A Couple Grants and Contests for Writers

August 10, 2013 at 3:58 pm (Writing Contests/Grants)
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WilliamAdolpheBouguereau

Well, I’ve actually been getting a fair bit of writing done and I’m planning to enter a grant competition at the end of the month.

I’m working on a short story for the Writer’s Digest Short Short Story Contest, 1,500 words maximum, getting one bit each night.  I’m really pleased at how it’s coming along.  It may be utter garbage but just the fact that I’m producing and having ideas is the best feeling.  (The British term “chuffed to bits” comes to mind.  I wonder if that would be a proper application of it?)  Anyway, the deadline for that is in November so I’ve got some time.

As I said, I’m working on a grant application at the same time.  It’s for the Sustainable Arts Foundation Writing Award.  You must have a child under the age of 18 and they do give preference to people who live in the San Francisco area but there’s no entry fee so I’m going for it!

Besides the application, they want 4 writing samples and they prefer you’ve written them since you had your child.  Well, I’ve got quite a few things on my Yahoo! Contributor Network board so I’m trying to choose four from that.  I’d LOVE to have anyone’s input who cares to take a look and comment.

I am thinking to choose between –

Memories and Choices  http://voices.yahoo.com/memories-choices-12079419.html

Devolution: The Beginning  http://voices.yahoo.com/devolution-beginning-11335874.html?cat=44

Regrets: A Confessional Villanelle  http://voices.yahoo.com/regrets-confessional-villanelle-11335696.html?cat=47

27 Minutes  http://voices.yahoo.com/27-minutes-11439900.html?cat=43

Faith Hope and Love  http://voices.yahoo.com/faith-hope-love-10777773.html?cat=43

Biomalware  http://voices.yahoo.com/biomalware-11149566.html?cat=44

I’d like to include the two that were featured on Yahoo!, Regrets and Devolution, because they got really good feedback.  However, Memories and Choices, Faith Hope and Love, 27 Minutes and Biomalware all have more to do with being a parent than those two.

To further complicate manners, novelization of Biomalware is my current project and novelization of Devolution is my next project so those might be good choices to show them where I’m headed.

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The Power of “Could” Over “Should” For a Writer

April 5, 2013 at 10:24 am (Uncategorized)
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Monkey-typing

This past week I’ve been on vacation, at home, but I’ve got diddley squat to show for it in terms of writing and editing. 

My plan was to edit the first fifty pages of Biomalware then go back and start a total re-write.

Then I got an idea for a new short story. 

Then the short story turned into a novel idea.

Then I made a list of all the short stories that I’ve started on my computer and never finished.

Then I made peanut butter chocolate chip muffins with my daughter.  (She did the stirring.  Well, some of it.  She’s only 2 1/2.)

And did a few Soduko puzzles.

There were other things in there but you get the idea.  Not much writing or editing.  Part of the problem is that I think about what I “should” do and my brain balks like a mule.

So, I’m going back to an old idea I learned years ago, turning “should” into “could.”  Instead of telling myself I should be editing Biomalware or working on a short story, I tell myself I could edit or pick a story to work on.  For some reason my brain just hears it differently and I don’t get the malaise that I get when I tell myself I “should” do something.  Hopefully that will help me getting some writing or editing done over the next three days, before I go back to work.

I did manage to post a new short story to Yahoo!, Memories and Choices.  I originally submitted it to the Writer’s Digest short short story contest but it didn’t win so I’ve put it out there for the reading.  It’s a bit of science fiction, magical realism and fan fic.

I understand there’s a Camp NaNoWriMo running this month.  They can be great for motivation but I won’t be participating this month.  I’m trying to focus on quality over quantity right now.

Happy Writing!

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Exploring and Reflecting Through Writing

December 28, 2012 at 1:04 pm (Uncategorized)
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OrteliusWorldMap

Last week I met with my writer’s group and they gave me some food for thought about my writing.

Because there were so few of us and we didn’t have much new to share, I read a few things I’d written in the past year and put on my Yahoo! Voices page.  One member told me that she thought, “people like your writing because you’re so honest.”  Another member mentioned that he felt I hold back in reading to the group.  He’s right, it’s much harder to read things for people face to face than what I post under the slight anonymity of a pen name.  Both comments drew me to think about the honesty in my writing.

Honest is something I certainly try to be in life.  In my writing it has to do with seeking the truth of the situation, whether it’s fiction or memoir.  I think that the more honest I am about events and my feelings, the more someone else can connect with it and use the experience.  I’ve always wanted to help people with my writing, if only to feel less alone.  I think the connection that writing and reading can bring, dispelling the illusion of our distance and loneliness, could be one of my most important contributions.  It’s all about the ripples.

