Janet Q. Glaser, the Wordwright
The Writer's Life of Frivolity and Philosophy

If you are a writer, you can teach a writing class. Now, don’t guffaw at that statement. Who better than a working writer to shepherd a group of folks who are hungry to set down words on the page? You remember the thrill of writing down your thoughts. Some of you may even remember the favorable response from friends and family who loved your story or article. Perhaps you are still in the glow of seeing your name on a published article or book. Don’t you want to help someone achieve their dream?

Teaching writing can be a volunteer job or a paid position. I began teaching a class on writing life stories after a writer in my writer’s group shared a diary that her great great grandfather kept in the 1800′s. This was an eye-opening experience for me. It almost became a mission for me to encourage people to write down their lives as a historical record of their times and as a gift to future generations.

In the beginning I wondered if all the studying, reading, outlining and decisions on areas to cover would be worth it. I am happy to report that I have had successful, paid for workshops since 2004. Not only have the proceeds lined my pocket with spending money…yes, it is not a huge money maker..but the responses from participants have warmed my heart as I see them leaving the class confident and ready to begin their life story and to organize it. They are inspired to write the information down for their families and finally accept that their life is worth living and sharing it with others.

Think about it. Choose your topic that you know you can teach and begin working out a workshop and a way to market it. The results for you will be satisfying and I guarantee you will learn more about your own writing through the exercises.

You are welcome to visit my website to view my page on Writing Life Stories. See? I cannot stop encouraging everyone to write their life story!

The FREE Muse Online Writers Conference is a fantastic conference to attend in October 11-17. You can go in your jammies, eat chocolate at your desk, and catch up on laundry while you meet esteemed writers, publishers, workshop leaders, and writers of all genres.

You may attend the forums and interact any time of day or sign up for scheduled workshops that work into your day’s activities. The workshop  handouts are packed with information that you can save and peruse later at your leisure. (I know, what leisure???)

The Muse Online Writers Conference is FREE if you sign up before August 15. A nominal charge of $5.00 is added after August 15. (Just think, you aren’t spending any gas money to get to the workshops…) Registrations will not be accepted after September 10.

This workshop has been valuable to the development of my career. I think you will pick up a nugget or two that will help you in your writing as well as meet some wonderful, helpful, sincere folks at the conference.

Let me know if you sign up.  I will look for ya’!!!

Grand Opening for Ask an Author is at 8 pm Central tonight, July 30. Lots of give aways and of course writing info and a chance to mingle with published authors. The purpose of the site, spear headed by Keira Kroft, is to help writers with writing a novel, answer questions on publishing, and to offer writing tips. You will also rub elbows with many published authors from different genres.

If you can’t make it tonight, then stop by the website. You know they’re always open 24 hours a day!!

I always wanted to be journalist, so I gathered my courage and approached our regional newspaper editor. I offered to write some articles for the paper and to my delight, he agreed to give me a chance. I discovered I enjoyed writing profiles on business people, getting to know and interview people who make a difference in the community, taking in the theater productions, festivals,  and events FREE. With a little imagination I turned a school visit into a story and apple picking into an article. I now have people who I regularly report on their organization and contacts I can go to for community information.

Yesterday I attended a Remote-Controlled (RC) planes Fly-In at an area airport with my hubby and grandsons. Not only did we have a fun time,  you better believe that it is going to make a great story for the paper! Be a journalist to meet lots of interesting folks and to write worthwhile, satisfying information people want to read.

When you begin your story or novel, do you use an outline to guide your writing or do you just begin and let the ideas/characters/plot take you in the direction of the story? Letting the story go along with no pre-planning means you are writing by the seat-of-your-pants thus gaining the title of a “pantser.”  We have lots of discussions at The Writers Chatroom among the newcomers and regular attendees of the Wednesday evening chats, as well as guest authors on Sunday nights,  as to the best method of writing a story or novel.

