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SPONSOR OF THE WEEK
Editor's THOUGHTS
THE PAIN OF CHANGE
The majority of writers want to ease into the business. They want success to find them subtly, and want everything to gradually climb up that ladder to greatness. But sometimes, some of the change in your life needs to happen with purpose.
At age 46, I'd reached 25 years with my employer, which gave me an option to retire early, albeit with a huge cut in any sort of pension. Nobody I knew ever took advantage of that opportunity, mainly because they never saw it as an opportunity. They had nothing to go to, so they stayed where they were.
I wanted to write.
So I went home, held a family meeting, and the consensus was for me to go for early retirement and write . . . with hubby taking the next promotion he could find, wherever it appeared in the country. We moved from South Carolina to Phoenix, Arizona. Suddenly I had to write full-time and justify my choice, and the choices my family made along with me.
I'm not saying you need to move across the country to take writing seriously, but you will need a major mind shift. That mind shift will, without a doubt, remove something else from your world. There will be sacrifice. There will be change. It should be so drastic that you feel obligated to commit, to justify your choice.
It might mean giving up most of your social activities or going to work part-time instead of full-time. It might mean keeping the day job but committing your down time to your stories. It might mean swapping domestic responsibilities with someone or hiring a housekeeper.
Or you might commit like Hugh Howey when he first started out: He sold his house to be debt free. His wife worked to pay utilities and groceries. He gave himself two years to make this goal of his work. And he did.
But to stick to your norm, to not relinquish activitites that serve as time constraints for your writing, to hope that you'll be discovered when you write a couple hours a week, is deciding to ease into this business. You keep your fingers crossed and hope that someone finds you, that they'll read your blog or stumble across your book on Amazon.
You make this business happen. You get yourself published. You promote your work. It's hard, but damn, to make advances is a phenomenal feeling. This is a profession where you have control, and it's up to you what you do with it.
-Hope Clark
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Come see Hope at the Pelion Peanut Party all day on August 9, 2014, in beautiful Pelion, SC. She'll be at the main peanut tent signing copies of Palmetto Poison, a Carolina Slade mystery set in the Pelion community. Peanuts, politics, murder, drugs, and plots to make your head spin.
And also come see her on August 11 in Henderson, NV at the Community Lutheran Church, 3720 E. Tropicana St. from 6:30-8:30 PM where she's speaking to the Henderson Writer's Group. Yes, guests are welcome.
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WORDS OF SUCCESS
I was surprised, as always, at how easy
the act of leaving was, and how good it felt.
The world was suddenly rich with possibility.
~Jack Kerouac (On the Road)
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The Carolina Slade Mystery Series
On Palmetto Poison. Carolina
Slade is the real deal - Southern charm, a steely determination, and a
vulnerability she'll never admit to. Slade is at her absolute best in C.
Hope Clark's Palmetto Poison so hold on for the ride! ~Lynn Chandler-Willis, best selling author and winner of the 2013 Minotaur Books/PWA Best First Private Eye Novel Competition
On Tidewater Murder: Terrific.
Smart, knowing, clever...and completely original. A taut, high-tension
page-turned--in a unique and fascinating setting. An absolute winner! ~Hank Phillippi Ryan, Agatha, Anthony and Macavity winning author
On Lowcountry Bribe: With
a story that moves so fast you are sure to get a case of literary
whiplash, LOWCOUNTRY BRIBE is almost impossible to put down. Written
with grace and ferocity, I for one can hardly wait for a second helping
of this unpredictably un-pretentious and hard-scrabble down-home gal. ~Rachel Gladstone, Dish Magazine
Purchase any of Hope's books and receive a one-year subscription to TOTAL FFW free. Send receipt to [email protected] |
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Success Story
I forgot.
I'm busy. Between working part time so I can eat and running a production company and writing the projects for my company, it slipped my mind. Last year I submitted a couple of essays for Chicken Soup for the Soul. I saw the listing in your newsletter and thought, Why not? When I didn't hear back, I just chalked it up to experience.
And then the email came.
Writing is solitary. It's thankless and fatiguing. I create stories, screenplays, poems and essays about my observations and my life. It gives me great joy.
I will be published in the upcoming Chicken Soup for The Soul - Reboot Your Life. As I reread the piece for final edit, it brought forward the feelings I had over five years ago when I left corporate America. I needed to do something better than work nine to five. This couldn't have happened at a better time.
So here I go again - rebooting my life for the umpteenth time.