I write for others, but even more so, I write for myself.  I explore ideas and situations, exorcise demons.  I particularly love end of the year writing – getting some last licks in before the year changes over.  There’s something reflective and magical about it.  It’s full of anticipation and potential energy.  We may reflect on the past year, think about where we want to go and chart a course.

I’ve definitely been thinking about the novel I want to finish.  I see it going through a lot of changes, giving it layers and depth.  I’m anticipating the day when I feel it’s ready to strike out on it’s own, to present it to people for the reading.

I’m excited about writing in the coming year.  Are you?

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Writing Goals Met and Voided

December 21, 2012 at 4:25 pm (Uncategorized)
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Did I blink?  The Weeping Angels didn’t get me but the year sure went by in a flash and here we are at the end.  It’s funny, in looking back over my writing blog and my Yahoo! Contributor Network page, I can see that I haven’t been sitting still.  I’ve accomplished a good little bit.  (I put up 9 new pieces just this month!)  I “won” Camp NaNoWriMo and National Novel Writing Month by writing over 50,000 words a month in August and November.  But it’s largely not the things I put on my “Writing Goals” list last December.

Was I distracted?  Perhaps, but perhaps I was taking advantage of opportunities.  There are things I really wish I had done so I will have to carry them over to my list for this year.  This past year has also brought some clarity about what I want to do with my writing so there are some things I will take off the list.  Here’s what I wrote last year for goals –

  1. Read Writing the Breakout Novel by Donald Maass and use ideas in writing and editing.
  2. Edit middle grade mystery novel.
  3. Write more and edit mainstream novel.
  4. Show both books to writer’s group for feedback.
  5. Choose agents and editors to submit to.
  6. Keep track of expenses. (Treat writing as a business.)
  7. Write an essay monthly and submit it to the Yahoo Contributor Network.
  8. Write an entry weekly for Melora Johnson’s Muse.
  9. Write an entry weekly for http://storymusing.blogspot.com.
  10. Write short stories as ideas come up.
  11. Read, read, read
  12. Consider paying for a professional copy editor to give me feedback
  13. Keep submitting.

#1 – I did read it and I think I incorporated some aspects into my writing.  It was very informative.

#2 – Nope.  Now, I don’t think I will at this point.  Children’s Lit just isn’t where I want to put my efforts at this point in my writing career.

#3 – I’ve definitely written a lot more in 2012 than in 2011 and I did write most of Biomalware.  I just need to finish it and then edit, edit, edit.

#4 – Kinda.  I did share a lot with the writer’s group but didn’t finish the novel so I didn’t show it to them.

#5 – I still have an agency in mind to submit to first..

#6 – No, I didn’t keep track of expenses.  We’ll see what tax season does to me.  I did make enough from Yahoo! that I’ll have to declare it so I’m just hoping I won’t have to start paying quarterly taxes.

#7 – Well, I can’t say I submitted something every single month, but I submitted so many in some months, that I added about 50 pieces of writing this year.  I’d call that solid work.

#8 – There were a few weeks I skipped but I did add an entry most weeks.

#9 – Ditto for #9.

#10 – Yep, I wrote several short stories this year and submitted some to contests and online.

#11 – Well, definitely not as much reading as I would have liked but I did spend more time listening to books on CD in the car this year and that has been fun.  I’m reading the latest Harry Dresden novel by Jim Butcher in hard copy right now and loving it.

#12 – Yes and no.  I have been submitting, just not a novel yet.

I think my overarching goals this year were to write regularly and to make some money off my writing.  I definitely accomplished that.  In 2013 I will finish Biomalware and start submitting it.  I’m just not sure how long that’s going to take.  Eventually, I’d like to say I WILL make a living at my writing but I’m afraid I’m still at HOPE right now.

What were your goals this year?  Did you accomplish them all or in part?  What are your goals for your writing next year?

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Give Yourself Some Writing Credit

November 23, 2012 at 11:54 am (Uncategorized)
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Taken by Bohringer Friedrich

So often, we think about all that we have yet to do or that we should be doing, but I’d like to take a moment to focus on all we do get done as writers, usually with schedules that are already full of living.

 Last week a coworker sent me a link to Pen Parentis (http://www.penparentis.org) an organization set up specifically for writers who are also parents.  There are dues to pay but you receive certain benefits by being a member, like being part of a community of writers who understand your challenges as a writing parent, savings on application fees for certain contest and fellowship application fees from Pen Parentis partners, an author profile, marketing space, promotion of your literary events on the events calendar and a Pen Parentis logo that you can use on your web site or e-stationary.

