THE WRITE PATH!

This isn’t really late for “The Write Path” submission. I emailed mine directly to Carrie Butler when it was due, but then I had a few people ask me why I didn’t post my article. So here it is.

 

The Write Path

One lesson I tripped on along the way to publication still haunts me. I submitted to a magazine that seemed a good home for one of my stories. This was back in the day when simultaneous submissions were an invitation to get yourself blackballed from a trusting publisher. Nowadays, as long as you disclose that a manuscript is a simultaneous submission, it’s fine.

 It didn’t turn out fine for me twelve years ago. I never informed the publisher my story was a simultaneous submission, because initially, it wasn’t. I submitted the story to them alone. However, having not heard from them a year and a half later, I decided to remarket the story. I wanted to do it right. Following etiquette, I sent a note requesting that my story be withdrawn from their consideration.

I had no way of knowing their acceptance letter crossed in the mail with my request. Unfortunately, the publisher had already sent my story to press when my notice arrived, and she was upset. It was too late to stop the presses. I received a heated phone call. Yes, I apologized.

Eighteen months is a long time to wait, so what should I have done? The professional thing would have been to send a status inquiry at least once before ever sending a notice to withdraw the submission. Had I sent a simple note stating that I’d like to keep the story in circulation if they weren’t interested, and politely requested that they let me know how much more time they needed, the end result would have been better.

They would’ve informed me they’d already sent a letter of acceptance. And if they hadn’t sent one yet at the time they received my inquiry, they at least would have been aware I wanted a decision made soon. Perhaps they would’ve told me that they needed only a couple more weeks to make sure they had room for the story before formally accepting it.

My story was published, and because I’d sent the story to another publisher the same day I sent the first a notice to withdraw, I immediately let the second publisher know the story had already been accepted elsewhere.

When I received my free copy of the publication featuring my story, disappointment deflated any excitement I could’ve had. A few necessary words had been omitted from the first paragraph, leaving an unclear meaning in a verb-less mess. I tried to convince myself the omission wasn’t a last-minute decision to pay me back for putting them under stress, but occasionally I’ve had doubts. On the other hand, publishers take pride in the magazines they put out, so it’s unlikely there was any malicious intent. Still, because of that butchered paragraph, I’ve never whipped out that magazine for any bragging rights, nor have I dared submitting to them again.

The best thing to do, whether submitting to a print publication or an online journal, is to tell the editor or publisher upfront if your story is a simultaneous submission. If you feel you should have received a response by a given date and you haven’t, send a polite inquiry before you even think about withdrawing your piece.

They may have put time into pre-publication preparations just to make sure they could fit your story into available space before they let you know whether or not they could accept it. Just as you don’t want your time wasted, don’t waste theirs. No one should have to wait eighteen months, but if you do, then go the extra step to send out an inquiry before you make a rash decision. It beats kicking yourself later.

Happy Writing!

HELP US WIN FREE PIZZA!!!

My grandson was selected by a local car dealership for the Cutest Kid Contest. The winner gets a free pizza and pool party. To help us out and vote for him, log in to Facebook and go to the website below to "Like" the photo of him. Please share with friends and family!   

 

Cute Kid Contest From Baby and Kids Expo

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GUEST AUTHOR MADELINE MORA-SUMMONTE on HOW FLASH FICTION UNFURLS

The People We Used To Be

Many people think flash fiction or micro fiction is easy to write because it’s so short. After all, how hard is it to write a 50-word or a 100-word story?

Well, at least for me, it’s harder than it looks. I usually go through draft after draft, cutting words and slicing those “throat-clearing” phrases as if my pen was a scalpel, attempting to uncover the heart of the story, to bare its bones, sharp and hard, on the page.

I thought the best way to illustrate my process – such as it is – is with an example. Here’s an early draft of my story, What’s Eating Xavier?

The rest of the landscape crew was up the block. Xavier was alone at the house at the end of the street.

His machine cuts into the concrete porch like teeth chewing and tearing at flesh and bone. The machine bucks, its gears gnashing, its motor burning hot then dying a cold death. Xavier curses. He prods at the bushes, feels his way along the wall, feeling for gouges in the concrete. Maybe, if it’s small enough, he can let it go, arrange the bushes over it so no one will be the wiser and he wouldn’t get in trouble.

