Perseverance

Perseverance is not a long race; it is many short races one after another. 

~Walter Elliott, The Spiritual Life

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I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. In writing you need perseverance to get any place.

About nine years ago, I met many friends who were all on the same path as me. We were all in a course, learning to write to see where this dream would lead. I had already taken a two year course and as perseverance goes, I jumped into yet another writing course. This one was free, and it had many classrooms full of wanna-be writers like myself. As the classrooms waned, my love for writing didn’t.

I met this one guy, awesome writer, who was going down the road with me, and as we met with many forks in the road, our paths separated as he continued in his day job and love of carpentry, and I was moving full steam ahead in the writing world. Nine years later, we are still friends, but both on different journey’s, as all writers wind up on.

Oh he is still an excellent writer, the love and gift didn’t go anywhere but he is now embarking on becoming his own boss in the Rehab business, and this year I’ve finally said enough is enough and moved on to something else myself. Yeah, I’m taking care of ME first, then I’ll move on to teaching you all, then getting a job in the real world, pending health issues.

My New Year, which began on Easter, left me with a whirlwind of changes that will be made this year. I will persevere in getting to where I need to go and when I get there, you all will be the first to know. If I don’t persevere, then I’ll get nowhere and be in this same situation come next year! So send up some positive prayers for me as I go on and move forward.

To be a writer, perseverance in many fields needs to be acquired first. It’s not just about writing, oh no, there is a lot more to being a writer than that!

You will become an editor -- correcting and perfecting your work before it becomes publishable. Don’t think an editor does it all for you. You have to be ACCEPTED first before they tinker with your manuscript and the least amount of tinkering, the better

A Copywriter -- Yes siree, an essential tool of the writer if he is to move forward in the writing field.
 
free assistance on copywriting are found here
 
A fileclerk? You might say, “No way, not in writing.” But YES way, in writing you need to keep track of all your submissions, accepted or rejected. You’ll need to keep track of money and expenses, for tax purposes.

A negotiator -- You’ll need this skill to work in a proper fee for all your hard work. Are you gonna just accept a $500 dollar offer for your manuscript? Think about it.

A Marketer -- You need to promote YOU and your work. No one can do it for you. And since you’ve taken on the role of fileclerk, you now have the beginnings of where to start. Connect with writers, promote together. Tweet your heart out.

An assistant to other writers -- Yes, you’ll want to help OTHER writers also. Maybe offer them something in a field that didn’t fit you. Hand it off to someone who writes in that field.

With perseverance...you just might make it!

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But the moment you turn a corner you see another straight stretch ahead and there comes some further challenge to your ambition. 

~Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

Now onto Editing...

"…your reader is at least as bright as you are." William Maxwell

We have written our work and are now ready to edit it. Editing is the stage of the writing process in which a writer or editor strives to improve a draft  (and sometimes prepare it for publication) by correcting errors and by making words and sentences clearer, more precise, and more effective.
 
The definition of editor is:
(1) An individual who oversees the preparation of text  in newspapers, magazines, scholarly journals, and books; short stories, manuscripts, etc.
(2) An individual who assists an author in copyediting  a text.
 
Writers have internal editors that always sit checking, rethinking and wondering if what they just wrote sounds okay. They go back and keep fixing each sentence to make it the most perfect sentence but in the process they are losing time in their writing day. I already did the blog post about turning that internal editor off!
 
I remember telling my one friend, who asked me to look at her work, to eliminate the overuse of the word AND. Well she had an ‘editor’ friend who told her not to remove the ANDS. A matter of preference? Is one eye different than having four different eyes looking at your work? Yes, all four will say something remarkably different.
 
I remember one time, I wrote this story. I fixed and tweaked my heart out. I asked an editor friend to do a once over and see what she found. My biggest problems were with tense shift, so she fixed them, made the story look brilliant in my eyes, but when I posted it to the classroom, I got hit with all kids of opinions of you should change this or that, and this is wrong, try this, until I put the story in my filing closet, never to be seen again.
 
Not that I mind opinions, but I realized that too many opinions can be harmful to your writing instead of helping you along. All writers (most of them anyway) think they are editors because they got an A+ for twelve years of English class. A grammar pro does not make the perfect editor, nor does a writer make the perfect editor. An editor has to understand sentence structure as well as story line structure; they have to have in-depth knowledge of the writing craft. To me I want my editor educated in the field of writing for many many years before I place my work into her/his hand. Your editor is the next step in getting published.
 