In an article by Robert Campbell, Outlining,  in Writing Mysteries: A Handbook by the Mystery Writers of America, this mystery writer admits he never used an outline. He preferred William Faulkner’s method of setting his characters on the road and “walk beside them, listening to what they have to say.” Campbell admits writing without an outline causes him to start down paths that lead to dead ends, but he discovers a lot about a character spending time on pages upon pages that he may have to discard. However, he feels that at least, he exercised the writing muscles.

Later in his writing Campbell discovered outlining using his “word processor” or even hand writing a simple outline. He also makes up documents before starting the story such as Chronology, Cast of Characters, Address Book, Timeline of History, Notebook and Agenda which “sketches the goals, desires and probable actions of each principal character as I move through the body of the book.” He builds on each of these documents as the work-in-progress (WIP) evolves.  Campbell cautions that at no time is anything engraved in stone. He remains flexible with each chapter.

It really makes no difference whether you need a map, guidelines, outline or just an idea to freely write a story. The important thing is to write. Don’t be paralyzed by constructing an outline, then never writing the story. With no outline, you may write paragraphs, pages, chapters, etc that will need to be cut for the final draft. But many authors incorporate those leftover pages into another future story.

Pleeeeeezzzz…just write! It’s in you. What a shame if you don’t let it out on the page.

The fifty cent word for pen name is pseudonym. According to dictionary.com a pseudonym is defined as a” fictitious name used by an author to conceal his or her identity; pen name.” So why would anyone NOT want to use her real name as the author? 

I used a pen name for the upcoming  mystery novel to be released in March 2011. I didn’t think much about using a pen name until I actually signed a contract. As an ebook, I will need to have a presence online to promote it, but my website and writings have all been under my name, Janet Glaser. To promote this book under my pen name, I will have to start from scratch building a readership through this fictitious name. If, for publicity purposes, I do connect my name to the pen name, then what is the point of even having one?

My main reason is to separate this fictional world of writing from my articles and non-fiction works. (I don’t know that an editor would like me to write articles for a children’s magazine and then discover that same writer’s name is associated with a mystery/horror story!!) I also believe that I can assure my privacy with a pen name. I don’t believe there will be a slasher at my door who takes exception with this mystery, but the fictional name allows an extra layer of security.

Now I need to figure out how to promote my pen name. Anyone have some great suggestions?? Thanks for your help!

I have discovered a fantastic book to assist mystery writers when stumped on police procedure and investigation. I write mysteries–(Mystery/horror novella, Sunshine Boulevard, Muse It Up Publishing, release March 2011)–but I must admit I do not come from a police or investigative background. I make up the story and then check with those who know about police procedure to add the polishing touches to scenes and action.

This week I checked out Police Procedure and Investigation: A Guide for Writers by Lee Lofland. Lofland is a former police detective and he spills the beans on everything from equipment used by police and detectives to procedures for investigating a crime scene. Arrest and search procedures, homicide, murder, and manslaughter, fingerprinting, autopsy (yep, I about lost my cookies reading this chapter), drugs and drug trafficking,  prisons and jails are just some of the information packed chapters in the book.  Lofland’s actual experiences are narrated in the sections called In the Line of Duty.  In the chapter on Arrest and Search Procedures, Lofland finds himself facing a “Mountain Man” who is crazy wild in a bar. I can tell you that Lofland successfully tames this wild man and arrests him.

If you are a mystery writer or want to be, this book is a fantastic resource to get you started. It may even spark a few ideas for story lines.

Police Procedure and Investigation: A Guide for Writers by Lee Lofland–Writer’s Digest Books, 2007

It’s summer time and oh so hard to sit down and write at the keyboard. Do you have that problem too? If you have children at home now, your time for writing is stripped away. I know authors who write during the child’s nap time, late at night or early in the morning when it is still quiet, while waiting for the soccer practice to end, etc. They find bits and snatches of time to get a story/article all down on paper.

Add to the small space of time available for writing, the temptation of  gorgeous summer skies and gentle breezes and all of a sudden the weeks pass with nothing written. Even my blogs are begging for attention.

