Writing 101, Day 3

Today’s Prompt: Write about the three most important songs in your life — what do they mean to you?

Only three?  That might be hard.  Well, let’s see, if I’ve only got three, we’ll go with Run, Rabbit Run, by Eminem, Angel From Montgomery by Bonnie Raitt, and Landslide by Stevie Nicks.

If you’re a writer living in obscurity, likely broke, maybe with kids, and you’ve never listened to Run, Rabbit, Run, go do it.  Don’t bother with the awful movie that spawned it, I wouldn’t want you to have to sit through it.  But the song speaks to something very deep in my heart about writers block, and trying to find the right words to express the image I’ve got in my head.  It’s nice to know that maybe I’m not the only one who can see a scene just right in my mind, but then when I try to write it out, it just crashes and burns like the Hindenburg.

Angel From Montgomery is one that my mom used to sing when I was little, so I hear her voice when I listen to it.  Even though she and I aren’t close, and never really were, it makes me think of the way I felt then, when I was little and she was the strongest person I knew.  Besides that, Bonnie’s just got this voice, you know?  It’s so deep and powerful.

And Landslide.  Just step away for a moment from the legacy and legend that is Stevie Nicks, and think about the song itself, and the myriad of meanings it can have for the listener.  When I first heard it, I would have said it was about a woman who’s husband was leaving her, and she didn’t know what to do with herself.  She’d wrapped up too much of who she was in being his lover.  Now, I hear a mother’s lament in it.  “Time makes you bolder, children get older, I’m getting older, too.  And if you see my reflection in a snow covered hill, the landslide will bring you down.”  Now, it’s the image of a woman who’s daughter is moving out into the world, away from her.  We build our lives around our children, and when they leave there’s a hole where they were.  But I think we all secretly believe that they’ll look at themselves and see a part of us there.  No matter how bad your relationship with your parents, there are parts of them in you, the same as there will be parts of you in your children.  For better or worse.

Music’s always been so crucial to me.  It expresses emotions in a way I have very rarely seen prose writers manage, hard as we may try.  We writers, we paint a landscape.  Song writers show us one flower.

2

Writing 101, Day Two

Today’s Prompt: If you could zoom through space in the speed of light, what place would you go to right now?

So, this one didn’t have a time limit, so I’m going with my normal ten minute sprint.

If I could be anywhere at all right now?  Pittsburgh.  I know, it’s not exotic, and it’s not far away, but it’s my favorite place in the world.  I got a chance to explore some more of my favorite city over Christmas.  My mother in law got tickets to a musical event at Heinz Hall, thinking that my older daughter wouldn’t be with us that night.  Plans changed, and she was.  We couldn’t get an extra ticket, but I saw a Starbucks across the street.  Now, understand that I live in a very small town, and I am sometimes a hipster.  I love Starbucks and we don’t have one in my little town of Butler.  So, I jumped on the chance to go write there while my family saw the show.

I wrote a whole new prolog for Broken Patterns.  And I looked around at all of the people.  There was just so much life there, so much going on.  Tired college students working on their studies, a couple sitting way too close to each other, parents trying to have some quiet time while their kids munched on some huge cookies.

After the show, back out on the streets, there was a girl doing a fire eating show, trying to make some extra money for school.  Did you know there’s this great place in Pittsburgh called the Cathedral of Learning?  It’s like a massive castle, and it’s open all the time for the college students to go study in.  Situated in the middle of the campuses, it’s like a dream of a mage acadamy.  Oh, and there’s a little coffee bar on the second floor that sells snacks.  If I could be anywhere at the speed of light right now, I’d be there.  I’d be sipping a coffee, typing this up.  Well, I’ve got the writing and the coffee (Starbucks house blend, I buy it in bean form and grind it myself,)  But I don’t have the Cathedral.  That’s my favorite place on Earth, I’ll tell you that.  If you ever get a chance to visit, do it.

Oh, and the park right in the middle of the three rivers, with the huge fountain?  You know, the one so big they had to install a special meter that lowers the water on windy days so it doesn’t hit the nearby buildings, and kids play in the outer ring in the summer.

Did I mention that in Pittsburgh you can find people fishing in the rivers in good weather?  Just fishing, in the middle of the city. Yeah, that’s how we roll here.

