Being the Voice Among Many

One Voice among many

Gibbon, Nebraska

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Yesterday we talked about being unique; today I want to talk to you about being a Voice. You say you’re popular among your writing friends. They swoon at your feet and are a welcome relief in the struggle to get to the top of your writing journey. That’s all well and good, but what does your voice sound like to strangers who’ve never met you.

Say a publisher is reading your work. They don’t know you from Adam so they are not in the popular crowd that you’re so used to having lifting you up and stroking your ego. They are strangers and theirs are the eyes that will read/publish your cherished work.

Like I had said, being popular is all well and good in your little clique of writers, but it isn’t going to help you among total strangers who are going to take a chance on you. Without a voice, you will get nowhere.

1) Query – Your query letter is going to be your voice to someone outside the familiar territory of your group of friends. Read the guidelines and follow them. They don’t want to know how to throw pies at someone, or hear your favorite joke, they want to hear about your story, and that is it!

2) Presentation – The way you present yourself is going to be the step you stand on. This isn’t the time to put on your funny hat and think that a magazine publisher/editor is your bud. Be professional. I tried to teach this to students and they pointed out quickly that the classroom is for fun and silly. I just wanted them to be prepared for the seriousness of writing and submitting. By practicing being a professional, maybe you’ll carry that with you when you need it the most. Point taken: classroom = fun and silly learning, Professionalism for the real world.

3) Reasons for wanting your work – You’ll give them the reason they are going to want to publish your work. Save your life story for the novel. This is not the place to think you are rubbing elbows. If you haven’t found your voice by now, this is not the place to begin looking for it. Give them a heartfelt, down to earth, PROFESSIONAL reason. What? You didn’t learn how to be professional? Should have listened to me the first time.

4) Waiting – This is the hardest part, even harder than the submitting of your work. The waiting is where you’ll more than likely cast self-doubt and second-guess, look at your work again and find fault, see errors and a ton of other negative things. Don’t do it. As hard as it may seem, don’t fret over your submission and being accepted. It may take months before you hear from someone, so take this time to write new material.

5)  Rejection – Oh dear, I mentioned the most horrendous word to a writer, the dreaded rejection letter. Hey, it happens more times than not, but that is not any reason to give up. This is the very reason you send out simultaneous submissions (sim subs); when all ten come back with rejection letters, refine your search and send them to ten more prospective mags/pubs/editors.

Now your voice is being read AND heard, so what are you waiting for?

Submission

Submission Time is upon us...

Now that we’ve written the story, we’ve workshopped it with fellow writer’s (or revised it five times to make it perfect) and now we feel it is ready to submit!

First you will search out markets for your work. I would look specifically for where you think your piece of work is going to fit in. Don’t send a child’s story to an erotic magazine, and whatever you do don’t send a teen pregnancy story to a sports editor. In other words, DO YOUR HOMEWORK!

Most publications offer online guidelines for you to follow. It is of the utmost importance that you FOLLOW these guidelines right down to the line. Word for word, check what each one wants and expects from you, the writer.

If they accept 2,000 words, do not think that ONE WORD over the limit is allowed. It isn’t. Don’t surmise that it will look better in a fancy font. It won’t to their eyes! If they ask for 12 pt. Times New Roman , then by all means that is what you will deliver to them.

A lot of times they accept email submissions but in a rtf. format. Again, DO YOUR HOMEWORK and find out what a rtf. format IS. It is a Rich Text Format that makes the work of the editor much easier, and often times that is why they request your story in that format.

Sometimes they want your story in the body of an email, that is what they want, and that is what you will send them. If they want Snail Mail with a S.A.S.E (Self addressed stamped envelope) It is your job to deliver the goods in the form that they require.
You want them to read your work not toss it in the bin. If you fail to adhere to simple guidelines, maybe you aren’t ready to be a serious writer.

Now we’ve submitted, what’s next? Well my friend this is where you will need all the patience of a monk. This is where you wait. My advice? Forget you sent it in and when the acceptance comes in the mail (or rejection) you can say to yourself, "I forgot I even sent that story out!"

But we all know that you will have already made a file for where (and to whom) you’ve submitted and WHEN you’ve submitted. And more than likely you will look at it every day and wind up becoming a nail-biter before the "You’ve Got Mail" voice arrives with an acceptance or rejection.

Sit back, have a drink (preferably green tea) and wait…and wait…and wait some more!
Nooooooo, you start a NEW STORY! That’s what we writer’s do while we wait! Then we have submissions and works in progress going at all times so that we truly DO forget where and when and who and what we’ve sent out into the world. (I’m kidding)

Always have a record of your work! And don’t forget to BACK UP your files! You never know when the great power outage will sweep across America, and at least YOU will have a copy of all of your work!

Or…you can just BLOG!

Write on!

It is okay to be planted, but it is so much nicer when you bloom! ~joni