I hope you all are enjoying your summer and have more determination to keep writing in spite of perfect June weather, ball games, carting children around to activities, vacation time, and pure exhaustion. Do you have any tricks or tips to help us settle down to the business of writing?  Please share….. Thank you!

Good news! I signed a contract for my mystery/horror novella, Sunshine Boulevard, with Muse It Up Publishing! The ebook is tentatively set for release in March 2011. I am doing a happy dance.

As you may recall in a post on May 5 entitled Rejected Again, I complained about publishers leaving a writer hanging by not responding to the submission.  I emailed my full ms to Lea Schizas of Muse It Up Publishing. She told me she would notify me within two weeks of a decision. Well within that alotted time frame, she emailed me. She wrote, “The editorial department came back with an assessment. We loved your writer’s voice.” She went on to say the contract and other paperwork was attached….I stopped reading and started again from the top. I read it all again to believe that I actually had a contract for this crazy book! I can’t stop dancing!

Muse It Up Publishing is  a small and upcoming royalty paying independent e-publisher. The official opening is in December 2010. But don’t wait to look them up because they are on the web now with submission information, authors, and book titles. It is an exciting time for everyone at M I U Pub. I am sure readers are in for a feast for the eyes and mind and heart with the talented authors already contracted and diverse genres.

Check out the authors page. My pen name is J Q Rose. I’ll keep you updated on this new adventure. Okay I’ll stop dancing now..for awhile.

According to an article in Publishers Weekly by Marcia Nelson, Author Solutions, a company made up of well-known self-publishing service providers–AuthorHouse, iUniverse, Trafford Publishing, Wordclay and Xlibris–is now establishing self-publishing associations with traditional publishers such as Hay House, Nelson, and evangelical Christian publisher, B&H. The plan is that the traditional publisher will monitor the self-published titles to glean books to add to their own lists.

Indications are that only self-pubbed titles selling 5000 or more could be considered for purchase by the traditional means. In self-pubbing circles, most books sell 300 copies.

This cozying up with the self-publishing services is a new way of thinking in the publishing world. Instead of looking down their noses at those who want to do all the work of publishing their fiction or non-fiction entries, the publishers are discovering that there really are worthwhile books written by authors who can not only write, but can offer different voices to topics that many traditionalists overlook. This opens up a whole new audience for purchasing books.

There are few and far between self-published books that are snapped up by a large publishing company, but with this new addition of self-publishing arms in the traditional field, there may be more opportunity to win a contract, if desired, with a traditional company.

Good morning, Writers,

 
I use the dictionary online, dictionary.com  It’s so easy and always at your fingertips if you are online. Even if you can’t spell a word, somehow the dictionary will give you variations to help you. (Do you remember when you would ask your teacher how to spell a word, and she would just say-”Go look it up in the dictionary!” That always frustrated me. How can you look it up if you can’t spell it?)
 
http://www.dictionary.com will get you there. There is also a Thesaurus connected to this site. It has a lot of great suggestions especially when you are writing and your mind is just mush.
 
Hope these sites will make your writing easier and more fun.

I am dealing with rejections again, I think. Within the past six months I have had two different publishers request full manuscripts on two books. I have not heard from them within the time frame allotted. So does that mean that my mss were rejected or that they were running out of time to notify me? Both of these mss were submitted via email. I would think it would be easy to just click reply and say, “Thank you, Ms. Glaser, we have no plans to publish your book although it is the most fantastic, well-executed story ever written.” Um, okay, I added the last part….

Four years ago when I began submitting books to pubs, I usually sent the query letter, 2 or 3 chapters, bio and used snail mail. I always enclosed an SASE (stamped self-addressed envelope) for a reply. And, lo and behold, I almost always received some kind of an answer (rejections).  Some had suggestions for pubs that might be able to use the book, great remarks about the ideas and stories, and some just a form letter stuffed into the envelope. But, hey, at least I KNEW. They didn’t keep me wondering.