That’s the end of my ten minutes.  See you tomorrow.

4

Writing 101, Day One

Ugh, I’m a slacker.  This was meant to go up yesterday, sorry.

Alright, so day one’s prompt is to just free write, about anything, for twenty minutes.  So, here’s mine.  Forgive any messiness in this post.  As the rules say, I am not thinking about what I’m writing, just keeping my fingers moving for twenty whole minutes.

Now, this is really fun, free writing.  I’ve always loved it.  See, I see writing as play acting, always.  I act out the characters in my head, and I play every part, even the men.  Even the bad guys, especially the bad guys.  I love writing for the bad guys.  so, free writing is like just playing make believe with your friends, the way my daughters do.  Alright, let’s play secret agents, or princesses in space, or FBI.  Now we’re Dr. Who’s companions, now we’re mermaids.  My kids are kind of eclectic.

Speaking of mermaids, I found a picture on Pintrest earlier that showed Ariel, from the Little Mermaid, sewing up her legs to get her fins back.  The message was that if you change yourself for someone else, you will eventually regret it with all of your heart.  It was a rather gruesome picture, but boy did that strike me.  I mean, think about the ramifications of that.  The love of her life, it didn’t matter at all when compared to being herself.  What if she had just stayed who she was?  What if she had found someone who could love her for who she was?

On the other hand, Ariel wasn’t happy as she was born.  She really wanted to be human, and live on land.  I have no idea why, but it was what she really wanted.  Maybe she did what she did to be comfortable in her own skin like Chaz Bono.  Just a thought.

See what I mean?  Having to keep your fingers moving four a whole twenty minutes brings out all sorts of things you wouldn’t normally consider.  I usually hate old Disney Princess movies.  Bell had Stockholm syndrome, Sleeping Beauty and Snow White were useless even if they were the main characters.  Cinderella was a wuss.  Arial might have had to be saved by the men in her life, but at least she went for what made her happy.  There’s a lesson in that, I think.

Sorry, I have daughters, I spend way too much time talking about princesses.  You should hear them go on about Anna and Elsa.  My goodness.

Which is a good example of the amazing amount of age bracket cross over recently.  Hunger Games, Divergent, Frozen, Harry Potter and Doctor Who are all good examples of things that are loved by people my age, (I turn 29 this year) and kids my daughters age,(10 and 11)  Is it because my kids are getting older?  Are they just more mature than other kids their age?  Am I childish?  Or is it just something about my generation?  Are we terminally stuck in our own childhood?  Maybe, think about all the remakes of things my generation loved.  TMNT, Transformers.  Even The Giver can be traced back to us, you know.

Now that was a great book.  Really, the gem of the dystopian future genre.  Really, if you haven’t read it, do.  I read it once a year for my birthday, and have ever since I was thirteen.  That’s fifteen times I’d read the same book, and every time I read it, it means something new to me.  Seriously, read it.  Before you see the book.

That, I think, is something that we as writers must all have a love/hate relationship with.  We see all these books get awesome blockbuster movies, and that makes us drool.  Makes me drool, anyway.  The thought of having my story, that started in my head, playing out on the screen?  But I think that we, as readers, also worry that it cheapens the story somehow.  For instance, I hate hearing someone say, “I loved the Divergent movie, but I had no idea it was a book until you just told me.”  Really?

On the other hand, I’ve always said that there is some great writing that’s never been in the binding of a book.  Gotham’s got a great story line, I’m a huge fan of the whole Avengers Vs. X-men story, Mass Effect is a great story too, and it’s a video game.  So maybe we shouldn’t be so judgmental of people who appreciate a great story in alternative forms?  And, I mean, it’s not like there aren’t books that are total trash.  Fifty Shades of Grey, Twilight.  You know what I mean.  So maybe we should be focusing on telling the good stories, no matter how we tell them.  I’m sure watching Leverage is going to be better for someone than reading Twilight.

Well, that was twenty minutes.  Thanks for indulging me.  And I hope that gives you a fun behind the scenes look at how weird my brain is.  We went from free writing about free writing to Leverage.

Have a great night, everyone.

