Month: September 2023

Authors, What’s Your Best Publishing Advice to New Writers?

Authors what's your best publishing advice to new writers?

Since this month’s theme is publishing, I decided to have questions to prompt discussions rather than photos to prompt stories. So, authors, what’s your best publishing advice to new writers?

My best advice is to dream small. It’s fine to work on a novel that you hope will become a national bestseller. But don’t pass up other writing opportunities because they don’t fit in with your dream as a novelist.

I joined my local chapter of American Christian Fiction Writers because I was working on a Christian novel. When the opportunity came for me to contribute to an anthology of Christian fiction, I jumped at the chance. Although I wanted my novel published, I recognized that this might be the only story of mine to see the light of print.

So I published my first mystery short story in 2018. I heard about a Christmas anthology and submitted “A Rose from the Ashes”. It was published. The publishers liked my mystery short story so much that they wanted to see the next story I wrote. That was A Shadow on the Snow, which became my first published novel.

No, it wasn’t the one I’d been working on for years and years. Shadow was much better. But I wouldn’t have had the chance to develop this new novel if I’d been stubborn about clinging to my original dream of becoming published.

So I’d love to hear from you, authors, what’s your best publishing advice for new writers?

3

If You Are Ready to Publish

Are you ready to publish

Since I’ve devoted this year to “The Journey of a Book”, I have to address the business side of writing: publishing, which is my theme this month. Not every writer needs to be published. If you enjoy writing for yourself or friends or family, then publishing may not be on your mind. But if you want to publish stories or books, you need to ask yourself if you are ready to publish. Below is the key question to know if you are.

Are You Willing to Let Others Shape Your Story?

When I first began writing, I thought I knew everything there was to know about writing fiction simply by remembering how the stories I’d read were constructed. The manuscript I brought to my first conference was perfect. All the publisher had to do was print it. I’d be on my way.

Except that this idea was delusional.

Publishing makes a story marketable to a wider audience. Professionals in the industry help you fix quirks of your writing that might hamper readers enjoying your story. For me, that meant having an editor point out when I used colloquial expressions that readers from other parts of the country might not understand. I had to have a teachable spirit, able to take opinions from critique partners, beta readers, and editors and use them to improve my story. I had to admit that no matter how much work I put into a book, I couldn’t do it perfectly and would have to accept advice on how to make it better.

And an amazing thing happen–my stories improved. Many new writers think other industry professionals, like editors, will harm their story. But those professionals want your story to be the best it can be. They also recognize that it’s your story. They want you bring out the qualities that make your story unique.

If you are ready to publish, you are ready to let the story be king, to allow others to make the story the best it can be.

Are you ready?

0

Use Labor Day in a Story

Use Labor Day in a Story

I decided to take advantage of the holiday falling on a Monday to inspire today’s writing prompt. How would you use Labor Day in a story?

For those of us with kids in school, Labor Day often feels like New Year’s Day. The beginning of a new school year feels like it should also be the beginning of the actual year. This makes Labor Day a good setting to start or end a story. I think it’s particularly effective to start a story because Labor Day picnics give you a reason to bring many different characters together and introduce them quickly to the reader. It would work well as ending if you had a story taking place over a summer.

For more prompts for stories set in September, click here.

0

Powered by WordPress.com.

Up ↑