Category Archives: All Things Writing

You can’t get too high…

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Well, here we go again: another week of so many tantalizingly possible ups, I’m almost certain to come crashing down for one (or more) enormous downs. Hey, everyone–please allow me to introduce our guest blogger for the day, Eeyore! 

Okay, here’s the scoop: First, I heard back from a highly-respected local mentoring press’ Acquisitions Editor that they would be delighted to publish my book. That is exciting news, of course, since this particular press does only publish 1 out of every 9 submissions it receives, they are an award-winning press, and the books I’ve seen are all very high quality. It was definitely balm for my writer’s ego to spend some time reading the editor’s critique and fantasize about moving forward with the process, but I’m just not there yet.

A mentoring press is still, after all, a type of self-publishing, even if this one is more selective than most about its authors, not to mention that it would still cost a pretty chunk of change to get the job done. I’m not dismissing it–just pondering it at the moment.

Then, out of the blue, I received a moving thank-you last week from someone who had read a health-related article of mine from a couple of years ago which prompted them to see a doctor and led to an accurate diagnosis of the individual’s very rare condition. I mean, wow–how much more of a difference in the world can you hope to make in the world as a writer than to, well, sort of, save someone’s life? After that, publication seems sort of secondary.

But only sort of. Because then I participated in a webinar with a literary agent earlier this week, part of which included submitting my first three pages for a critique. After the spate of recent rejections, a critique was all I expected, but on the strength of those three pages, the agent requested a partial review of 30 pages! Again, she could get to page 29 and decide, “Bleh, that’s enough for me,”, but just having had someone ask always feels good.

And then, on that “real job” front: just when I least expected it, I got an e-mail requesting an interview with me for a job I applied to a couple of weeks ago–I was hoping it might be a good enough fit to actually speak with a live human being about it, but given that I’ve sent out dozens of applications over the last year without a single interview being granted, this was a pretty exciting development.

So to recap: thank you from grateful reader; acceptance for publication by mentoring press; request for a partial from a bona fide literary agent; and job interview later this week (and it’s even for something I don’t think I would actually hate doing every day!)

Oh, and of course, my beloved Chicago Bears won this past weekend–it doesn’t get much better than this, does it?

Um, no–and that’s precisely what has me worried now. Stay tuned, everyone.

It’s Been A While…

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Wow, I must have been having a lot of fun for the past few months, because I cannot believe I haven’t posted anything new since–what was that, July? Egad.

Yes, the time has flown–I just wish I could remember what I was doing that was so much fun it kept me from blogging all this time. On the other hand, maybe it’s better that I can’t–it probably wasn’t that much fun.

So, it’s the shiny New Year, which means it’s get-back-on-track time (again). I wouldn’t necessarily use the word “resolution”, but I do seem to get a firmer sense of resolve around this time every year–equal parts guilt and shame over not having accomplished more than I did the previous year, I suspect.

What’s on the docket for this year? Well, other than trying to get rid of my “writer’s butt” (if you’re a writer, you know what I’m talkin’ ’bout), right now, I’m updating my blog, so I can check that off my list (yes, I actually did write that one down). I spent the morning working on an article for a newsletter; spent the early afternoon in a Webinar about how to get an agent (yes, I’m still looking); and I just finished working on a writing grant-proposal (note the hyphen there–I do write grant proposals, but this is a grant for writing. Kind of confusing, I know.)

And then, of course, there is my annual “Will-she-or-won’t-she-finally-be-accepted-to-grad-school?” drama coming up in the next month or so. You’d think I would’ve given up by now, but what can I say, I’m a masochist. I worked up new samples, secured a couple of new letters of recommendation, deleted the “Excuses for my Poor Math Grades” essay and got it in just barely by the deadline (along with, she said indignantly, the greatly increased application fee). I think you should get a refund of the fee if they reject you more than once.

As for longer-range plans, I am finally beginning my search for a “real” job. Since I’ve apparently never held one of those (teaching didn’t count, I guess), I assume that that means doing something I hate for a minumum of 6-8 hours every day; probably having to drive at least an hour each day for the pleasure of doing it; and the thrill of coming home at the end of each day tired, crabby, and unfulfilled–at least, that’s what I’ve heard. Oh, and no Social Security benefits when I retire because the Baby Boomers will use them all up. (I’ve heard that, too.) Can’t wait!