Thank you for what you do.
Continued success.
Sabrina Zackery
Mz3 Productions
featured article
When to Walk Away
By Lynn Chandler Willis
A few years ago I saw an announcement for the Tony Hillerman contest. Named after the great mystery novelist, the contest has very specific rules, including where the novel must take place. The winner receives a publishing contract with St. Martin's and a nice advance. With the deadline three months away, I dove in and wrote Wink of an Eye like a madwoman.
But forty-thousand words into the manuscript, I realized there was no way I could complete it, have it edited, and polish it for submission in such a short time. I was not going to submit a very rough first draft.
So I chucked the contest but kept the manuscript, kept working with it, hoping to submit somewhere, someday. My critique group edited the story, but I wound up shelving the book for a while as I moved on to other projects.
Then two years ago at a conference, I had the opportunity to pitch to an agent. The agent loved Wink of an Eye, saying the voice had tremendous potential. But her next words made me blink. "I know I can sell this to a small press."
At the risk of sounding arrogant, I knew I could sell it to a small press. But when the agent told me to send the entire manuscript, excitement urged me to oblige. A week or so later, I received an email from the agency intern saying, yes, she loved it too! But we had a few problems. Good voice, but too much dialogue. Excessive description because it was too visual; per the intern, having readers say they can "see it as a movie" isn't a good thing. Oh, and the beginning had to change.
But they loved it and knew it would sell to any number of small presses. I scratched my head at what was supposed to be my big break. A real agent wanted to represent my work. So why wasn't I doing back flips?
I went to work on the suggested revisions and soon had several documents named Wink rewrite, Wink rewrite2, Wink rewrite3, and so on . . . until I said enough. Some of the changes I agreed with--like changing a passive verb--but the dialogue and descriptive imagery stayed.
This story was my baby and my maternal instinct warned me to tell the intern thanks but no thanks. I was overly confident with my work; I just knew my story. I'd written enough years and had surrounded myself with enough published authors to recognize which changes work and which do not. I can even step away from even my own work and say, nah, it doesn't work. So it wasn't an ego thing. Mama bear was protecting her cub.
So what happened to Wink of an Eye? I submitted it to the St. Martin's Press/Minotaur Books Best 1st Private Eye Novel Competition and the darn thing won. With all its dialogue and descriptive imagery and even the occasional passive voice. It will be released November 18, 2014.
I knew I had something good, and I stood by it.
BIO: Lynn Chandler Willis is the author of the best-selling true crime book Unholy Covenant. Her debut novel The Rising (Pelican Book Group) was released in July 2013 and was named a finalist for the Grace Award and the INSPY Award. Chandler-Willis is the 2013 winner of the Minotaur Books/Private Eye Novel Writers of America Best First Private Eye Novel competition for her novel Wink of an Eye. It will be released by Minotaur in Nov. 2014.
competitions
MALAHAT REVIEW OPEN SEASON AWARDS PRIZES
http://web.uvic.ca/malahat/contests/open_season/info.html
ENTRY FEES:
$35 CAD for Canadian entries; $40 US for American entries; $45 US for entries from Mexico and outside North America. $15 CAD for each additional entry (from anywhere).
Open Season bestows a prize of $1,000 in each of three marquee categories: poetry, short fiction, and creative nonfiction. Deadline November 1, 2014. Poetry: up to three poems per entry; maximum length for each poem is 100 lines. Short fiction and creative nonfiction: one story or article per entry; with a maximum length of 2,500 words. Entrants receive a one-year subscription to The Malahat Review for themselves or a friend.
CBC LITERARY AWARD FOR SHORT STORIES
http://www.cbc.ca/books/canadawrites/literaryprizes/shortstory/
$25 ENTRY FEE.
Deadline November 1, 2014. Opens September 1, 2014. Submit your original, unpublished stories between 1,200 and 1,500 words. All Canadian citizens and permanent residents of Canada can submit. The First Prize winner will receive $6,000, courtesy of the Canada Council for the Arts, and will have his/her story published in Air Canada's enRoute magazine and on the Canada Writes website. He or she will also be awarded a two-week residency at The Banff Centre's Leighton Artists' Colony, and will be interviewed on CBC Radio. The 4 runners-up will each receive $1,000, courtesy of the Canada Council for the Arts, and their stories will be published on the Canada Writes website.
NILSEN LITERARY PRIZE FOR A FIRST NOVEL
http://www6.semo.edu/universitypress/Contests/Nilsen_Prize.htm
$25 ENTRY FEE.
