Get Published!

Hello. I'm new here.

Sun, 13 Feb 2011 23:37:19 GMT

Posted by: spookymuldrake

Name: Rachel Muldrake

How did you get started writing?: I started writing in middle school thanks to the wonderful English teacher I had. I continued writing because my stories amused my friends and I've been writing ever since.

What are you working on right now?: At the moment I'm halfway through a short story. I'm also working on a couple of novels. I have several ideas for graphic novels, but they're all in the planning stages.

What are your goals for that project?: I'll be submitting the short story to a publisher at the end of the month. If they like it, it will be published in an anthology. (If they don't like it, then it's back to the drawing board.)

Favourite novels/writers: The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle, The October Country by Ray Bradbury, Lizard and Hardboiled / Hard Luck by Banana Yoshimoto.

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Intro Post

Wed, 12 Jan 2011 07:35:54 GMT

Posted by: kit_r_writing

Name: Kit Russell

How did you get started writing?: I'm not sure; I've been doing it a long time. I know I wrote my first "novel" when I was 14. And even before I could write, I was a storyteller; my grandmother told me about how when I was little, I would act out stories I made up with my toys.

What are you working on right now?: For 2011 I have three goals: write 500 words a day, write a short story every week and submit one once a month (or is that two separate goals?), and to get at least one novel edited and submitted.

What are your goals for that project?: I'd like to get at least a few of the stories published, of course. Right now, though, I'm trying to get myself used to submitting on a regular basis.

Favourite novels/writers: there are so many to choose! My favorite novel in 2010 was Feed, by Mira Grant. My favorite book of 2011 (so far) is House of Discarded Dreams, by Ekaterina Sedia. The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings are overdue for a re-read, and I'm going to pick up Lois McMaster Bujold's latest Vorkosigan book as soon as I can.

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Hi!

Tue, 28 Dec 2010 02:23:22 GMT

Posted by: clare_dragonfly

Hey... doesn't look like this community is terribly active, but I just joined anyway so I'll introduce myself!

Name: Clare
How did you get started writing?: Um... my earliest memory of writing is in second grade, when we had Writing Workshop every Friday (I think before lunch). That was always my favorite part of the week.
What are you working on right now?: My online serial novel, Chatoyant College; an urban fantasy/supernatural YA novel; and various short stories and bits.
What are your goals for that project?: For the first, get more readers; for the second and third, get them traditionally published.
Favourite novels/writers: Holly Black, Neil Gaiman, Garth Nix, Robin McKinley, The Mists of Avalon, Little, Big

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Just a hello

Mon, 20 Sep 2010 16:21:53 GMT

Posted by: doc_lemming

I'm secretly John, got a semifinalist in the Writers of the Future contest one quarter, have published a couple of other stories online or in paper, but in semipro environments.

I write in sword and sorcery right now, but I've dabbled in mystery and SF too.

Hope to see more from all of you.

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Creative writing CFS list

Sat, 05 Dec 2009 18:50:01 GMT

Posted by: alphaviolet

One good resource for people in this community might be the CRWOPPS-B e-mail list on yahoo.com. I keep an eye on the calls for submissions there and have also forwarded some of them to my friends.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CRWROPPS-B/

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Muse Online Writer's Conference: Last Call

Tue, 15 Sep 2009 13:53:51 GMT

Posted by: magycmyste

I can't remember if this has been mentioned here or not, but the Muse Online Writer's Conference is coming up in less than a month! For anyone who doesn't know, the Conference is fully online and free, so it's available to those of us who can't afford to travel and can't take time of work or school to attend. Classes and workshops are taught through a combination of week-long forums (so you can participate no matter what time zone you're in, 24/7), and hour-long chat workshops which are question and answer sessions with the presenters. It looks like there's a lot of great presenters lined up this year. Also, I'll be moderating a couple of the chat sessions this year, though I'm not sure which ones yet.

In addition, if you're looking for an agent or publisher, there are pitch sessions this year for several publishers and two or three literary agencies, including the famed Chip McGregor. But the pitch sessions are going to fill up fast, and you need to have your manuscript polished and ready if you're going to do this (My manuscript isn't at this stage yet, so hopefully, I'll take advantage of this next year).