His fingertips press against the crumbling concrete. He measures it, smiles. Not too big, not too bad at all. He would be okay.

Then something inside the crack reaches out its tongue and licks him.

Hmm…I see some good stuff buried beneath that flabby prose. Shorter, tighter sentences and more intense, vigorous words would accentuate the creepy factor. I also ask myself - what does the reader need to know for the story to work? In this case, a few things: Xavier is working alone near a supposedly haunted house; he’s disliked by his coworkers; and, he’s cocky and willing to cover up his mistakes rather than take responsibility for them. Armed with all of this information, I go back to work and, after a few more drafts, come up with the final version of What’s Eating Xavier?

Xavier works the old Dudley house alone. The landscape crew sniggers, says its haunted. They give him the hardest jobs, the crappiest equipment. They’re just jealous – of his youth, his good looks.

He’s daydreaming of being rich, famous when the mower rams into the house’s foundation. The machine judders, its gears gnashing. The motor burns hot then dies a cold death.

Xavier curses. He finds the hole – a small, dry mouth edged with soft, crumbling teeth. He can hide it, no problem. He smiles.

Until something inside the hole unfurls its tongue and licks him.

You can see the difference in the last sentence alone. By slightly changing the words and their order, and replacing “reaches out” with “unfurls,” the ending now slides off the page and into the reader’s ear, just like that tongue.

Give it a try. Dig deep to find the kernel of your story. Hone your prose. Hunt for the best word possible.

Writing flash fiction is a challenge, but one well worth undertaking.

BIO: Madeline Mora-Summonte reads, writes, and breathes fiction in all its forms. She is the author of The People We Used to Be: A Flash Fiction Collection. 

 

Looking Back on the A to Z!

This was the first year I’d ever participated in the A to Z Blogging Challenge, but it won’t be my last. First, I’d like to thank all of the co-hosts who created and organized this challenge, because without you, I would’ve never found so many interesting blogs, nor met so many wonderful people.

I’m a writer, and with that title comes not only a yearning to explore new subjects for future work, but a responsibility to continually strive to better the writing I put out. I think it would be impossible for a writer to walk away from this challenge without having gained incredible resources for almost any topic. If I wanted to create a realistic setting for a story that takes place in a part of the world I’ve never been, I’d visit the travel blogs I came across through the Challenge, and I’d find the fuel I needed to flesh out my story. Likewise, I would know who to go to if I wanted to create a character who’s a medium, a character who’s big on games, a character who can cook anything. So what I’m saying is, I’ve learned about a wealth of topics, and I’ve noted the blogs that would prove useful resources should I need to research those topics further.

But I’ve gained a lot more than that. I didn’t learn only about topics. I’ve learned more about people. I’ve made friendships. I’ve gained a sense of community with other bloggers in a diverse world that sometimes seems too large. This challenge has opened the world to me in a way I would have never imagined. I feel as though I know many of the people I’ve met through this challenge, and my new challenge will be to try and keep up with visiting all of them from time to time.

Silvia Villalobos urged me to join this challenge, so along with the co-hosts, I owe her a debt of gratitude.  

            My goal in joining this challenge was to increase my blog readership. I was hoping to bring my 33 or so followers up to 101 followers, so that I could say I had over 100. I now have 215 blog-roll followers, a few dozen e-mail subscribers, and I don’t even know how many bloggers following through RSS feeds. So, I made my goal, and a whole lot more. Most important are the friends I’ve made and the many blogs I joined to follow. Blogs that will continue to teach me through this learning experience called life until the end of mine. I couldn’t be more grateful.

            I wasn’t really prepared for the 40 and 50 daily comments left on my blog–though I appreciated them – because I found it difficult to get back to the sites of each of those bloggers, read their posts, and say something, as well as visit five new blogs each day and write my daily post–but I did it. I had the flu two days and computer problems one day, and I missed returning a comment or two then, but I did get to those blogs the following day.

Next year, I’d like to promise I’ll get smart and write my posts out well in advance, but I’m going to be honest. My life is always busy. I write five days a week, I’m a copy editor for other writers, and my entire summers are busy with painting. Those weeks that my husband and I are preparing exhibits for an art/craft show, it’s all I can do to manage my self-mandated one paragraph to one page of writing per day (I write more during the other seasons.)

