Quote for 10-24-10

You must want to enough. Enough to take all the rejections, enough to pay the price of disappointment and discouragement while you are learning. Like any other artist, you are learning your craft- then you can add all the genius you like.

-- Phyllis Whitney

back up on that horse

sent the rejected work out again so submissions are back at 12

a good number. . . .disciples, steps in AA, months in a year. . .

"No Plot, No Problem"

Pulled out my copy of the book by Chris Baty, the founder of National Novel Writing Month. Planning to read for encouragement.

I don't have a plot (but he says that is not a problem)! I do have an idea for a work though. I found out something while researching something else. When I was in Las Cruces in February, my father asked me if I had ever finished this short story collection based on memories/stories my grandmother had told me.

I said I hadn't, that I was always starting new projects 'cause I'd find out something new that piqued my interest. I told him that I was writing about the Civil Rights Movement in Nashville but that I was also interested in something new I'd learned that had to do with US soldiers in Germany and since he was a US soldier (stationed for a time in Germany), I said I was going to ask him all kinds of questions.

Now, unfortunately, my father died so he can't be a source; I'll have to find someone else. We'll see if this piece of history becomes my novel.

All giddy and nervous but not like before when I gave up after a few days. I didn't officially register so the accountability level was low. This time I'm getting a counter for the blog so I can see how much progress I'm making.

A book in a month. I think I can do that. I really do.

Susan Diplacido

is one of the coolest people ever & a tremendous writer to boot. A new interview (by Don Capone in Eclectica) here

Quote for 10-23-10

I lived to write, and wrote to live.


--Samuel Rogers

Give me residence

Two more I plan to apply for. An additional-- that sounds absolutely wonderful-- is a maybe 'cause it's the whole summer long(were I to receive one) and I'm going on vacation with my kids and to that workshop in Paris next summer. No matter, if I were to get the three I want, I would definitely be in New England this time next year. One would put me right smack in Vermont, where I want to be, and travel costs would be on someone else's dime.

A residency in this beautiful place in Ireland but there's no fellowships or scholarships or funding because you are a struggling-writer/starving-artist.

My motto: give me residence and pay for me to be there;-)

a rejection

so I'm at 11 subs.

only 89 to go.

National Novel Writing Month

yup, I signed up.

publication

My story "The Jar" has been republished here

T.J. Forrester!

He is the writer who will be my first interview on this blog. He has two books coming out; I am a huge fan of his short stories and am looking forward to his collection, though his novel sounds very very interesting.

The novel's coming out first and I'll be reviewing it and interviewing him soon. Am contacting his publicist to work some things out.

For now, you can go to his website at www.tjforrester.com to check him out.

Quote for 10-20-10

I admire anybody who has the guts to write anything at all.

-E.B. White

subs

I sent a work out and it was rejected (as I knew it would be). Hours after I sent it, I thought to withdraw it 'cause I felt it wasn't complete. But I got "fired" before I could "quit."

would have been 14 works out. but I'm at 12.

13 + 1= 14-1 = 13- 1 = 12

'cause another work has been accepted.

back to 13 submissions

the 2 rejections and the 3 acceptances = stories I need to finish

Quote for 10-18-10

A story isn't about a moment in time, a story is about the moment in time.

--W. D. Wetherell

it's a start

Working on stories for the anthologies I would like to be in. Racking my brain for an idea for one and finally, when I stop and just let things be, some first lines to follow.

now to grab paper and pen and go where this woman goes. . .

a (writing) space of my own

there is nothing sweeter

Quote for 10-17-10

If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot...reading is the creative center of a writer's life...you cannot hope to sweep someone else away by the force of your writing until it has been done to you.

--Simon Armitage

I will spend a day doing that but not that. . . maybe

Found a box of stories I'd collected from various magazines-- Mademoiselle, Redbook, etc. -- when those magazines published fiction, some are 30 years old!! Some works from online magazines too. I thought I'd toss them but obviously I have them for a reason: Something in the story touched me.