0

The Writing Life- Orginizing Submissions

You should know by now that I have a thing about organization. Especially when it comes to my writing, keeping order is keeping my sanity.

Submissions are a pretty big thing to keep organized. If you haven’t started yet, start right now. If you’ve only got one submission, set up your process anyway. Those suckers will multiply like ferrets if you’re doing your job right. Get ready now, because you need to keep track of a lot.

Who did you send this project to? This is a no brainer. If you sent your manuscript to an agent and they politely pass on it, they are going to be less polite when you lose track and send it to them again. You have wasted your time and theirs.

Now, an often overlooked portion of this step is making a distinction between the agent and the agency. When you submit a manuscript to an agent who is part of an agency, they probably showed it around to their fellow agents who might also want to look at it. So don’t, unless informed otherwise by the submission guidelines, send that same work to a different agent. You also need to keep a list of agents by name. It is absolutely plausible that when you sent your manuscript to agency A and agent 1 read it there, then moves to agency B, they still read your book already.

You will also want to track what sort of reaction you got from agencies and publications. If you have a lot of short stories you’re selling at once, you’ve going to have some cross over. I have a few markets that I often send my work to. When you do that, you are going to see some trends. This magazine likes your work, but this one never gives you a positive response. Maybe it’s time to look at magazine B. Either you need to step up your game, or decide that this isn’t the market that’s going to appreciate your voice.

If all this isn’t enough to keep track of, I’ve got one more important piece of data for you to track. How many submissions did you send out in a month? When I’ve got a lot of active projects, I love to play the beat my own high score. Remember, when you’re a writer, you are your biggest competition. Don’t worry about what any other writer is doing. Be a better writer than you were last month. So, try to send out more work this month than you did last month.

Now that we know what we’re tracking, we have to have a system to track it. Now, this is something that I have struggled with over the years. I started out tracking agents on index cards. That was concise, but messy. Then I tried to incorporate cross indexing, and it was such a mess.

Then, when I tried and failed to sell my murder mystery, I wrote down every agent I sent it to by the month. At the same time I had this complicated, color coded chart of short fiction, markets and reactions. It was a huge ball of highlighter

So now, I am working in Open Office to create a super simple list. I love this because it is searchable. I can look up an agents name with a simple control F. I list the title of the project, then under that the market, date I sent it, date I got an answer and what that answer was. It is taking a lot for me to do this, because I am really addicted to paper. But it is so much easier, that I’ll just have to get over it.

Whatever style you like now, don’t be scared to move it around and change it up. The important part with this is organizing data. You need to see the patterns this data will make to make better decisions about your writing business.

This week’s affiliate sponsor is Share A Sale. If you want a great starter way to incorporate adds in your writing that’s not pushy or skeevy, check them out.

How do you organize your submissions? Are you happy with it, or do you think it could be better?

0

Don’t Do This When Submitting Your Writing

If you’ve been a writer for more than an hour, you know that there are a whole freaking lot of reasons why an agent or editor will reject your work. There are a lot more reasons for them to reject you than accept you. To start with, anything in their huge pile that’s better than your work.

Maybe it’s too long, too short, not in a style that’s consistent with the rest of their magazine. They’ve already been pitched three other books about carnivorous office supplies this week, and yours isn’t as creative as the first three. There’s just no end to that list.

That’s all really subjective stuff, though. If you’re rejected because your work isn’t the right fit, or because there were others that were better, that’s not a negative reflection on you. It’s just part of the game we play as writers. They say getting published is like winning the lottery. If you play, you really might never win. But you’re sure to never win if you don’t bother playing at all.

Of course, you’re also sure to never win if you buy a ticket and then toss it in the river. Or finger paint on it. At this point in the metaphor, I might have lost you. What I mean is, there are some sure fire ways to make sure your submission gets tossed, deleted, and possibly even scorned. So please, if you ever want to stand a chance of getting published, don’t do anything on this list.

* Don’t send your submissions in on anything at all besides regular white paper onto which you have printed your work in regular black ink. Do not send drives, no sensible person would put it anywhere near their computer. Don’t use some fancy stationary, don’t use any color but black ink. Seriously, this is a business venture, not a letter you’re sending to your buddy from summer camp.

