Flash Fiction to be Published

As in - MINE! 

I've been digging around Duotrope's Digest, which lists magazines, journals, publishers, etc. of fiction and poetry.  It's a great resource for finding places to submit short stories and poems.  I figured I should try to break into some magazines with small pieces as a way to gain publishing credits I can use in my query letters.  Plus, I have a couple older pieces that I really love and felt were good enough to be published somewhere.  It can be difficult to find just the right outlet for your short stories/poetry because you have to read the actual journals/magazines to see what their tastes are, and not every one offers archives or samples on their websites.  And I don't know about anyone else, but I don't want to spend $10 per back issue, or $20 or more per yearly subscription just to find out if that publication would be a good fit for me.

So anyway, I started looking for outlets under the theme of religious/spiritual, because the two pieces I was looking to submit are spiritual in nature.  Unfortunately, they're not particularly Christian, or Jewish, or about the nature of Christ, or related to Scripture, or...... you get the idea.  Lots of the publications were overtly religious, and my pieces are not.  They're more skeptical and questioning of religion.  Finally, I came across Divine Dirt Quarterly, a brand new e-publication that describes themselves as "theology's tabloid, here to spread the dirt on the divine."  And I thought - perfect!

So at one o'clock this morning, I was sitting with my laptop, doing one last fine-toothed edit on my two pieces (one poem, and one long-poem-turned-flash-fiction-story) and emailing them off to their respective editors.  I was all prepared to sit back and wait for a few weeks for a response, because the website said the slots for the inaugural issue were full and they were currently reading for the second issue.  Imagine my surprise, when I checked my email and saw a response from the fiction editor - he wants to publish my flash fiction in Divine Dirt Quarterly's inagural issue - which will be out later this month!

I'm so freaking excited I can't even express it properly on screen!

Aside from my high school literary magazine, I've never had anything published!  While searching for potential publications, I found myself giving preference to print publications (I mean come on, who doesn't want the satisfaction of holding pages in their hands??) but Divine Dirt Quarterly is online only.  And that's okay, because I felt it was such a great fit for what I'd written that it didn't matter.  Not only that, but the subject matter is something I would enjoy reading, and that I could write more about and possibly submit to them again in the future.  How awesome is that?

So as soon as I have details - like a publication date - I'll post it here!

Thanksgiving!

The world seems to be in Christmas mode already.  Everyone sort of bypasses Thanksgiving.  No one ever decorates for Thanksgiving (except my mom), we don't have cool Thanksgiving songs on the radio, people don't go around saying happy thanksgiving for weeks before the holiday actually occurs.  And working in retail, it's even worse.  So I thought I'd take a moment to do a Thanksgiving post.

Here are some things I'm thankful for:

• My husband, who is supportive of me in all my quirky writing habits, even if he doesn't understand them.
• All the rest of my family, especially my little brother who's a freshman in high school and just underwent his second spinal fusion surgery.  He's braver than me, I think.
• Having a job that pays my bills, no matter how stressed it makes me sometimes.
• My adorable dachshund Button who makes me smile every day.  Even when she uses the floor as a toilet.  And chews my clothes.  And wakes me up at 3am to go potty.  She makes me happy.
• All of my old friends, people I went to high school and college with, who keep those lines of communication open with this slacker who never emails or calls.
• All of the great writers I've met through Authonomy and AQC, who will encourage me when I need it and give critical feedback when I need it, and who inspire me to be a better writer.  I'd name names, but there are too many and I'd forget someone and feel bad.

So those are some of the things I'm thankful for.  What about you?

Review: From the Query to the Call

I recently told you about the ebook I purchased, From the Query to the Call, by Elana Johnson.  This is my review, but first I wanted to mention that Elana has just snagged herself an agent!  Congratulations Elana, you definitely deserve it.  Can't wait to be able to hold one of your books in my hands!

Okay, back to her ebook.  I absolutely dread writing query letters.  For Confessions of a Non-Believer, I actually formulated the basic query even before I started writing.  The whole concept just fit very neatly into query format.  I got lucky there.  But Sorry's Not Enough has been a very different story.  It's a very character-driven novel, and while the plot elements (such as the love affair between two people suddenly going very wrong when they're placed in the roles of student and teacher) certainly garner interest, it's really the emotional journey of the characters that's the most important aspect.  Every time I tried to get advice on my query, I got lots of advice saying "sum up the plot" and "cover the important plot points" or "what happens in the story?" and in trying to answer those questions, the query would end up bogged down in pointless details.  When I tried to focus on the emotional elements, people would say "but what happens?" or "too much psycho-analysis" and "do you really know what your book is about?"

Well OF COURSE I know what it's about! 

So, needless to say, query-writing is a high-anxiety activity for me.  I've read a few of Elana's queries before, and had seen her in action critiquing (very insightfully) other people's queries.  I had high hopes for her ebook, then.  And I can happily report that she did not disappoint.

I expected 20, maybe 25 pages of advice on writing a query, but NO.  The book delivers 63 pages on everything from what a query is/is not, why you need one, and how to write one.  Then, it goes on to discuss researching the best agents for your novel, strategies for submitting and surviving the wait, as well as the rejections, and finally, how to handle "the call" when an agent is interested in representing you. 

It is an interactive ebook, with links to the websites of writers whose query letters she uses as examples, websites to help with your query, and websites to help with agent research.  There's also a link to a set of worksheets to help you craft your query.