Oh, come on, you folks who know me know me better than to think I’m a Debbie Downer like that–I’m just pulling your legs with all that Bad Attitude stuff. I’m actually kind of looking forward to working outside of the house again (“kind of”–I’m all about hedging my bets). After a few months of reporting to work in pajamas, you start to feel a bit slovenly (even though I just got some really sweet new pajamas for Christmas.)

So, that’s my docket for now. How will that affect my writing? Well, I’ll still do it–it’ll just take a little longer to get to stuff (says she who took 6 months to get around to updating her blog.)

If you really like me, you’ll wait…

See you in June!

Just kidding.

Ups and Downs…

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One of my new favorite songs to warm up to on my runs is “Tippin’ on the Tightrope” by Janelle Monae. There’s a section of the lyrics that seems particularly fitting as I work toward my writing goals:

“You can’t get too high/You can’t get too low/’Cause if you get too high/No, you’ll surely be low”

The last couple of months have been a period of quite a few highs and lows for me, to be sure. After accepting what felt like my 500th rejection notice, I was feeling pretty low and thinking about updating my resume to start looking for a “real” job. Down.

Then one of my freelancing roles suddenly expanded, bringing me a bit more steady work. Up.

I was turned down for acceptance to grad school–again. Definite Down. But, just this morning, I read in the local paper that, due to tough financial times, the university in question “admitted the smallest class to its Graduate School this decade”, accepting nearly 100 fewer students this year. Okay, so not a true Up, but it did make me feel better to think that it wasn’t just me who got the shaft from the Admissions Office–there were a whole lot of us out there.

However, feeling better about it doesn’t change the fact that I wasn’t accepted. Um, yeah. Down.

But then an agent whom I’d queried months ago (and who, I must confess, is the one agent with whom I’d most like to work) contacted me and requested a partial review of my revised manuscript. Way Up.

And then today, two rejection slips: one for a short story I’d submitted and the other for an article I’ve been shopping around for a few months. Back Down.

Up, Down, Up, Down.

Is this what life in a “real” job would be like, I wonder? There’s certainly a respectable amount of appeal in a job that would come with a steady paycheck and reduced mood swings, I think. So I wonder.

Sometime this next month, if the agent’s estimate is accurate, I expect to hear back from her. Will it be Up (a full manuscript read)? Or will it be Down (No, thanks, even less interested this time around)?

Also this month, I expect to receive word on my status in The Loft Literary Center’s Mentor Series Competition. I’ve applied before: In 2008, I made it into the top 20 (big Up), but only the top 12 were accepted. (Need I say more?) I did submit for both the fiction and creative nonfiction categories this time, so hopefully that doubled my chances, but who knows? Up. Down.

Yep. Who knew making a go of this was going to require so much intestinal fortitude? It’s enough to make a lesser woman seasick.

Fortunately, I’m not a lesser woman. Hang on, I’ll be right back (it’s time for me to spin around in my chair a few more times.)

Obit notice…

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It is with great sadness that I announce the demise of Widow Woman, at least in her current incarnation. She succumbed at 9:12 this morning after a long illness, in spite of the heroic and tender care she received at the hands of her long-suffering caretaker (who, in a bizarre twist of fate, was also her executioner.)  In lieu of flowers, please send memorials to Writers Anonymous. Or directly to me. I’ll probably need them.

What’s up, you might be asking? Well, here it is: For more than a year now, I’ve been toiling to get this monster of a book off the ground. Twice, I got to the point where I thought it was finally finished and began sending it out. But I must confess that, all along (if I’m honest with myself), I felt deep in the pit of my stomach that there were things about that manuscript that just weren’t working as it was conceived. (And clearly, the agents I queried agreed.)

It’s never easy to look at something you’ve worked so hard to create and admit that it’s crap, but that’s just what I had to do. It was time to put the old girl out of her misery, so this morning, I killed her. She’s dead. (Secret: It was kind of liberating.)