And that's what you want as a writer, right? To evoke an emotional response from a reader. So I'm going to some time, a whole day probably, to reread those works and look at them with a critical eye, an open mind, and find out what I, as a writer, can learn from them.

I also have a pile of guidelines for magazines I wanted to submit to. That I'm really leaning toward the recycling bin 'cause I don't know if I want to do the searches to see if the publications are still around. Maybe. I don't know.

Probably not. Probably.

Quote for 10-16-10

If you wait for inspiration to write; you’re not a writer, you’re a waiter.

– Dan Poynter

my first interview on this blog,

I hope, is with a writer whose work I love whose first book is coming out next year. Waiting for him to get back to me regarding.

Have a book I plan to review by one of the wonderful editors at the wonderful Poor Mojo's
Almanac(k). He sent it to me the other day.

Working to expand this blog beyond me and my writing, though I am quite charming;-)

LOL

in the midst of moving

My father died earlier this year and I've been staying with my mother, but I've got my own place now and I'm moving stuff, mostly books.

Hope to see a difference in my writing output. Caretaking is exhaustive. But I'll have a more balanced schedule and more energy come next week.

Have lots (way too many) unfinished literary projects. Need to clear that up.

Excited 'cause it's all deja vu-ish. The times I was most productive-- writing daily and for hours on end was when I was an instructor before and I wasn't sweating finances and when there was the time for me to be able to stay at the computer lab ('cause at home I just piddle around and find ways to procrastinate) until the twelfth of never. I live close to the university and there's a 24-hour lab so I can go early or stay really late or whatever. When I was working at Vanderbilt, I'd do that 'cause I'm a late-night person and I got some things done.

But no writing tonight. No submissions 'cause I'm in the midst of moving.

Oct 15th is a bust . . . and not

didn't make it to the post office. didn't have a chance to write today. and I don't think I'm going to make that 11:59 deadline.

no matter.

Got an acceptance from an anthology for a micro and by default, (since they weren't mentioned in the acceptance letter or contract) I have two rejections for two other micros sent to the same anthology. It won't be print-- it's going to be released on Kindle and the iPad.

And the rejections don't bother me. Those two were rushed and not my best work. An opportunity to get them right and honest. Find the place they really belong.

And the publishing company is doing another themed anthology; I plan to get some more submissions ready.

Quote for 10-15-10

Writing is no trouble: you just jot down ideas as they occur to you. The jotting is simplicity itself - it is the occurring which is difficult.


--Stephen Leacock

I need two stories today

I thought today was the end of the reading period for a journal but it's actually November 15 so I've got a month more to work on the story I want to send to it.

Still, I need two new stories today.

One is almost done but it has to be at done/contest-worthy status just before 6pm 'cause that's when the post office closes. I need a October 15 postmark.

The other story has to be emailed so I have until 11:59 pm however I don't even have an idea for the book's theme, an inkling, a anything (yes, I know that's grammatically incorrect but I'm stressing here)!

It can be minimum 500 words.

Still I don't have one.

Quote for 10-14-10 (even if it's late)

You feel the call. That's the important thing. Now answer it as fully as you can. Take the risk to let all that is in you, out. Escape into the open.


-- Elizabeth Berg

I applied to be listed in the Poets & Writers' writer database

'cause they offer grants to organizations (for writer's fees) if you're reading for them or running a workshop, etc.

You have to have a certain number of publications to be listed. I know I've met the requirements as a fiction writer, not sure if I did as a poet, though I requested to be listed as both.

Waiting for their yay or nay.

Have something else in mind to help me move toward greater national visibility, but I'll hold back on that for now.

#18

a new piece, a micro.

16 and 17

"it is being considered for the book"

my submission for an anthology. Hope "considered" gets changed to "accepted."

Quote for 10-12-10

The artist must be in his work as God is in creation, invisible and all-powerful; one must sense him everywhere but never see him.


--Gustave Flaubert

plans for this blog

Book reviews == fiction, esp. short story collections like the two I have by Crystal Wilkinson, and books about the craft of writing. And interviews with writers I know and don't but want to.

A list of journals and magazines I've been published in and/or just love.

A literary haven, of sorts.

photo submissions too

Have six photographs out to two magazines.