 Anyway, it got me thinking that, you know, I’m doing pretty darn good at this writing thing. I am a parent of a small child, I commute an hour each way and work a full-time job. I still write, even participating in National Novel Writing Month where I wrote over 50,000 words in August during Camp NaNoWriMo and hope to do so again this month. I’ve published things on Yahoo! Voices and earned actual money from it, as well as entering various contests.

 Of course, all this writing doesn’t happen in a vacuum. My job is a tremendous help. Not only am I librarian, surrounded by books in a moderately large library, but I run an adult writing group there, sanctioned and originally requested by the library. My director is tremendously supportive of my writing endeavors too. When I had two pieces featured on Yahoo! Voices, she celebrated by giving me a ticket to a local charity fashion event.

 Then there is my family, friends and past school teachers. I’ve never been laughed at or scoffed at but rather supported in my writing. I remember each of my English teachers in high school being supportive in some way.  I remember going to a reading with some students from one of my English classes in high school. I thoroughly enjoyed it and when we left I said that I really liked one particular story and wished I could write like that. My English teacher looked at me and said, “You write better than that.” I never forgot that.

 Last, and perhaps most importantly, my husband is very supportive of my writing – verbally, actively and financially. He listens to me talk about stories that I’m writing with interest and when he knows I’m working hard on a piece he will do extra chores around the house, like emptying the dishwasher when it’s not his turn. The laptop that I’m writing on right now, plus the voice activated digital recorder and the Dragon NaturallySpeaking software that I use were all bought for me by him.

 No, all the roadblocks in my way have been of my own creating which creates a little bit of guilt. I love to write and hope to one day write for a living. Now I have to prove that is what I want by writing and submitting finished pieces. I could kick myself for not moving toward my goals faster, but as the song by Jason Mraz says, “I’m letting myself off the hook for the things I’ve done/ I let my past go past/ and now I’m having more fun.”  We need to start giving ourselves credit for all we do accomplish and enjoy writing. Who’s with me?

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The Writing Future is Becoming Clearer

September 3, 2012 at 11:03 am (Uncategorized)
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I spent a large part of my free time in August (which is minimal at best ) drafting my novel, Biomalware, for Camp NaNoWriMo.  It was a challenge, painful at times, depressing and exhilarating.  I suffered from a bit of writer’s block in the “great swampy middle” as Jim Butcher calls it, and had to rush toward the end.  I didn’t really think I’d complete the story arc but somehow it came together.  It’s exciting to be this far along with it after only a month. 

I started with a short story about a man, a widowed single dad, who takes his two year old daughter to the doctor’s because she seems to get sick most of the time after eating.  The doctor diagnoses a new form of IBS but the nurse slips him a note suggesting that something else is happening.  It turns out that a new line of genetically modified food is making her sick.  As I worked on the book, unexpected events suggested themselves.  We had a natural gas explosion that destroyed a house in town and it fit into my story perfectly.  It also turned out that making people sick was not all the food was doing.

There’s a lot to do yet though.  I’ve completed the story arc but it’s pretty skimpy in a lot of places.  Before I started, I was planning to add another 50,000 words to the novel in September to finish it but now I think I’ll focus on editing and rewriting to add material.  (I still have a little research to do in order to make sure it all makes sense.)  I hope to end up closer to 80,000 words. 

In October, I’ll hand the novel off to my writer’s group for feedback, hoping they’ll have time.  That should help me focus it a little better, and maybe expand more.  I’ll also recruit some other beta readers from family and friends to give me feedback.

November gets a little tricky.  I’ll still have a editing to do but I’d like to finish Devolution for National Novel Writing Month in November.  I started that some time ago and have released two parts of it on Yahoo! Voices.  Planning for that will also fill some of my writing time in October.

I have the first agent picked out to submit Biomalware to and I plan to submit in December.  It was kind of funny, I knew what agency I wanted to submit to and the latest Writer’s Digest had a list of twenty-five agents accepting new work.  Two of them were from this agency and one listed science fiction. 

Today I’m hoping to take out all the portions of the manuscript that I knew I didn’t want to keep but left in to reach my word count for Camp NaNoWriMo.  I’ll take them out and put them in a separate document so that I still have them to refer to, and in case I decide I do want some portion of them.

It’s turning into an exciting year for writing.  The future I envision, of writing for a living, just seems to become more clear as I work.

 

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Advancing Confidently Into a Novel

August 25, 2012 at 12:04 pm (Uncategorized)
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Last week I attended a talk and poetry reading by Michael Czarnecki, a poet and publisher in upstate New York.  He mentioned a quote that had always affected him deeply and it made a deep impression on me as well.