It’d be easy during those busy times to tell myself as soon as life slows down, I’ll write those posts. But sometimes life doesn’t slow down, and in case this year proves to be one of those hectic ones, I’ll be writing on the fly again for The Challenge next April. But I’ll make it, and I know that now. (I also now know that should a publisher ever ask me to skimp on sleep for a few weeks to meet a commitment, I could do it.)

            As far as suggested changes for the overall challenge, I really didn’t see much that could be improved upon. One thing I did find frustrating was when someone would leave a comment on my blog, and I’d click on his or her name in hopes of being routed to his or her blog, and instead I was taken to a Google page. On the Google page there would be a number of blog addresses, and I wouldn’t know which one belonged to the original commenter I was trying to find.

I often spent ten and even fifteen minutes tracking down someone’s blog so I could return a comment. By the time I got to the letter X in The Challenge, if I clicked on somebody’s name and it took me to a Google page instead of a blog, I clicked right out of it. I just didn’t have the time to check five blog addresses in comments to find the right one.

When Silvia gave me tips on signing up for this challenge, she did mention I should make sure I had my blog URL in a signature in every comment I left. I’m glad she told me of this, because it made my blog easy to find.

            I’m going to miss everybody, even though I’ll be visiting them often. There is no way I can visit fifty blogs every day of the week for an entire year. I’d never get my regular writing done, and I do give myself a strict schedule. But I’m grateful I now know where to go when I want to listen to good music, and I where to go when I want to be visually inspired by top-notch photography or to get my husband a new recipe (hee!). I know where to good books to put on my TBR list, and where to go if I simply want to read a good story. I also know that throughout the year, I’ll be getting to know the friends I’ve made even better, and hopefully I’ll be meeting a few more.

            If you leave a comment on my blog this week (while I’m preparing for an art show), please know that I may be day or two late in getting to your blog, but I will get there.

My best to you all, and I’ll see you soon.

 

I made it!!!

What? You don't think posting a badge alone is a worthy post?
Hah! I got news for you. This is a big horn to toot, and I'm tooting it as loud as I can!

Happy writing and congratulations to all you
A to Z survivors! WE did it!


 

Z IS FOR ZOOLOGY!

Ideas can’t be copyrighted, so these ideas are free for you to use

Z is for Zoology. (Skim to the underlined genre or style that best suits you.)

Romance. As a last minute choice, Rolene jotted her name on the sign-up sheet next to zoology. As she thought about writing on zoology as a possible career choice, her dislike for manure and the smell of wet fur loomed in her mind. What was she thinking? And Professor Litchinson would expect a top-notch research paper. Zoology. What a zany idea. Preposterous even.

Rolene spent the next night sitting in on a talk about molecular biology. Ugh. It took three aspirin to get through it. Wednesday night improved. She attended a lecture about animal behavior, and the presenter, a man who made her knees weak every time he opened his mouth, brought two little lion cubs for all to observe. After the lecture, Rolene jiggled the tongue of the zipper to her sweater, a habit when she felt nervous, and stepped closer to the gentleman. And the cubs. “They’re adorable,” she said, ordering her knees not to give out.

She barely made out the man’s words, because her eyes were fixed on his smile and her heart was pounding louder than her voice.

It wasn’t until she felt a cool breeze across her chest that she’d realized she’d jiggled her zipper so hard, it broke.

Okay romance writers. Give him a witty line to save her, and let’s watch these two fall in love.

Mystery. There’s a lot of room for mystery in a zoology department at any university. Consider the wrong person taking the molecular biology course, and as luck would have it, he’s Bria’s lab partner. He utters under his breath snarky remarks about the professor and even said, while looking straight in her eyes, “That traitorous jerk is the only reason I signed up for this course.” Another time he mentioned in what she had assumed to be jest that he’d like to bury that guy (the professor) and put him in a nameless tomb.

Bria had never given the comments thought, assuming her partner was just a negative person having a bad day, until another faculty member addressed the class and announced that the professor was dead. Poisoned, actually, perhaps with something concocted right in this lab. Everyone in the room was now a suspect, and especially those who understood chemistry. How she regretted acing the course.

You can take it from here, mystery writers.