* Don’t send anything an agent or editor didn’t specifically ask for in their submission guidelines. Usually they want a query letter, synopsis and maybe a brief author’s bio. They do not want pictures of you, little ‘gifts’ or really any other creative thing you might come up with. Just send what they ask for, because I promise you it is all they want to see. This also means things like perfume. Don’t spray your letter, manuscript, or any other thing you’re sending with anything. At best it’s annoying, at worst it’s an emergency trip for an agent with an allergy.

* Don’t do anything stupid with your manuscript. This was one I didn’t even know was a thing until I heard an editor complaining about it on Writing Excuses. Apparently some writers will do stupid things like turning a page of their manuscript backwards. I guess this is to see if the agent has read that far. I imagine that if I were an agent, and I was reading a manuscript, and I found a backwards page, it would just piss me off. You really don’t want an agent to be pissed off at you.

* Don’t fail to read the submission guidelines before you do anything else at all. Read them, take notes, and make sure you abide by them to the letter! There is lots of room for creativity and spontaneity in our field. This is not one of them! If an agent says he only accepts non fiction, don’t send him your fantasy novel. If an editor asks for paper submissions and you e-mail yours, it will be deleted, not read. If you send your full manuscript when the agent asked for nothing more than a query letter, it will be tossed in the trash and you will have wasted a whole lot of time and ink.

* Don’t pester people. If an agent hasn’t responded to you in the time she said she would, and she did not specifically say it was alright to contact her, don’t. While there is a chance that your manuscript got lost in the shuffle, it’s far more likely she read it, decided to pass, and didn’t have the time to send you a letter. That’s why most agents put on their site how long to wait. So you’re not waiting around for nothing if they just don’t have the time to respond to you. They’re just not that into you, move on.

* Don’t try to bribe them. Just don’t. It won’t work, it will make you look like a pathetic fool, and you will have burned a bridge before you ever set foot on it. If you really want to spend money to get published, just self publish.

* Don’t call an agent or editor, unless they specifically say it’s okay. Spoiler, they probably won’t. From the perspective of an agent, this marks you as a problem client. They assume, and they might very well be right, that you will be the sort of client who is a huge pain in the ass. Agents want to work with professional artists, not huge pains in the ass.

* Don’t go crazy with the fonts. My preference is the good old fashioned times new roman size twelve when I send in work. It doesn’t need to be that, but it should be professional. If you’re not sure a font is professional, don’t use it. Simple as that.

* Don’t tell an agent how much your sister, aunt, babysitter, best friend, husband liked your book. He doesn’t care how much some unnamed person liked it. Yes, your loved one is an amazing human being, and you feel for them the way Leslie Knope feels about her best friend Ann Perkins. No one else cares, unless you’re uncle edits The New Yorker.

* Don’t send a perspective agent your whole damn life story, unless you’re writing an autobiography about how you worked with Green Peace to paint peace signs onto baby seals to save them from the clubers. Many agents will ask for a bio, and that’s great. Give some colorful details about how you became a writer, and list some of the things that drove you to write this book. Then stop. Save the story for Ellen when she’s interviewing you.

* Don’t mention any work that hasn’t been published, any contests that you entered and didn’t win, or any of the agents you’ve sent your book to that passed on it. Never be ashamed of your failures, because it’s so much better to fail than to not try. But you do not need to brag about all of your attempts to a new business partner. On a similar note, don’t mention any books you’ve written other than the one you’re trying to get representation for. Lots of writers have written several books that just weren’t up to scratch. That’s nothing to be ashamed of, I’ve got three of my own. No agent will ever hear about them. If I mention them, an agent might be afraid I want her to represent them, instead of the awesome book I’m presenting her with today.

* Don’t lie, mislead, or try to over blow your accomplishments. It’s unethical, sleazy, and you will absolutely without a doubt get caught. You will also get blackballed.

* And finally, don’t send anything to an agent that you haven’t checked, rechecked, run by a friend, and then checked again.

The good news is this, if you avoid these fifteen things, you’ll present yourself as a professional writer who’s not going to be a huge pain in the ass to work with. Believe me, that will make you a very appealing prospect.

1

Writing Prompt Saturday- Write a Habin

How is it possible that I have never heard of this before? What with my love of haiku, sent you and tanka poetry, you would have thought I would have found Habin a long time ago.

