I have not blogged in over two months. Good intentions to write entries once a week have been waylaid by everyday life. In other words, I have been busy over the last few months.

I’ve been busy with life, but also busy with writing.

I have been working on my short stories and submitting them to magazines.  Some encouraging rejections have landed in my inbox, but no acceptances. I’m encouraged enough by the positive feedback in my rejections to keep submitting.

One short story market asks for a query prior to sending them your short story. I’m stumped with this guideline, except to say a query for a short story must be more compact than a query for a novel. I will give it as try, as I think my story would fit perfectly in this magazine.

I have finished editing my novel and it is with a beta reader right now.  I’m interested in hearing about what works and what does not.  At this juncture, I am blind to my writing in my novel.  I will soon start the re-query process and continue working on novel number two.

This is all for now. Happy writing all!

Besides putting the final edits to my novel, I have been writing a short story about a sixteen year old homeless girl and her younger brother surviving in current culture. Amidst all the troubles of these kids living in homeless camps, there are moments of peace and joy. I think I have a good story in the making.

Since I have never been homeless, I have engaged in some local introspection, if you will, of how I might add flavor to my story.

For example, in a neighborhood where I park for work, a box of books has been left on the sidewalk. Everyday I have seen fewer books in the box, as if people have been helping themselves to their favorite read. What if my characters were to come across this free mini-library and find books that can take them to worlds away from the hardships and possible horrors awaiting them on the street?

Another example is a walk I took during my lunch break at work the other day. In the city where I live, there are long paved trails, double decker at some locations, running alongside a flowing creek protected by lush canopies of trees and brush. As I enjoyed the scenery, I began to wonder about the many places that a homeless girl and her brother could camp unseen.

My point is that research is all around you. You don’t have to stick to the old adage write what you know, you just need to turn your imagination on and research enough to fill in the details. Most of all, remember to write honestly and from your heart.

Happy writing all.

The scuttlebutt among some writing circles is that you must hire an editor before sending your work out to agents or publishers. A good freelance editor has a history of editing your type of book, has excellent editing skills, and costs buckets of money.  Many people do not have the money for a good freelance editor, so  they hire someone cheaper who may not have the necessary skills to do a good job.

Other groups of writers say that we must edit our own work. Self Editing for Fiction Writers by Renni Browne and Dave King is the often recommended reference guide.  I bought this book years ago, have read it from beginning to end, and it is still part of my writing library.  Browne and King teach writers to polish their work to a high level of professionalism.

Finally, a new group has emerged; those who swear by editing programs.  The process here is to copy your text into a box and run software that checks for numerous grammatical issues. The problem is that some of the software cannot discern a dialogue tag from an action included with dialogue, or it marks was as passive (when it is not), and suggests cutting out every adverb in your document.    

At this juncture in my writing writing adventure, I do whatever it takes to produce the best product I can. Other than just having someone else write your manuscript, I suggest one or a combination of the following:

• Hire an editor, but work with him or her so that you learn to recognize errors in your own work.  
• Use a self edit using a written guide.  Make sure you read and highlight the important points and practice the editing exercises so that you are clear on common grammar errors. 
• Use editing software, but make sure you use one that offers explanations for grammatical errors.  Do not use software that highlights words and phrases but does not give clear explanations.  

If you hire an editor or use editing software, make sure you are well-versed in grammar, spelling, and sentence structure. A self-editing guide is your reference for when your get stumped on grammatical errors. The bottom line is that you must never rely on someone or something else to edit your work for you and just take the result at face value. Editors are human too and computer programs are automated.  You make the final decision as to the editorial changes in your work.

Happy writing all!

It’s query time again for my novel.  I have rewritten, edited and re-edited my work, searched for agents who represent my genre at Query Tracker and Agent Query, completed due diligence via Preditors and Editors and Writers Beware, and honed my query letter and synopsis. Now, I am hopeful that an agent may become excited about the story I have written.

After sending queries out two weeks, ago, I have received one standard rejection out of ten. In my book, that’s nine more chances to land one of many fabulous agents.  The glass is always half full, never half empty.

If you are a writer and submit to magazines, agents, and/or publishers, you will get rejected. I doubt any writer has had a one hundred percent acceptance rate.  If you have never gotten rejected, please share how you did it.

At the writing forums I frequent, many writers want to know while they have their work on submission. The best advice I have seen, which I also follow, is to work on something else.

My something else is my second novel.  I started this one about six or seven years ago, but never got past the first chapter until last year.  I now have written twelve chapters and between 20 and 30 thousand words. I keep a running synopsis so I don’t forget an important plot point or a thread that needs follow through.

I am also writing some short stories and editing the newsletter for the Redwood Writers Club. This year, I would like to submit some of my short stories as well as look into other areas of writing.

I could be stressing over the what ifs while waiting for agent responses, or beating myself when I receive a rejection, but I am choosing to stay neutral and to work on those other projects. Besides writing, my job is to put my best work out there without expectation of the outcome.