Literary. Daphne appreciated studying in the natural field of zoology. It gave her another way of viewing motherhood. Some animals were so overly protective of their young it made her feel empty inside, because this was a bond she’d never experienced with her own mother. Still, sometimes she’d watch the behavior of the animals, and she thought she could almost feel what a strong love was, sort of like reading a book and living the life of the characters along with them. But then there were those other animals, the ones who seemed to act as though their duty was done as soon as they’d given birth. Watching them felt like watching a reel of her life, an unnecessary thing her mother had to deal with to appease the law and societal expectations. Perhaps her mother was too animalistic–and that’s why she apparently saw no problem in leaving her young behind to make it on her own.

            But studying the different animals, the nature of them, did put Daphne’s life in a new perspective. It gave her a different view of her mother, a less resentful view. But Daphne couldn’t deny that it also made her wonder what kind of mother she, herself, would be, if she ever agreed to become one.       

Now you have the background on this character, and to give her a place in a literary story, you might have her caring for a specific animal that gives birth, and use the parallel with her own life. Through this type of reflection, she may be enlightened in a way she never would have imagined.

Children’s. To work this big word –zoology–into a story for children, you might consider writing it in a sort of teacher and sidekick manner. Imagine that Uncle Vernon is a zoologist, and he’s bent on explaining the profession to Kyle. “Zoology is studying everything about animals. I study how Koala’s react to their young, where kangaroos sleep, and what giraffes eat. I learn all about animals.”

“Like dinosaurs and aliens?” Kyle asks, stepping his feet up the back of the sofa.

Next, you can have the uncle try to give more information, but maybe with a little more character, perhaps with some antics. Then the young boy (sidekick) will again ask, “But what about dinosaurs and aliens?” (Then use this idea as repetitive interruptions to the uncle’s speech.)

This isn’t really unrealistic. Have you ever tried to have an educational conversation with a child whose mind was set on a particular subject, rather than the one you wanted to discuss? They try to listen, really they do, but they always come back to their own questions. You can use that to your advantage. You can lighten a serious topic, or you can make a boring topic less boring.

I love children’s books, but I admit the textbook style ones don’t even grab me on the first line, let alone hold me. I’ve never tried to read one to a kid, because I wouldn’t know how to make it interesting. But I think it can be done if you add a sidekick to throw in a little humor after every three or four lines of boring education. It will even make the learning part fun.

Then again, if you can imagine an uncle as a zoologist, you can imagine that he’d always have amazing stories to tell and pictures to look at. What would happen if the pictures he had from his visit to South Africa were on his desk, because he treasured them and had been admiring them. Unfortunately, when he left the room, your little character accidentally spilled his grape soda all over the photos. How will he try to cover up or “fix” his blunder? Naturally, in his attempt to make it right, he’s going to make it even worse. After a few times, the pictures are barely recognizable. Now what will your character do?

What ideas can you pull off the top of your head? If you can offer some in genres I didn’t cover, such as horror, sci-fi, or fantasy, please share! Readers will appreciate it.

Happy writing!

 

 

Y IS FOR YODEL!

Ideas can’t be copyrighted, so these ideas are free for you to use.

Y is for Yodel (Skim to the underlined genre or style that best suits you.)

Romance. Kirsten wanted to stay home, but Janessa wouldn’t take no for an answer and hauled her down to the karaoke bar, because the owners were doing something different tonight. A yodeling contest. Seriously? Fine, she’d go, but no way would she stand up there and yap like a hillbilly. But her plan didn’t go so well when Janessa enlisted a couple of patrons to help tote Kirsten to center stage.

Laughing more out of embarrassment than enjoyment, Kirsten couldn’t get out even one yodel. Then Janessa had the gall to ask the audience for volunteers to do a yodeling duet to help Kirsten out. Kirsten’s first instinct was to ring her best friend’s neck. She changed her mind when a man with Blake Shelton’s dimples and sexy green eyes hopped onto the stage and stood beside her. Add a little music, clapping, and toe tapping to this scene, and it won’t be long and Kirsten will be yodeling and dancing a do-si-do for the rest of her life.

Mystery. Karleah wasn’t really breaking and entering when she stepped into her brother’s apartment. He’d said she could borrow his lightweight dumbbells to start getting in shape before she invested her own money into any equipment. Jogging she understood, but it wasn’t doing much for the flapping wings of her upper arms.

