More Fundamentals of Publishing

As all of you demonstrated last night, you know where and how to look for markets for your work. You can

• Identify authors with work similar to your own.
• Look to see who published their work.
• Check the acknowledgements pages for names of agents and editors.
• Look for presses, magazines, and journals seeking writers in your genre.
• Single out target markets for new writers.
• Talk to writers you know or meet in classes and conferences.
• Be unafraid to ask questions.

You can also look at the following books:

• The Writer's Market
• Guide to Literary Agents
• The Novel and Short Story Writer's Market
• Jeff Herman's Guide to Book Publishers, Editors, and Literary Agents
• Complete Idiot's Guide to Getting Published, Sheree Bykovsky

And links:

• Writer's Market
• Association of Author's Representatives
• Predators and Editors
• Writer's Digest
• Fiction Magazines
• Literary Magazines

After you've compiled a list of potential markets, don't let your fear of rejection stop you. Rejection is something ALL writers live with. Remember, when you get turned down...

• Let yourself feel bad, but only for a little while.
• Think about what constitutes success. In Major League Baseball, the batters with the highest averages fail two thirds of the time. In basketball, the best three-point shooters fail sixty percent of the time.
• Always have a Plan B. That way, when Plan A doesn't pan out, you'll know what to do next.

Rejection is there. Be prepared. It's what you do afterwards that really counts.

Description

Your next assignment is to choose a passage in your work involving two people and some action and describe it using the techniques we discussed in class. The last assignment will be to rewrite this descriptive passage as dialogue (2 assignments on the same piece of writing), so make your selection carefully.

Here are some basics:

• Use description to help your reader visualize people, places, action.
• Practice showing rather than telling.
• Make sure your description moves the story along.
• Employ description to add to characterization.
• Avoid using description as filler.

Good description is

• Specific
• Well-observed (those five senses again)
• Revelatory of the character's inner life
• Consistent in its point of view
• Properly placed within the narrative
• Best delivered in small strategic chunks

When in doubt, leave it out.

Some Reminders:

• Please send me the publication information you shared last night so that I can post it on next week's blog.
• Assignment 4 (300-500 words) is due Friday, March 5 at 10PM. Don't forget to email copies (in Word 03 format) to the members of your group.
• For those of you turning in your ONE long piece (10 pages maximum), the due date is Friday, March 5 at 10PM. I'll return your manuscripts to you later next week.
• As I announced last night, for the final session, I'll be asking each of you to read to the class an excerpt (5 minutes) of your writing. You can sign up for that next Monday. I urge you all to participate, since this will be good practice for you, Once you're published, reading your work is standard operating procedure. So get started now.

This Week's Challenge:

We talked about how difficult describing the sense of smell can be. Almost always, it's not done directly but through analogy to something familiar. So...

Identify your favorite dessert and use two or three similes (employs "like" or "as") or metaphors (doesn't) to describe it.

Have a great week.