“If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.” ~ Henry David Thoreau

I’ve taken that quote and put it on a photo I took of giant hay bales in a field, ready to be taken to the barn, then made that my desktop background so that it encourages me every time I open my laptoop.  I think it’s a good principle to labor under when trying to write a novel for publication.  An early American version of “If you build it, they will come.” (Field of Dreams) 

I write for the joy of creating the story, but that joy is multiplied when it’s shared with other people who appreciate it.

(Incidentally, Michael’s house burned down about a month ago.  There’s an Indigogo fundraiser to help them re-build. They lived very simply, with no running water or grid electricity, so the house wasn’t insured. They really need help rebuilding. Any contribution would be very appreciated. More info via the link Raise the Roof for the Czarnecki’s.  Of course, there are writerly perks for contributing.)

Less than a week away from the end of Camp NaNoWriMo and August, writing has slowed down significantly.  I can see an end in sight, I’ve actually written the last few lines of the book already, but getting there has shifted into slow motion.  There’s going to be a whole lot of re-writing and adding to this book in September.  My writer’s group helped this past Thursday night with ideas and letting me talk through my plot.  (I can’t recommend joining a writer’s group enough.  The right one can absolutely tap you into a well of creative energy.)

I also have a plan that’s helping to keep me going.  I’ll get the first 50,000 words of Biomalware done in August with CampNaNoWriMo, then in September I’ll re-write and add to the novel.  Then a quick edit and pass it out to my writer’s group.  Put it away in October and wait for the group to give me feedback.  Edit again at the end of October, and start submitting.  Ideally, I’d like to have my first rejection by the end of the year.

Okay, that’s a fib, I’d REALLY like to have an acceptance from the first agent I submit it to but that seems so much like reaching for the stars that I’m scared to hope for it.  I’m willing to go the distance for this book.  I’ll keep submitting until I run out of agents that I want to submit to, then I’ll submit to editors and when I run out of those, I’ll self-publish.  One way or another, this book will be available for people to purchase.  I’d rather for it to be sooner rather than later.  (I’d also like a movie deal because I think it’s that type of book, just to to put that out there to the Universe.  *winkwink*)

In the meantime, I’ll write another piece, or two or three, of the book I started serializing on Yahoo!, Devolution.  I’d love to finish writing that one in November with NaNoWriMo.  I think it has a lot of potential too.

There’s always something more that I want to write and I can’t help believing that if I keep plugging away I’ll eventually reach my goal of writing for a living.  Of course, working smart can help make that path a little smoother but when I can’t do that, I’ll just stop the hell out of the weeds.

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Determination and Dreams

July 30, 2012 at 10:00 am (Writing Inspiration)
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I had a dream last night that was rather interesting.  I was sitting at a computer and I had the realization that if I just started and wrote the darn book, it would sell.  In the dream, I blew my nose, opened a blank document and wrote something along the lines of “she blew her nose and…”

Now, I could take this as a sign that if I just sit down and start typing on my novel, the words will come, they will be good and it will sell.  That’s an exciting and a scary idea at the same time.  Or I could take it as a statement that I believe in myself.  If the latter, why haven’t I done it?  Can it be, as Marianne Williamson says, that I am afraid of success?

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?’ Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you.” ~ Marianne Williamson

Perhaps it’s like having a lottery ticket.  I buy a lottery ticket, either scratch off or for one of the drawings, as a game.  I don’t particularly think I’m going to win, but since I bought the ticket, there’s that slight chance.  Maybe 1 out of every 5 times I’ll win a dollar or two.  1 out of a hundred times I might win twenty dollars.  Maybe one day, I’ll actually win something significant.  My odds for writing and selling, something I’ve been working on improving my skills at for a while now, have got to be a lot better than that.  The great thing is that my enjoyment is not contingent on the selling, I can just enjoy the writing part of it too.

I had an assignment this past week for the Yahoo! Contributor Network.  After storms on Thursday, we were without power to Saturday night but I knew I had the assignment to do so, on Friday morning, while my husband was there and my daughter was playing, I sat on the couch with my laptop, which was thankfully fully charged, and made notes then drafted the essay.  I found out that, even with my attention divided, I could still write.  I’m afraid it’s not going to carry over into fiction very well, but I’ll find out.  (We went out to lunch and then stopped by McDonald’s to use the Wifi so I could upload the essay.)

I’m going for NaNoWriMo in August.  I may not finish the book in August, in fact I’m sure I won’t, but I will take every opportunity to write and make significant progress.  This is the year.  This is the year that I write a book and sell it.