Anyway, Lea has extended the registration through September 20th, so if you're interested at all, hurry!

http://www.themuseonlinewritersconference.com/registration.htm (and yes, registration and setup happens through a Yahoo! group. )

Hope to see some of you there!

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Question about following up

Mon, 01 Jun 2009 00:22:43 GMT

Posted by: magycmyste

I have a question about following up. I realize that response time in most places is usually about 2-3 months, or longer, but I'm wondering if I'm in a slightly different position here. A little while ago, I made my first writing sale to Thaumatrope, a twitter SFFH 'zine. The day I got my first response back, I sent another one in (5/6), and 4 days later (5/10), I submitted a Twitter serial.

Now, for the first story, I got my response back within two days. This might have given me unrealistic expectations about response time, but I thought it was appropriate, since a Twitter story has to be told in 140 characters or less, and shouldn't take long to read. The second one, I got an acceptance 20 days after submission. And I haven't heard back at all about the serial yet.

I looked around, but Thaumatrope does not give any indication at all that I can find of response times, and I suspect the editor may have been on vacation or something for a while since during that 20-day period, there were no tweets from him at all. For the single stories, I used Thaumatrope's online submission form, so it was easy to see that those went through and whether the status had changed. The serial, however, was supposed to be submitted in an Excel sheet attached to an e-mail, and I never received any response after sending it, not even saying that it wwas received. Also, the status doesn't get tracked online like the single stories.

I'm wondering whether it would be appropriate to go ahead and send an e-mail to follow up on this, at least to make sure that the serial was received properly. Thaumatrope is now closed for submissions for stories, and I would hate for it to close for serials as well, only to find out that something went wrong, and my submission never got through in the first place.

Any thoughts?

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First experience with an editor

Sun, 31 May 2009 20:20:49 GMT

Posted by: missdanaidae

I entered a contest at Fantasy Magazine that asked authors to write a story in ten sentences or less based on an image of their choice. The editor running the contest chose my story as one of the top ten finalists so I thought I'd share what it was like working with an editor on revising my piece.

( Editing )

The contest can be found here. All ten stories are of a high quality and I find most of the art beautiful as well. You may vote for up to three stories. My piece is "Beyond the Sun Before the Moon." I hope you enjoy it!

Does anyone have any stories, good or bad, about their experiences with editors and revision? Any tips on what to say or not say to an editor? How to revise that story you love so much and can't stand to change?

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One of them durned introductory posts.

Fri, 22 May 2009 18:25:40 GMT

Posted by: seidskratti

I'm being arrogant and assuming that even writers who aren't trying to publish novels at the moment are welcome. In which case, my introduction. Which I made a whole new post for. Because I'm special.

( Join me beneath the cut... )

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Odyssey Podcasts

Mon, 18 May 2009 02:40:28 GMT

Posted by: missdanaidae

Odyssey is workshop for fantasy writers, but many of the lectures can benefit all writers.

Some topics included in the podcasts:

-The difference between a novel and a short story
-Tips for a strong query letter
-Strong Openings
-Selling to magazines
-Writing for Anthologies
-Revision

You can read about the podcasts, download individually, and subscribe to them on iTunes here . Lectures are free to download! The Odyssey website also offers articles on writing and getting published.

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Scrivener: Writing Program for Macs

Tue, 12 May 2009 03:53:28 GMT

Posted by: missdanaidae

Scrivener is writing program for Macintosh computers that several published authors have praised. The price is $39.95 for regular uses and $34.99 for scholars, educators, and students. You only pay once; the updates are free. The program has more great aspects than I can list so I'm just going to talk about the features I use the most.

-The Corkboard: This is my favorite way to brainstorm. The corkboard allows you to create index cards which let you plot out your stories sentence by sentence, scene by scene, etc. Rearrange the cards however you please to find the best flow. Your wall is endless and you'll never run out of cards.

-Keeping all documents in one binder: Scrivener creates "Projects" for each story you write. Projects contain multiple documents in one file so you can have as many drafts and revisions as your please all in a row. There is also a special folder for research that is a great place to keep photos, movies, and sound clips for setting and character reference or whatever else you need.