Deadline November 1, 2014. $2,000 and publication by Southeast Missouri State University Press and an invitation to present a reading at the University. Submissions must be previously unpublished novels, novellas, or collections of closely linked short stories.
TENNESSEE WILLIAMS LITERARY FESTIVAL FICTION CONTEST
http://con13.tennesseewilliams.net/fiction-contest/
$25 ENTRY FEE.
Grand Prize: $1,500, Domestic airfare (up to $500) and French Quarter accommodations to attend the next Festival in New Orleans, VIP All-Access Festival pass for the next Festival ($500 value), Public reading at a literary panel at the next Festival, Publication in Louisiana Cultural Vistas magazine. Top ten finalists will receive a panel pass ($75 value) to the next Festival. This contest is open only to writers who have not yet published a book of fiction. Published books include self-published books with ISBN numbers. Those who have published books in other genres besides fiction remain eligible. Deadline November 16, 2014. A submission is one original short story, written in English, up to 7,000 words.
MAGIC OXYGEN LITERARY COMPETITION
http://www.magicoxygen.co.uk/competition/
£5 ENTRY FEE.
Deadline November 30, 2014. First Prize - £1,000. Second Prize - £300. Third Prize - £100. Two Highly Commended - £50. In addition, we will be planting a tree in Kenya for each entry, so every entrant is a winner! When the contest closes we will email the GPS co-ordinates of your tree to you. Short Stories up to 4,000 words, excluding title. Poetry up to 50 lines, excluding title and lines between stanzas. The theme is open.
GRANTS
LOWER MANHATTAN CULTURAL COUNCIL
http://lmcc.net/program/creative-curricula/
Creative Curricula makes grants of up to $5,000 to Manhattan-based individual teaching artists or small to mid-sized nonprofit cultural organizations (arts organizations, social service agencies, senior centers, faith-based organizations, folk societies, cultural centers, etc.) working in partnership with Manhattan public schools. Deadline October 15, 2014.
QUICKFUNDS - IDAHO ARTISTS/WRITERS
http://www.arts.idaho.gov/grants/indquick.aspx
QuickFunds supports professional development and new or exemplary arts projects. Open to emerging and established artists who have attained a certain level of proficiency as represented by work samples, the grants provide timely assistance for projects, activities, or travel to seminars, workshops, and conferences. The Commission's emphasis is on increasing the skill of the applicant; focusing on the process rather than product; production rather than promotion. QuickProject requests for up to $1,500 and require a cash match of 1:3. Professional Development requests for up to $750 and require a cash match of 1:1. Reimbursement is for direct expenses only. All recipients must submit a final report to receive reimbursement.
NEBRASKA INDIVIDUAL ARTIST FELLOWSHIPS
http://www.nebraskaartscouncil.org/artists/individual_artist_fellowships/
The IAF program focuses on various major artistic disciplines on a three-year rotation, including Visual Arts, Literature, and Filmmaking and Performing Arts. The IAF deadline traditionally occurs every November 15, and rotates amongst the artistic categories. Upcoming application deadlines:
Literature: November 15, 2014. Visual Arts: November 15, 2015. Performing Arts and Filmmaking: November 15, 2016.
RHODE ISLAND GRANTS
http://www.arts.ri.gov/grants/pgiguidelines.pdf
Project Grants for Individuals (PGI) are available to Rhode Island resident artists and do not
require a non-profit 501(c)3 umbrella. Through PGI, RISCA supports highly creative and
talented artists who seek to produce, perform, teach, or share their work with the
public. Projects might include the coordination of community arts events, public performances,
arts workshops, creative collaborations, and exhibitions and installations with a strong public
component.
FREELANCE MARKETS
SCRAP
http://www.scrap.org/scrap/index.htm
Scrap is the bimonthly magazine of the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI), a Washington, D.C.-based trade association with more than 1,600 member companies that process, broker, and consume scrap commodities, including ferrous and nonferrous metals, paper, glass, textiles, rubber, and plastics. Scrap pays $600-$1,000 depending on the length and difficulty of the assignment. Payment upon acceptance. Byline given.
THE CATTLEMAN
http://www.thecattlemanmagazine.com/advertise/writer-guidelines.html
The Cattleman covers all aspects of the beef industry in Texas, Oklahoma and the Southwest. In the most recent readership survey, subscribers said they were most interested in the following topics in this order: range/pasture, property rights, animal health, water, new innovations and marketing. Our feature stories are generally more in-depth than other livestock publications. Word counts average between 1,500 to 2,000.
