WRITING ADVICE: Writing My Way Back Into Publication…I Hope…

In September of 2007, I started this blog with a bit of writing advice. A little over a year later, I discovered how little I knew about writing after hearing children’s writer, Lin Oliver speak at a convention hosted by the Minnesota Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. Since then, I have shared (with their permission) and applied the writing wisdom of Lin Oliver, Jack McDevitt, Nathan Bransford, Mike Duran, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, SL Veihl, Bruce Bethke, and Julie Czerneda. Together they write in genres broad and deep, and have acted as agents, editors, publishers, columnists, and teachers. Since then, I figured I’ve got enough publications now that I can share some of the things I did “right”.

While I don’t write full-time, nor do I make enough money with my writing to live off of it...neither do all of the professional writers above...someone pays for and publishes ten percent of what I write. When I started this blog, that was NOT true, so I may have reached a point where my own advice is reasonably good. We shall see! Hemingway’s quote above will now remain unchanged as I work to increase my writing output and sales! As always, your comments are welcome!

It feels like my writing – well, to be honest, my PUBLICATIONS – have hit a brick wall.

VICTORY OF FISTS and HEIRS OF THE SHATTERED SPHERES: Emerald of Earth, were available as ebooks briefly, but the publisher was ignoring my agent’s request for royalties (which actually never came). Because "Life in these United States", VICTORY will never be published. HEIRS is currently being serialized here: https://stupefyingstories.blogspot.com/2022/01/heirs-of-shattered-spheres-emerald-of.html

At any rate, I had a few stories published at the beginning of this year, and it looked to be good.

Then I hit a brick wall as you can see if you look to the right at PROFESSIONAL PUBLISHING CREDITS...

In trying to “leave a mark” or “say something”, I may have stumbled. Since my last sale, I’ve submitted sixty times with no acceptance. My recent stories have fallen on ponderously deaf ears.

“What the Cockroach Said” (N-S Korea), “Storm Change” (Native American sovereignty), “The Princess’s Brain” (What fraction makes us Humans?), “And After Soft Rains, Daisies” (Alzheimer’s future care), “Talking my Way Back Into Life” (what happens when you’re suddenly older than you were?), “Rock of Ages” (When you’ve hated someone for two hundred years, can you make peace?), “Titan Mission Drops Bomb” (scat humor in space…OK, maybe I get it for this one…), “Lovely to Behold” (incredibly weird biology leads to murder; accused of being magic…), “Possums Don’t Have Belly Buttons” (cute but ultimately futile), “Candace Mooney and the Princess of Mars” (homage to ER Burroughs), “The Daily Use of Gravity Modification in Rebuilding Liberian Schools” (this one is my biggest disappointments…I wanted to show the impact of a technological breakthrough on an everyday job in a civil war ravaged country (I’ve been there, seen the results of war) and how it might be used to help raise a place up; as well, my agent and I parted ways (amicably)…and now I have a slew of stories that don’t seem to be going anywhere.

I am so tempted to be bitter and blame The Media, but the fact is that I’ve turned into my now-least-favorite-author in that I’ve allowed my “message” to sublimate my story. Have I lost focus because I’m intent on “leaving a mark” on society? It’s what I challenge my seniors to do as they contemplate graduation in the spring of 2018. I am trying to meet that goal myself, but…it’s FRUSTRATING. I also wonder about how this blog impacts my work. My politics and religion don’t line up at all with…well, the circles I choose to be in – speculative fiction and education. Seems that how I see the world is diametrically opposed to the majority in both places…

So, I’ve been reading and I’ve started to pick up some wisdom. The three most important things:

1) Think before you write. THAT’S a hard one to do for me. I tend to just pop off a story without much thought as to the emotional and intellectual impact I’m looking for. That segues into…

2) Advice Nancy Kress gave that I’m working hard at absorbing: “How can I lay out a story so that a reader will be ‘always absorbed’?” and “How can I lay out a story so that a reader will END the story with a different perspective, a confirmation of their belief system, or discover a new, interesting place?”

3) VERY recently, I discovered this from Chuck Wendig: “All stories need unanswered questions. All stories demand mysteries to engage our desperate need to know. Storytelling is in many ways the act of positing questions and then exploring the permutations of that question before finally giving in and providing [some] answers.”

4) I also learned this from Lisa Cron: "Story is what enabled us to imagine what might happen in the future...we're wired to turn to story to teach us the way of the world." [From the Introduction]

Now, how do I combine those three things in order to take me into CONSISTENCY?

I’ll keep you posted…

Image: https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/9f/22/3b/9f223b1e57a36e14db3eb13715fbe3f9.jpg