It’s not a poetry form, strictly speaking. Think of it as more of a prose form that is designed to complement haikus. It should, in fact must, be beautiful and poetic on its own.

When writing a habin, you want to remember a few things. First, while this is prose that reads like poetry, it traditionally is impersonal. While this is hard to master, it’s not impossible. It’s really a masterful form. Think about it; you’re trying to invoke deep emotions in the reader without imparting any of your own.

I love that. It gives the reader the opportunity to decide how they feel about an image, instead of depending on what the writer thought about it.

So let’s try it. Take a haiku you’ve written, and write a habin to go along with it. If you need some inspiration, here’s one of mine.

Wetness in the air
Grey clouds heavy overhead
Washing off old snow

It’s a simple moment in a simple day, these clouds above a rain soaked ground. While the sun might be a pleasure at this dark and wet time, if there was no rain, the dark mess of the snow might linger until it’s covered by fresh again.

Our affiliate sponsor for the week is Pen Boutique. They’re still doing a ten percent off sale. Which is a pretty good deal if you’re looking to invest in a Filofax planner, like I am.

Did you write a Habin poem? Let us see it in the comment section below.

0

Markets- Brittle Star

For no reason I can think of, I’ve been finding markets that don’t accept e-mail submissions recently. Sorry for the long term investment of time submissions, but sometimes it’s nice to return to our roots. Man, do I remember those days. Typing up a submission, then printing it out and praying I could get it into an envelope before formula or coffee got spilled on it. Cursing because I’d run out of ink (why is ink so expensive, anyway? I swear it would be easier to just buy a new damn printer.) Sending out submissions with the old school self addressed stamped envelopes. Waiting weeks and weeks to get a rejection letter. These days I can get rejected four times before Wednesday, and still have plenty of time for more.

Anyway, let us indulge in some nostalgia, and take a look at Brittle Star.

I’ve always had a soft spot for literary magazines. They have such an air of creativity and cutting edge art. Brittle Star is no exception.

Genre- It’s open, but this is a literary magazine, so you really don’t want to send in anything too super genre specific.
Word count- For poetry, any length, but only send four poems at a time.
For short fiction, limit 2,000 words, and you can send two at a time.
Payout- Not listed.
Wait time- Also not listed.

Make sure to check out the submission guidelines. This is an overseas magazine, so their general rules are a little different than normal. I always advise checking out the submission guidelines.

Our affiliate sponsor this week is Pen Boutique. If you haven’t checked them out yet, you should. They’re doing a ten percent off sale right now. Oh, and I might have not mentioned this before, but they have Filofax planners!

Did you have any luck with this magazine? Let me know, and I’ll put it on the monthly brag board! It goes up the last day of every month.

0

Check This Out- Self Publishing Review

Understand that the irony of kicking off a month devoted to submissions with a shout out to a blog devoted to forgoing the whole notion is not lost on me.  But I am a woman who firmly believes in duality.  I plan on seeking an agent for Woven, it is true.  But I have other plans, plans that involve e-books.  I intend to self publish those.  So when it comes to the great debate between self publishing and traditional publishing, you’ll see that I’ve got a foot in both camps, and I like it that way.

The Self Publishing Review found its way onto my Feedly feed very recently, as part of my effort to work harder at the business side of this creative business.  It’s got all the sort of articles that you’d expect for a site like this, advice about formatting, different self publishing companies to consider, and a fine selection of editors that you can hire to check your work before you self publish.   (Do this)

Basically, if you want to self publish, you want to do two things first; read this blog in July when I’ll be devoting a whole month to it (spoiler!), and check out Self Publishing Review.

What do you think of Self Publishing?  Did you check out Self Publishing Review?  What was your favorite post?