MOTHER EARTH NEWS
http://www.motherearthnews.com/writers-guidelines.aspx#axzz387KF8KAB
MOTHER EARTH NEWS is a bimonthly magazine that promotes more self-sufficient, financially independent and environmentally aware lifestyles. From our readers, we welcome articles and quality photographs for our "Country Lore" department. "Country Lore" presents handy how-to tips of 100 to 300 words; payment is $25 to $100 per published item. We accept submissions for consideration for online posting to our website, but do not pay for them at this time. Most of our feature articles are written by our Contributing Editors. We sometimes assign articles to freelance writers, particularly those who have experience with our subject matter (both firsthand experience and writing experience). If you would like to submit a query, please send a one-page outline. Also send digital photos, if available.
BACKCOUNTRY
http://backcountrymagazine.com/magazine/submission-guidelines/
Send us researched, original ideas with a strong backcountry hook, from current events to prolific characters to unique destinations. We are always looking for Feature ideas, as well as Destination stories for our Route Finding Department. Pitch us Profiles and Newsworthy items, Mountain Skills pieces, and Accounts of avalanches and other mountain mishaps as well. Our standard payment for manuscripts is $0.35 per word.
BACKPACKER
http://www.backpacker.com/guidelines/
All articles and photos that appear in the magazine must adhere to Leave No Trace's ecologically friendly practices. Likewise, we do not promote motorized use in the wilderness or backcountry.
Our readers are knowledgeable and experienced backpackers; therefore we accept only authentic, well-researched, well-crafted stories. We pay $.40 to more than $1.00 per word, depending upon the complexity and demands of the article, as well as the proven experience of the writer.
JOBS
FREELANCE CONTENT EDITORS
Location Virtual.
http://www.sourcebooks.com/company/careers.html
Sourcebooks, Inc., a leading independent book publisher located in the western suburbs of Chicago, seeks freelance content editors, copyeditors, and proofreaders specializing in education, test prep, and study aids. We are looking for freelancers to add to a pool of resources to help us develop our SAT, ACT, Advanced Placement, and other study aids test prep materials in both book and online formats. Qualified candidates will possess an extensive background in education or specialized experiences in teaching or creating test prep materials, either in the classroom or for other publishers.
publishers/agents
SOHO PRESS
http://sohopress.com/soho-press/
The imprint within Soho dedicated to literary fiction (and the occasional memoir). The Soho Press imprint publishes bold literary voices -- authors who craft new and powerful stories and offer us fresh ways of seeing the world.
SOHO CRIME
http://sohopress.com/soho-crime/
For more than twenty years, Soho Crime has been publishing atmospheric crime fiction set all over the world. Our books run the entire range of crime fiction to detective fiction, police procedurals, thrillers, espionage novels, revenge novels, stories of thieves, assassins, and underworld mob bosses -- but you can count on an immersive adventure steeped in cultural and setting detail.
SOHO TEEN
http://sohopress.com/soho-teen/
Soho Teen publishes a select list of YA mysteries and thrillers by international bestsellers, award winners, and debut novelists with stellar credits. Born of the conviction that compelling YA of any genre involves thrill and mystery, Soho Teen's titles include the paranormal and dystopian, the humorous and realistic, the tragic and uplifting -- whatever serves a great story best.
SOURCEBOOKS LANDMARK
http://www.sourcebooks.com/resources/submissions-guidelines.html
Our fiction imprint, Sourcebooks Landmark, publishes a wide variety of authors and titles. We are interested first and foremost in books that have a story to tell. However, we are currently only reviewing agented fiction manuscripts, with the exception of romance fiction.
SOURCEBOOKS JABBERWOCKY and SOURCEBOOKS FIRE
http://www.sourcebooks.com/resources/submissions-guidelines.html
Our children's imprint, Sourcebooks Jabberwocky, publishes books across all age ranges of children's books. Our young adult imprint, Sourcebooks Fire, publishes the best new voices for the next generation of book lovers.
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Fine print
Please forward the newsletter in its entirety. To reprint any editorials, contact [email protected] for permission. Please do not assume that acknowledgements listed in your publication is considered a valid right to publish.
C. Hope Clark
E-mail: [email protected]
140-A Amicks Ferry Road #4
Chapin, SC 29036 Copyright 2000-2014, C. Hope Clark
ISSN: 1533-1326
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