The Writer's Column ft Favour Egbogun

Favour Egbogun is a writer, storyteller, and photographer. She writes beautifully crafted Christian fiction that leaves her readers hearts yearning for more and most importantly, transformed.

Writing journey 

Favour got inspired to write when she read a friend's poem. She was attending covenant university at the time and she was at 100 level. She fell in love with the poem. Prior to this, she had always loved literature and it was something she wanted to do but had not written anything before reading that poem. 

This was the beginning of my writing journey, however, I was not serious with it, Favour claims. She showed a friend one of the pieces she wrote and the person said: "oh this is good, your writings are not shallow, they are quite deep". This made her want to write more so she joined the writing team of DAVAASS MEDIA and was able to fulfill her dreams of writing more. She was so inspired. 

People began to know her as someone that writes. One thing led to the other and she stopped writing for a while. In 2019, she got back to it, she would submit entries for competitions and would never get feedbacks, well she did get one feedback, she was part of the top 32 out of over 100 entries but unfortunately, she did not make it to the final stage. She continued to write stories for competitions but would never finish and end up not submitting them.

Favour was not the child that always knew she wanted to write. Yes, she was interested in art, poetry, and the likes but she never knew that about herself, she just found herself writing. The more she discovered about herself, the more she got to realize that she could actually express herself with the words she writes. 

She took some classes in writing and read books to improve and better understand the art of writing. 

In 2020, she wrote a script titled a King's king and co-produced it with a friend who was the director in photography, the story was told in pictures. You can watch a King's king on Youtube with the link below.

https://youtu.be/6btNZI14n4g

Turning point

She still remembers it like it was yesterday. Miss Uwaila Omozuwa, a 100 level microbiology student studying at the University of Benin was beaten, hit with a fire extinguisher, and raped by unknown gunmen inside her local church on Wednesday 27th May 2020. This sad and unfortunate event inspired Favour to write a poem on rape, she poured out her emotions in that poem, and surprisingly, it got so many likes and reposts. She said to herself, for people to like this poem, it means it is actually good. 

Writing challenges

One of the challenges she faced was basically her not believing in herself. There was just this imposter syndrome of self-doubt that was lurking around her. Thankfully, with God and the support of her family, she learned to push through that fear and overcome the spirit of self-doubt. 

She also noticed that people kept leaving positive comments on her works. They were like; this is lovely, it is so timely, it spoke to me, etc. This also helped in building her confidence. 

Another challenge she faced was monetizing her writing. As a beginner, she wanted to try things out so she got a job at an animation company, the pay was low but she took it regardless because she wanted the experience and wanted to build her portfolio. Her job description was basically to write scripts for animations. It was an interesting experience she says. 

Back then, she did not have the mind to challenge the price and state her worth because she felt she was inexperienced. Thank God that is all in the past now. She has been able to build her confidence and give her clients her price worth.

Motivation

Her greatest motivation is to see people change, make Christ known, and draw people closer to God through her stories. She is also motivated by God, people, her family, and her desire to tell Godly stories.

Photography

As the covid 19 Pandemic kicked in fully, she delved into photography. She would write a story, take pictures that would illustrate the story, and post them on social media. This idea was not random, it came from God and was inspired by a book she read by Laju Iren titled Mirror Mirror.

One thing Favour has learned is that as a writer or a creative in general, whatever genre you are into, you should be bold about it. She writes Christian fiction and when she started writing in this genre, she thought, they were very few Christian fiction writers, it is not popular so people might not want to read it, but this did not detour her. She kept writing, in fact, she did not really care because that was what she was passionate about, she still is.

Stories of Light

Favour published her debut book titled stories of light this year. Stories of light is an anthology that comprises 50 literary works; 41 stories, 7 poems, and 2 letters that will leave you captivated and wanting more. It centers around young adults and the challenges they face in their Christian journey. 

She never knew she was going to publish a book much less an anthology in 2021. She always thought her first book was going to be a novel but God had other plans for her. She found herself writing series of short stories, then God told her to compile all the stories she had written and put them in a book. 

She always knew she was going to write and publish a book someday. She even started working on a story but she did not know she was not going to publish this particular story, at least not yet. 

The whole process of writing and publishing her book made her began to respect authors even more because to sit down, come up with ideas for a book, write down those ideas, publish it and get someone to actually buy it is not easy at all.

She worked on stories of light for about 2-3 months before it was published. So far, she has gotten a lot of positive feedbacks and reviews from readers. A particular reader called her and said; she was so blessed and the book impacted her. 

Stories of light is an amazing book, one that will transform your life, so you should definitely read it. You can purchase the ebook at Okadabooks and if you want the hard copy, please leave a comment with your email address and we will get back to you. 

You can connect with Favour on Instagram @fa.vour

Thank you for reading and see you in the next episode.