0

Plans for April- Submissions

Alright, so we’ve talked about a lot of things.  Characters, and organization, and planning and plotting.  We’ve talked about getting inspired, and what to do if you’re not so inspired so you get your ass in your chair and write anyway. I’m ready to talk about the next step now.  I’m ready to talk about submissions. After all, it doesn’t matter much how star spangled terrific your writing is if you never send it anywhere.  Kind of makes sense, right? This month, we’re going to talk all about the scary, crazy, frustrating, intimidating, amazing world of fiction submissions.  For me, they’re kind of like a job interview and a blind date mixed together, where his parents might stop by to visit. The submission process is the where you set aside your artist hat, and put on your business hat for a time.  You’ve created a product.  An amazing product that no one else could have made, your story.  It deserves to be presented in the best of packaging. This month, we will-

  • Break down exactly what goes into a submission packet.
  • Learn how to write the perfect query letter.
  • Talk about what you should, and absolutely should not do when sending queries.
  • And talk about rejection letters, because I don’t care if you’re the next Tolkien, you’re going to get rejected.

Any opening thoughts about submissions?  How excited are you to send out your work?

0

listening to children

Recently I’ve realized that I’ve done almost nothing for children’s writers. This makes less than no sense, because in my opinion, children’s authors are super heroes. You think I’m wrong? I’m not, and I can prove it, too. Think back to your very first favorite book. I am willing to bet it was not an adult book, and it likely wasn’t a young adult book, either. My very first favorite book ever was Where The Wild Things are, by Maurice Sendack. I read that book twice a day on average. I also read Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs, and it’s thrilling sequel, Pickles To Pittsburgh. I devoured these books and gradually discovered bigger and bigger books. Goosebumps, The Baby Sitter’s Club, Chocolate Fever, The Last of The Unicorns. If I hadn’t learned to love reading with these, I might never have bothered with Philippa Gregory, Robert Jordan, Brandon Sanderson, or any of the other adult writers I love so much.

If you write for adults, stick around. We’re going to talk about that too. Today, we are talking about developing a skill that tool me years to master; listening to children. It’s all about character building, you remember, and some of your characters just might be children. So, if you don’t have any of your own kids, borrow some.

Learning the language

Children don’t talk the same way adults do. It’s like a whole new language, or an old one depending on how you look at it. And I’m not just talking about word usage, though that is a big factor. Kids string together words in a fresher, less uniform way than adults, because they haven’t yet learned the way everyone says things. They don’t use cliche phrases or metaphors. They just say it just how they see it. This can also be hilarious.

Learning the ideas

Another thing you’ll learn when listening to children is that they have what they think are all new ideas about, oh everything! Simple things are new to them, and they have none of the structural knowledge that we as grown ups are burdened with. You give a grown up a coffee cup. Unless they spend too much time on pintrest, there are about four things we can do with that cup.

A kid, oh my goodness, a kid will look at the coffee cup and give you ways to use it that you never in your wildest dreams considered. It’s a Barbie bath, it’s a car, it’s literally anything you could possibly think of. So when you’re writing for children characters you have to keep in mind that level of creativity. You have to learn how to see the world like a child sees the world again.

Learning the topics of high importance

Another really important thing to consider when writing for a child character is that what adult considers important is nowhere near what a child considers important. Time moves so different. Remember when it felt like Christmas was never going to happen because there was just no possible way that many days could go past.

Things that are important to children are things like shiny rocks on the sidewalk or finding a $5 bill on the ground. That is a monumental event to a child. Though to be fair if I find a five dollar bill on the ground that’s a pretty monumental event but that’s another story. (A sad one about a starving artist who likes coffee shops too much.)

The point is, children see the world with more excited eyes, they know things that we as adults have entirely forgotten. So when you’re going to write children characters, you need to spend time around children to remember their level of priorities.

So take some time and spend it around small children. They don’t need to be yours. Trust me you can always find ways to borrow other people’s kids if you don’t have any nieces or nephews or friends with kids.

Look for babysitting jobs if you’re still in college or high school. People are always looking for people to watch their kids especially if your affordable, because believe me as a parent, affordable childcare is not a thing that exists.

Take a notebook and just listen to them talk and take notes. The kid will love being the center of your attention and you will be in a better position to write a child character for your next book.

Our affiliates sponsor this week is Pen Boutique if you get a chance be sure to check them out. I swear, I found half my birthday wish list there.

And don’t forget to check us out on Monday on Facebook for the literary agent of the week, and on Thursdays for the discussion of the week.

So what do you think? When you need to write about a child character what do you do to get inspired? even better what was your favorite book of the kid that sparked your love of reading?

1

A WordPress.com Website.

Up ↑