What I want in an editor, and I’m sure editors look for it too, is a like minded individual. We can not expect an editor who has reviewed, written and enjoys the genre of evil, to appreciate a novel about spirituality and God. They will be very cynical and sometimes unable to give you a good edit. Same for a person of faith trying to edit a dark dark text. You might think you can cross the line and be very objective, but really you’re going to find that you’re more critical and putting in your opinion.
 
As you revise your work and make it shine, remember to think before you delete that imperfect word or rearrange the structure of the sentence. When you submit your work to an editor, make sure they are of a like mind because it is then that you won’t mind handing it over to them. And the editor I choose will be with the magazine, publisher of my choice. Right genre, write right!

"To be clear is the first duty of a writer; to charm and to please are graces to be acquired later." Brander Matthews

Internal Editor

It is perfectly okay to write garbage – as long as you edit brilliantly.
C. J. Cherryh

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Now this has happened to all of us writers at one time or another in our writing career. We open our workspace (document) to write, begin writing, and see a typo or something else that catches our eye, we go back to fix it and do that down the entire page, and realize the entire five hundred words were led by...our internal editor.

As much as I hate to admit it, editing has hindered my writing on more than one occasion. I don’t just mean a proofreading of my work; finding the misplaced comma, grammatical errors, typos and such. I mean editing to where I rewrite a sentence, place a more heavily understood metaphor in its place; trashing an entire sentence and rewriting it to where it looks and sounds right. This has been me on more than one occasion.

I’m here to tell you to shut it off!!! You can not get anything accomplished if you’re always looking back over your shoulder to see the trail (mess) that you leave behind. We must always look ahead and embrace whatever we must at that place in time. Writing is like the long journey which we trek down in life; we’re always doubting, shaking our head, often trying to fix the wrongs and make them right, and how successful was THAT? Impossible!

As writers we always try to fix the wrongs as we’re writing and that is just plain futile! It gets you nowhere and certainly doesn’t keep you writing. I’ll let you in on a little secret. It might not be a secret, maybe all writers have found this morsel as they grow as a writer.

1. Open your document and turn spellcheck off!!!
2. Start writing and DON’T look up at the screen!
3. Don’t stop until you feel that you’ve hit 500 words, AT LEAST!

Okay, now you can look up at the mess, I mean writing. If this is enough writing for you. Stop and fix. If you’re writing a short story, look back down at the keys and begin writing again, another five hundred words. Keep doing this until you’re done for the day and you’ve accomplished what you came for.

Don’t allow your internal editor to tell you what to do! Too often we listen to others around us or that small voice inside, and we’re ready to listen to it too, because we always think it to be right. Well I’m here to tell you the truth. Nine times out of ten, that voice is wrong and just wants to confuse you and lead you astray. Know anyone like that?

I grew up in a household full of negativity and had to teach myself how to break free from that scary inner voice and listen to the one true voice that God gave me. One Voice- one truth. Remember that! As you’re writing and the voice says, ‘that’s no good! You stink.’ Turn it around and repeat after me, ‘MY WORK IS GOOD! Not GREAT BUT GOOD!!!’

As you continue to feed a positive affirmation to the mix, the negative voice sounds like a muffled taped-mouth voice! Eventually ONE VOICE will win, and it won’t be that lackey the internal editor!

Something Wicked this way Comes

Genesis 1:4 And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.
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Something Wicked this way Comes...

Just so you know, I write spiritual stuff. I embrace the light and everything that means to you and me. I try my darnedest to walk in an upright manner sharing and giving love where it might lack. But as for my writing, now that’s a totally different story. (Pardon the pun.)

Most of the time when I’m writing a short story, I start off with my heroine as this upstanding epitome of the highest perfection, then as I’m sitting there writing, something takes over my character and things start to happen. It is as if she has been overcome by the dark force and then my story heads down a path of unknown.

A discussion began in the f2k class when a woman asked if she was the only one where her ‘people’ seem to take charge and the story basically writes itself or is written by these people (aka characters.) Many of us writers piped in to assure her that not only do our characters claim full reign but that what we had intended on the story being took a turn somewhere along the line and we came up with something utterly different than what we proposed the story line to be about.

I’m wondering if this ghost that takes over is our conscious turning off the internal editor. You see, we all write with the internal editor on. We backtrack every paragraph, we spellcheck a page, we’re constantly checking for consistencies and inconsistencies. With that mind, remember, you lose something along the way. You’re so worried about everything being right, you miss the point of where you went wrong.

As writers we can not try so hard that we lose sight of the story. I’m telling you, when you try to write a story, when you try to get it perfect, when you keep trying so hard to make everything right, it is at this point that you’ve lost the basis of your story. You’ve allowed the characters to quiet down and hide in the shadows. You have essentially put tape over their mouth’s and you, the writer creator of the work, has taken over to make your work perfect.