Yes, pictures of tress.

Quote for 10-11-10

The story I am writing exists, written in absolutely perfect fashion, some place, in the air. All I must do is find it, and copy it.

--Jules Renard, "Diary," 1895

continuing on

At the computer to do some more writing. The 15th is a deadline for a contest and more importantly the cut-off date for the reading period of a magazine I want to submit to.

To work, Gwendolyn. To work.

and maybe another acceptance

A publication I sent a story to is currently closed to regular submissions, but they are having a contest. The editor tossed my work into the hat. Some non-winning stories will be published along with the winning one so we'll have to see what happens there.

another acceptance

and publication

"My Little Boy," a work that had fallen off the web is back up here

It first appeared in the wonderful Small Spiral Notebook.

Quote for 10-10-10

I have a sense of these buried lives striving to come out through me to express themselves.

--Marge Piercy

submissions #14 and 15

out late last night. One piece (a reprint that had fallen off the web) accepted this morning. So I'm at 14 again.


I was looking at another reprint and I don't know what I was thinking when I originally wrote it. A character is involved in a drunk driving accident and I don't mention anything about an arrest. Red flag. Need to look at the logistics of my stories more closely.

More writing today. Hoping for more acceptances even though it just means I'll have to keep writing to get to 50 +

But that's the idea. Keep churning the stories out. But good ones, honest ones.

Quote for 10-09-10

There are times when quantity is at least as important as quality in learning an art.


--Lawrence Watt-Evans

2 new stories

At the Farmer's Market this morning. Usually I work on bears while I'm there but today I decided to write. Two new characters with tales asking for a look. One will be easier because I've got the last lines. Works that come to me like that generally write themselves; I just take dictation and tweak some stuff. We'll see.

submissions #

11
12
13

eight, nine

and ten

Quote for 10-08-10

Fiction is a lie, and good fiction is the truth inside the lie.


--Stephen King

the time to write

three days to do so so I'm gonna.

Quote for 10-07-10

Any book that helps a child to form a habit of reading, to make reading one of his deep and continuing needs, is good for him.


--Maya Angelou

Quote for 10-06-10

I'm going to marry my novels and have little short stories for children.


— Jack Kerouac

1,2,3,4,5,6,

7

that's how many works I have out now. Reprints and some new things. Slowly working my way to 50.
And there will be no simultaneous. 50 and then my ego will try for 100.

Quote for 10-05-10

Keep in mind that the person to write for is yourself. Tell the story that you most desperately want to read.


--Susan Isaacs

Anything to keep from writing

Sometimes when I'm writing on a regular basis and am really getting some things done (like finishing up these eight stories I'm working on-- or not) I find I start to proscrastinate, surf the web, visit websites-- ANYTHING as long as I don't write.

And yet when things are such that there isn't time/space to write, I'm upset.

Go figure.

I've wasted enough time this evening.
It's time to write.


And not on this blog.

Come, if you're able

The Mom Egg Fall Reading

Saturday, November 13th

1:30-4 p.m.


Bowery Poetry Club

308 Bowery

NYC

Admission $5

Featuring poets, fiction writers, and essayists of The Mom Egg, including:

Kristina Bicher

Estelle Bruno

Rosalie Calabrese

Fay Chiang

Wendy Levine DeVito

Jessica Feder-Birnbaum

Stephanie Feuer

Alana Ruben Free

Kelli Stevens Kane

Colleen Michaels

Gwendolyn Joyce Mintz

Theta Pavis

Puma Perl

Joy Rose

Lynne Shapiro

Golda Solomon

MJ Tenerelli

Susan Tepper

Marjorie Tesser

Lisa Williams

Quote for 10-04-10

The moment a man sets his thoughts down on paper, however secretly, he is in a sense writing for publication.

-- Raymond Chandler

in the afternoon mail

my contributor copy of "Hint Fiction."

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Paris in June

I'm attending a writing workshop in France next summer!!

anthologize me!

Have about 16 in mind that I want to submit to. Only a few I can use previously published so I'm going to have to get my creative mind churning.