’s not a filter, it’s sophistication. Right? It says “serious writer energy,” not “I-just-spent-twenty-minutes-trying-to-find-the-flattering-side-of-my-face-but-there-might-not-be-one”.

The worst part is I’ve now read my own bio so many times that none of the words look real. Psychotherapist. Writer. Yorkshire. It all feels like a jumble of made-up syllables. Psychoshire, writerist, therayork. I could replace them with “candle enthusiast” and “occasional dust gatherer” and no one would notice.

But in the end, it’s done. The photo exists. The words are written. The deadline looms. And somewhere, deep in the universe, I doubt anyone cares but me.
Still I am proud and pleased and excited and all manner of other things making me into the giddiest of kippers, lets hope the picture isn’t too much of a fish face.