Now even though she’s dead, I’m not actually giving up on her. I still believe in the story, and I think it’s got the foundation to build something really fantastic with it. Even though killing it was relatively easy, there’s no way I was going to bury it.

So what did I do? I got a couple of good writing books, talked through various plot difficulties with a couple of very trusted readers, and wrote, wrote, wrote. I ate, drank, and slept on it for a few weeks now, and the good news is, I think I finally know where I want to go with it.

Of course, wherever there is good news, there is usually bad news stepping on its heels, and this case is no different. The bad news is that the changes I’m making will necessitate what will, in effect, be a complete reworking of the entire manuscript. This isn’t just dropping a chapter or aborting a single character I’m talking about–this is a rewrite on what will be a Bionic Woman-type scale. This will take some time, for sure.

They always say that novel-writing ain’t for the faint of heart, and it’s true, but I think this will be very much worth the effort, because this morning, after days of plot/character development, backstory imaginings, and armed with a notebook full of notes, I finally got started on the resurrection.

Whoo! It went like gangbusters! After months of feeling like I was sort of fumbling around in the dark, I feel like the lights finally turned on, and not only on, but blazing. My only problem today was stopping, because…

there is now, of course, this little timing issue, in that my kids are home from school for the summer now, which will make it harder to find guilt-free writing time, but somehow, it’ll get done. I’ve set myself a goal for the end of the summer for the rewrite–I will keep you posted on how it goes. At least I know that my children are old enough to know now that this is what Mom does: She’s a writer, and writers write. Boom. End of story. (Or at least, it will be, I hope, by the end of the summer.)

So–that’s the latest. I’ll keep you posted on my progress.

Does this mean it’s all bad?

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Okay, so it’s probably obvious that I’ve gotten a bit off track lately (if I’m honest, “lately” means “ever since Spring Break”). I’m not exactly sure what to blame it on, though I’ve got plenty of options: extended illness, relatives visiting, visiting relatives, midterm exams, final exams and projects, sick children, spring cleaning, etc., etc., etc. In other words, life.

But whatever culprit I choose to blame, the bottom line is that I have been shamefully lacking in discipline for at least two months now, at least as far as my own writing is concerned. I have done some work, and it’s had some limited payoffs: a grant proposal I wrote won its funding; a short story I submitted received second place (ew, that sounds kind of like a Community Chest card from Monopoly: “You’ve won second prize in a beauty contest! Collect $15.” That’s more than I got for the short story, to be honest…)

I completed another new short story, and I did finish up my final newsletter issue as editor (I did have to write original content for that, too.) And just today, I finally sat back down with my manuscript (yes, the same one I’ve been working on for almost two years) for another round of rewrites to incorporate the last critique I received.

Ugh–rewrites. I know it has to be done, and I acknowledge that each time I’ve done it, I’ve liked the end result better, but I must confess: I am ready to be done with this and move on to the other novel I’m still only five chapters into.

So what’s the holdup here? Life, I guess–there just always seems to be something more pressing going on than my writing, and I’m not sure when–or if–that sort of thing is ever going to stop happening.

How do other people do it? I remember reading in one of my writers’ magazines where one writer’s dog vomited in the foyer and she was so disciplined to “write-no-matter-what” each day that she left the vomit there for the rest of the day and continued to write. I wish I could say I had that kind of discipline and focus, but sometimes I’m just not sure I have that kind of intestinal fortitude to just drop the world off at the door to my office, that kind of “Unless it’s bleeding out, ignore it” approach.

I read something Neil Gaiman said in his blog, something like “anything that keeps me from writing is bad.” There are an awful lot of things that keep me from writing–kids, dogs, husband, friends, house, laundry, errands, cleaning–even me! So if all of those things are keeping me from writing, does that mean they’re all bad things? I mean, I understand what he’s trying to convey, but I’m beginning to wonder if,  in order to be a successful writer, you have to have a little bit of…I don’t know, selfishness? Is that the missing ingredient here? Do I really have to tell the whole world “bleep off” (censored–sometimes my daughter reads this) in order to succeed? What if I can’t?

Ah, well…I guess I’ll just have to go clean up the vomit first and think about that later. At least I got some work done today…