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Humbled & Developing a Novel Idea

May 25, 2012 at 3:36 pm (Uncategorized)
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It’s been a heady week for me, watching my page view hits rack up on Yahoo! Voices.  The story and poem are still featured so I’m waiting to see where that run ends, but I had a humbling moment yesterday as well.  I finally actually looked at the poem since I put it up and realized, to my chagrin, that I had transposed two stanzas so that the rhyme scheme was not proper for a villanelle.  In a villanelle, the last line of each stanza is supposed to alternate.  The way it was displayed, stanzas 3 and 4 ended with the same line.  Ah, well. I consoled myself with the delusion that only a poet would notice.  (I certainly didn’t.)  I fixed it and had a bit of a laugh at my own expense.

Moving right along, I’m getting ready for CampNaNoWriMo.  Are you?  I won’t pretend that I actually intend to write 50,000 words in June, but I’m using it as a catalyst to get my new novel off the ground.  Before June 1st, I’ll continue to read Writing the Breakout Novel by Donald Maass and make notes for the novel as I find inspiration.  This weekend I hope to fill out the character, setting and plot sheets I found online.

The novel I’m going to write is based on my own short story, Biomalware.  (Hubris, anyone?), I’ll try to give you an idea of how I’m using Writing the Breakout Novel to help me develop this short story into a novel.

Biomalware is about a young, widowed father who takes his two year old daughter to the doctor’s office because every time she eats, she’s in pain.  She only eats when the hunger overcomes her fear of the pain.  The doctor writes the father a prescription that should help but the nurse slips the father a note telling him that there’s someone who can help more.  He goes out to the place on the note and the farmer there tells him it’s GMO crops contaminating all our food that has made it indigestible for his daughter.

My writer’s group strongly urged me to turn this into a novel.  I decided to take their advice but obviously the story needs a lot of developing to sustain a novel.  Writing the Breakout Novel is helping me marshal my thoughts to do that.  I’ll give some examples of advice from the book and how it has inspired my thinking.

Maass says that it is important to try to capture the times of your story.  In my case, that would be current day or 2012.  What things catch my attention in the news?  There’s the polarization of people over issues, the different political parties, dissenting factions over gay rights, anti abortion activism is on the rise, and corporate rights seem to trump the individual all too often these days.  I’m not sure what will work into my story, perhaps all of them over the course of it, but the last one seems particularly appropriate as I recall a certain corporation taking farmers to court because their seeds were contaminated by the corporation’s GMO seeds through cross pollination.

Maass suggests you should try to “shatter your protagonist with a tragedy or give him an unexpected gift.”  That got me thinking. I could have the kid die, though I don’t know if I could stand to do that.  I could definitely flashback to how he lost his wife.  I could have him get the medicine and have the kid get worse, perhaps from malnutrition because, though the medicine is masking the symptoms, the food is still not being absorbed by her body properly.  I like the latter two ideas best.

“I would like to suggest that there are two character qualities that leave a deeper, more lasting and powerful impression of a character than any other: Forgiveness and self-sacrifice,” Maass says.  My character seems to have the self-sacrifice thing nailed down.  He’s a single, widowed, father who is going to go to extremes to help his own child, and other children like her.  Now, where can I bring forgiveness into it?  The doctor?  The father may be angry with him for pushing the medicine but the doctor wants to help and has probably simply accepted the party line fed to him (though he has also ignored the warnings of the nurse as new age mumbo jumbo.)  He has failed his patient to some degree, but not out of malice.  There is room for forgiveness here.

I’m about halfway through the book and I’m not sure I’ll be able to finish it before the 1st, but perhaps.  It’s exciting and intimidating to contemplate starting a novel again.  I just hope I can go the distance.

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Getting Noticed

February 11, 2012 at 1:18 pm (Uncategorized)
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It’s a thrilling experience when something you write starts getting some attention.  That little flash fiction homage I wrote, Sweet Summertime, went from 8 views to 800 then on to 3 THOUSAND 841.  (Update – I just checked and it’s up to 6,600 views.  Apparently it stays on their front page for at least a week.  Wahoo!)  I’ve actually made a few dollars off something that just occurred to my brain one Sunday morning.  It’s nice to see that but it makes me wonder why?  Is it just the search engines noticing the tags I put on it or is it people actually reading it?  That’s hard to say when you don’t get feedback.   I did have one nice note from someone I don’t know.   (People I do know don’t bother to comment. Wish they would.)

I certainly appreciate the edict not to look a gift horse in the mouth, but I would like to understand what drives the numbers on a thing like this.

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