She didn’t even switch on a light until she got to the spare bedroom that he called his mini gym. She turned on a small desk lamp, but she couldn’t find the dumbbells. She got down on her knees and peeked under the desk. There they were.

Just as she grabbed the weights, two voices carried from the front room, and neither one belonged to her brother. One sounded harsh, then the voices quieted, until one let out a chuckle that turned into a sort of yodel. A really odd but unmistakable laugh. She had the impression these guys were not her brother’s friends. Soon she heard clanging and thumping–they were fighting. Trembling, she waited until she heard nothing, then she crept to the living room. Yes, a big man lay with his head bleeding. Karleah stepped closer, picked up the bloody fireplace poker next to him, then dropped it, just as a voice from the doorway said, “Hands in the air.”

Investigating to clear herself, Karleah interviews friends and family of the deceased, as well as her brother who claims to have no idea what’s going on. She learns that the dead guy had a very gruff laugh. Good. Now all she has to do is find the one man in the world who had a yodeling sort of laugh.

Literary.

Dreams of the yodeling woman in the blue dress had first interrupted Mia’s sleep when she was six years old. Her parents had told her she’d probably seen someone on TV that impressed her, and her subconscious thought about the strange singing during her sleep. By the time she was ten and often yawning through school, she knew better than to ask her parents if they knew such a woman. They would not only insist it must have been someone on TV, but they’d get irritated with her for repeatedly bringing up the subject. They weren’t even open to discussion about it, which made Mia even more curious. It wasn’t until her early twenties that she’d forgotten about the lady, because through adolescence and her new adult years, her own yearnings, teenage angst, and social life kept her brain more than busy. But just after her thirtieth birthday and on the day she began working at her fifth job for the year (hoping to find her true calling), the dreams were back, and this time more vivid. The woman spoke to her. “Don’t forget me,” she said, and when she did, Mia felt sure she’d heard the voice before, sometime long ago.

This might sound more like suspense than a literary story, but it’s what you do with it that can make it either. It can be both. Use metaphor and incorporate a sense of self discovery in your symbolism. At some point, Mia will realize that she isn’t looking for answers to a dream. She’s looking for a piece of her own past, and just like all of our pasts, until we can put can them in proper perspective, they can hold us at a standing point, stop us from moving forward. For Mia, she will never find her place in the world, not at work and not at home, until she takes the time to know who she is. She needs to satisfy the restlessness within.

Children’s stories. Since I have a bad flu while I’m writing this, I’m going to incorporate a little truth into this premise for a story. Afflicted with an unrelenting flu and sore throat for the last twelve hours, thirteen-year-old Sophia fretted on how she’d manage to show up for the preliminary choir recitals. She hadn’t missed a day of rehearsal throughout the entire exhausting month, and now she could barely open her mouth without running to the toilet. How was she to yodel? And Mrs. M was counting on her, and no one else had practiced the yodeling aprt, because it was assigned specifically to Sophia.

If she talked to Mrs. M, surely there’d be disappointment, but Mrs. M would understand and tell her to stay home. But throw in the towel two days before the big finale? No way. There had to be a solution. Sophia had already eaten soda crackers, and that wasn’t working. Chicken soup and warm 7-Up hadn’t helped, and neither did gargling with that nasty tasting salt water. What if she got up under the spotlight and hurled right in front of everyone? Or passed out–she sure felt as though she could.

Okay writers, I strongly suspect that many of you have more energy than I do right now, so I hope you can finish this up. It’s not hard to imagine what could possibly go wrong in this story, but to make it work I think the stakes would need to be a bit higher. There’d have to be some reason that showing up for this recital is so important to Sophia, more so than simply to tell herself that she did it. But then, not wanting to let down an instructor that you admire can have power, because we all have to face letting someone down at some point in our lives. Besides possible disappointment, what else can go wrong when Sophia considers her goal? Maybe she does take the chance, and she knows she’s about to throw up, so she runs offstage, just in time to puke all over her secret crush who was watching from the left wing.

What ideas can you pull off the top of your head? If you can offer some in genres I didn’t cover, such as horror, sci-fi, historical, or fantasy, please share! Readers will appreciate it.

Happy writing!