Guess what? Nobody is perfect! I bet that was enlightening wasn’t it? You need to put tape over your brain! ha ha. Turn the internal editor off. Don’t tell me, but, but, but it is too hard. Tell me, okay I will and see what kind of story you write. You’re characters will come out of the shadows, they will become people who are shaped by your fingers but their conscious. They will carry an air of mystery with them as good verses evil challenge each other to a duel. The characters will become people, no longer cardboard cut-outs. Living breathing entities.

In essence, something wicked this way comes.

Editor Etiquette?

pic: A pinwheel of red and silver. the symbol of wheels going round and round
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I remember early in my writing career I looked at publishers. A pretty hard knock on the door if I do say so myself. So I looked at editors. Did you know there are people who will take your money, tell you to fix your work, take more money, needs more work. You see the cycle here?

I was told you should never shell out money. If your work is good, should you have to pay someone to say it is good, or give them money and they will help you make it good? I’m sorry but something is wrong with that scenario.

Keep in mind that there are editing services out there that are legitimate. When you have a completed manuscript, you’ve revised it ten times and are ready to submit but you feel you need another eye to look at it, a professional eye that will pinpoint any kinks that are missing in the story.. This is when the editing services come into play.

Be ready to shell out money, but the benefits of an editor are when they read it and like it, they will suggest places to send your work, will help you get your foot in the door, stand behind you 100%. Remember they will only take you on if they feel you are worth it. They are more than likely with a publishing house, and often will either accept or reject your submission. Your story has to be good for them to even bother.

Some will take your money. There are so many scammers out there so you need to be sure you do your research of the place, person, credentials, etcetera before forking over one dollar.

In the writer’s world, I find it tacky to say, “My editor said this, or my editor said that.” Now when you say a friend said this, or a friend said that, it comes off as banter and not boasting. When in a writing group, of published authors, editors and the like, to me (notice I said to me because we all as individuals have preferences) tossing out my editor said this and that is undermining the board of trusted peers.

When you are published, be proud and let it soar where it may. But boast over and over again? As a writer, you need your ego in check because one day my friend, there will be someone to knock that ego through the roof. Patience as a writer, is your best friend. Respect for other writers is a MUST!

Here is an interesting question I felt compelled to share. “How do I find an Editor’s name for submission?” The answer is at Fiction Notes. Nowhere does it say brag your heart out once you connect!

Write Right people, and whatever you do, be original!

I must add that here is a link for an AWESOME writing coach!

Query

The query letter is what is going to get your foot in the door. Are you getting rejection upon rejection? Maybe it is the query letter and not your novel at all.

In the query letter to the publisher you will become your best marketing tool. You need to sell yourself to the publisher and not giving them a good enough nibble of your story may cost you the possibility of getting your wonderful masterpiece accepted.

You’ve finished your novel (or article), you’ve revised it, reworked it, taken the advice of your peers and changed what needed changing and now it is ready.

But wait…you’ll need to query the editor first and see if this is something that they would be interested in. An agent working on commission is only going to accept what will make him money. You need to tell them (the agent, publisher or editor) that this piece of art is going to sell, sell, sell!

Now think of cutting your entire manuscript down to one page. That’s right, you’re going to sell yourself in one page and give them the gold mine that they’ve been searching for.
Don’t go on and on about yourself, there will be plenty of time for that AFTER he accepts your work.

Just like starting your novel/article you’ll want a hook (and please make it dangle with a tasty worm so you can reel him in.) Tell him a little of what your story is about by asking a ‘what if’ question and leave him dangling for the answer. Don’t spill it all in a paragraph.

Try not to bloat the imagery. Bloating will give you an adverb filled telling query when you want to SHOW them what makes your book special. Try not to tell him it is a Stephen King like novel or this will send a red flag to them that you’re not a pro in this challenging field.

Whatever you do, don’t give him (editor/agent) all of the chilling details of your ending. Allow him to savor what you’ve written thus far and leave him begging for more. Your end to the query letter will also be the place to put in the ‘you’ part. Your experience and credits you have to your name. Give him the manuscript length and ask if he’d be willing to give it a read, thanking him for his time. He may want sample chapters and this is when you will send him three for a taste of your art. SASE and send it off!

You should hear back from them in three to four weeks, if not, a brief cordial note asking if he is considering your request.

If a rejection comes in, it was your query that didn’t sell him. This is why the query is of vital importance. Make it SHINE brighter than the morning sun!