The query advice is much more than vague statements about what each paragraph should include - which is much of what I'd encountered previously (e.g. Start with a one or two sentence hook, then give a brief summary of the plot.....etc.)  Elana breaks down the query into small, definable, non-threatening parts and dissects them - there's the hook, the set-up, the conflict, and the consequence.  She explains the purpose of each section, and gives examples from her own and other queries.  As the book progresses, you can see the query taking shape from the examples she gives.

One of the best pieces of advice I took from the book is to write the hook last.  I've always tried to crank out a great hook first, which was stressful.  Using the worksheets, I answered the questions necessary to write the hook, but didn't write it until I had finished writing the rest of the query.  It was actually much easier to come up with a hook at the end.  I also had a major a-ha! moment when she pointed out the circular sense of closure that should come from the query - take the hook, add on your consequences sentence, and that should be your book in a nutshell.  Not sure why that never dawned on me before, but it was a great moment.

This book also helped me realize 1. I need to do more research into the agents I submit to, and 2. I need to expand my potential agent list!

So I still have a few minor tweaks to make on my brand new query before I send it out, but if I get a good request rate after I send some out, I'll share it with you all.  Meanwhile, I highly recommend From the Query to the Call for any writer who wants to craft a strong query and who need a little bit of guidance on what to do once you've got a killer query.

Don't forget to check out Elana on her website, and her blog.

To NaNoWriMo, or Not To NaNoWriMo....

There's a mouthful for ya.  If you're not familiar, NaNoWriMo is National Novel Writing Month.  Thirty days of literary abandon.  The goal is to write a novel by midnight on November 30th.  They define "novel" as 50,000 words.  The focus is quantity, not quality.

It's funny, because that's the exact opposite of how I usually write.  It takes me ages and ages to finish something, even when I have a pretty clear idea of where it's going, because I search painstakingly for exactly the right words to use, the perfect scenarios to accomplish what I want from a chapter, etc.  When I have a first draft, it's a pretty darn good first draf (in my opinion, of course haha).  But I suppose in the time it takes me to get a complete first draft, plenty of other writers have done the first draft and a couple edits already.  So maybe NaNoWriMo would be good for me.  It would force me to focus on simply writing the story, ignoring mistakes that can be fixed later, inserting some kind of filler when I can't figure out exactly what I want so that I can move on and keep writing.

But still, a novel in a month?  It seems pretty daunting.  I'm not sure if I can put in the time and energy that would take.  We're heading into the holiday retail season, which means busier, harder, longer days at my regular job, which already takes a lot out of me.  Can I handle NaNoWriMo too?

The other thing that makes me uncertain is that they ask you to start from scratch.  You can't include any previously written material in your 50,000 word goal.  And I don't really have any new ideas right now.  I have Confessions that I've been working on, as well as Marisol's erotica story.  I have ideas for the sequels to the erotica, but is really prudent to start writing a sequel when I've barely got 3 chapters of the first book? 

I think I would like to give it a try, but I'm hesitant.  I still have next week to figure it out, since it doesn't begin until November 1st.  If I can come upwith even a half suitable idea for a new project, maybe I'll jump into NaNoWriMo feet first, sink or swim.

Think you might be interested?  Everything you need to know is here:  http://www.nanowrimo.org/

Faces of the Future

I'd like to introduce you to one awesome chica, and I thought she deserved more than just an aspiring author profile.  She doesn't even know I'm doing this, so it'll be a big surprise.  Her name is Elana Johnson and, short and simple, she rocks.

I "met" Elana through a critique group on Agent Query Connect some time ago.  I was working on Charlotte/Sorry's Not Enough, and had just recently decided that I wanted to take my writing to the next level and attempt publication.  She was working on a YA fantasay currently titled Loves Magic.  I feel privileged to have seen the early stages of that book, plus early peeks at a few others.  You can learn about her books on her website.  Elana always had useful, insightful critiques, and her own writing improved leaps and bounds while she was part of group.  She's continued to improve and I can honestly say I'd gladly read any of her books as soon as they're in print.

Okay, so being a great writer and critiquer is one thing.  But why, you may ask, does she get this special post?  Because she's fully invested in her writing and her future career.  In addition to maintaining a professional website, she blogs.  On more than one blog!  She has her personal blog, she's a contributor to the Query Tracker blog, and there's also Query Ninja.  That's three - count 'em, three! - blogs in addition to her regular writing to fit into her schedule.

Oh yeah, did I mention she's a wife, mother, and has a full time day job?  I can barely handle my day job, one blog, a husband and a dog haha.

To top it all off, Elana has written an ebook to help writers with their queries.  I recently purchased my copy of From the Query to the Call.  (Expect a review in the coming weeks!)  The Query Ninja blog is where Elana personally helps writers perfect their query letters - currently only available to those who purchase the ebook.  Elana will also be starting her next book during National Novel Writing Month in November.  NaNoWriMo is a fun - or crazy, depending how you see it - 30 days of novel writing.  The goal is to get 50,000 words in a month.  I'll blog more on that next week.

Honestly, Elana is an inspiration and a role model for me.  I hope to step back one day and find myself engrossed in my writing - whether it's actual novel-writing, blogging, publishing, promoting, or whatever - the way she is:  with wit, grace, humor, and one heckuva great talent!

So remember the name Elana Johnson.  I have a feeling she's going to have a great career ahead of her.  Check out any of the links in this post to learn more about her and read snippets of her writing and see for yourself how talented she is.  When she's on the best seller list, you can say you saw her here first!