-Full Screen: If you're easily distracted, but don't want to hole up in an empty room with a notebook and pencil, full screen mode can help you out. In full screen mode you can adjust the opacity to black out your desktop so it will be just you and the open document.

-Compile: Once you've finished your masterpiece, just export into a Word document, save as HTML, or print. The formatting will be done for you. No need to copy/paste and reformat the text manually!

Other things I keep in project binders:
-Lists of publishers and agents who may be interested in the piece
-Query letters
-Record of rejections and acceptances

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Article: Pitch Lines, Website: querytracker.net

Fri, 08 May 2009 01:59:49 GMT

Posted by: gillian

The pitch needs to convey three things: the plot, the genre and the tone of the story. And it needs to convey these things in one concise sentence. It doesn’t need dialogue, it doesn’t need a cast list, it doesn’t necessarily need the title and it definitely doesn’t need the word count—and before you snicker at this advice, you should know that these are common mistakes. And they’re not the only ones.

Link

Website Rec:

QueryTracker.net

Provides:

List of top literary agents

Tools to keep your queries organized
Benefit from the collective knowledge of thousands of other writers, all of which are enduring the query process just like you.
Export and backup your data at any time
The data compiled on agents and queries will give you special insight, such as:
      The number of queries sent to each agent.
      The number of queries each agent accepts.
      The number of queries each agent rejects.
      Response times of agents.
Plus much more...

This a free website that's basically a database of agents. It shows an agent's acceptance rates of manuscripts, the number of queries sent to each agent etc.

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Storyist: Writer's Software for Macs

Wed, 06 May 2009 12:07:00 GMT

Posted by: elfcraft

I learned about Storyist from the NaNoWriMo website, and it's a dream of a program. It keeps everything - your notes, outlines, settings, and character bios - all in one convenient place so you can instantly refer back to things, plus it auto-formats your work into manuscript form and contains a handy manuscript style guide so that you can ensure that your book doesn't automatically wind up in the trash when the intern opens the mail (I've been that intern; it's in the job description and it really happens). From the website:

With an intuitive interface that puts you in control, Storyist provides:

* A word processor with a page layout view and support for headers, footers, and style sheets so you can produce submission-ready manuscripts and scripts.
* A storyboard with customizable story sheets so you can track your plot, characters, and settings.
* A project manager with fast, project-wide search capabilities so you can keep your writing organized and accessible.

The downside is it's not freeware like a lot of the programs for Windows out there. It currently goes for $59 ($69 if you want the CD and not just a downloaded file), but in my opinion, it's worth the price if you're serious about writing.

( Here's a screenshot )

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lulu.com

Tue, 05 May 2009 08:58:19 GMT

Posted by: nerakrose

http://www.lulu.com/

I found this site a couple of months ago. With it you can upload your book-files and publish your book as e-book, hardcover and/or paperback and it's supposedly cheap and gives proper revenue to the artist. Anyone can do it and there's no editor looking through your stuff (so the quality of some of these things are thereafter...).

Any thoughts and/or experiences with lulu.com or similar sites?
Would you consider using a service like this or not?
Would you recommend a service like this?
I'm curious.
(I for one would probably prefer a 'proper' publisher...)

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yWriter V.5

Mon, 04 May 2009 11:27:29 GMT

Posted by: meoryn

I came across this nifty program during my cyber travels. The only thing it doesn't have unfortunately is spellcheck. It does however make it easy to organise your chapters into scenes to manage your story. There appears to be a new version out (Version 5) which has a few changes from Version 4. And it's free. (for those of us a little light in the piggybank).

You can read up more on it here.

Note: I am not sure how you want to manage tags for the com so I just left that blank.

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Getting things started: Intros!

Mon, 04 May 2009 06:31:32 GMT

Posted by: gillian

Hey everyone! To kickstart the community, I thought that the best thing to do would be to have some introduction posts! We're a really small community right now, so it'd be cool if everyone could participate. Let's get to know each other!

Name:
How did you get started writing?:
What are you working on right now?:
What are your goals for that project?:
Favourite novels/writers:

( I'll kick things off with my intro! : ) )

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