I hate to send the ms to another pub if the one who has it has invested time and money in reading it and it may have a chance, albeit small one, that the pub may still have it under consideration.

I know the simple thing is to just ask. I did. Still no reply. I guess I might as well face it…They don’t want the books. sigh

The one thing I have learned after receiving a rejection is that I have improved the book(s) each time. In fact it makes me focus more on what I am trying to achieve with each book and make revisions accordingly.

I must give kudos to the new website for children’s stories… Smories. They closed their contest to choose 50 stories for the site on April 30 and told all the submitters they would let them know if the stories were accepted by May 5. In fact they did let me know May 4. Unfortunately my story was not accepted, but I enjoyed knowing where I stood. The rejection letter was very kind and supportive encouraging me to keep sending stories. (Okay, I know this same email was sent to every one of the thousands of writers who submitted, but give me a little break here.) It is comforting to know they responded, so I will probably consider submitting another story to them when I have a worthy one.

Rejections are hard, but having your story, your book, your article rejected by a pub/online/magazine is not the end of the world. Timing is everything. Just be determined to make it better and to submit it to the right publisher where it will fit with their guidelines. Good luck!  And yes, a lot of luck is what determines your acceptance.

I was so excited and thrilled to get a ticket to hear Anne Lamott, a national celebrity author,  speak in our little county in West Michigan. The small rural town of Grant built a magnificent Performing Arts Center that seats over a 1000 people. Miss Lamott spoke in this cavernous hall, just her standing behind a “pulpit” talking to about 800 eager listeners.

I watched her slump on stage, not exactly full of energy and spunk as I had imagined her. She sighed a few times into the microphone as she pulled off her backpack, found her papers, and laid them on the podium. She then explained that she had to get up at 3:30 a.m. in California to make it to this speaking engagement. I thought, oh yeah, but look at other entertainers/speakers who run on adrenalin all the time. They always act perky and happy. She looked exhausted and all of her 56 years.

Then a funny thing happened….she became energized as she spoke. The more she talked about her own quirks and oddities, the funnier she got and the more I got into her stories. She has certainly had life experiences that I know nothing about with alcohol and drugs. She has searched for faith in her life and is now a born again Christian with a deep spiritual life.

She is in love with her 9 month old grandson and has throughout her books talked about Sam, her 21 year old son. All that love poured forth and surrounded us as we listened. She painted word pictures of places she has been so vividly with a litany of description and excitement. Lamott also flirted with politics saying it like she feels it. It evoked laughter from this very conservative area.

 Her newest book, Imperfect Birds,  deals with the drugs used by addicted teenagers–prescription drugs that are accessed from parent’s cabinets. When the kids leave for college, they are on their own to use the drugs, so they sub cheap heroine for the script drugs. The drugs of today are so much more potent and powerful than those of the ’60′s that teens become addicted on the first try.

By the end of the evening, I appreciated this woman who can make fun of herself, but actually make fun of all of us. Her stories are our stories in the universal sense. Maybe we have not dealt with drug addiction, but we have all dealt with some addiction or big problems in our lives. Now we can take a look at ourselves from the inside out, thanks to Anne Lamott.

We rented the movie, Julie and Julia, to pass a rainy afternoon/evening today not realizing that the topic wasn’t about cooking, but instead the writing life and well, life in general. Julia Child was a famous cook on tv before there ever was a Food Network. She wrote the cookbook, Mastering the Art of French Cooking, back in the ’50′s published by Knopf, still in print and selling.  

Julie is Julie Powell, a frustrated writer, who loves cooking. She decides to blog about her goal to prepare all 524 recipes in Julia’s book in 365 days. The stories parallel with Julia Child working on her cook book and trying to find a publisher and Julie preparing the recipes and then blogging about the results, as well as letting readers in on her life. (I loved the comparisons of writing a book in the ’50′s to blogging in the 21st century–typewriter vs laptop, those dreadful sheets put between paper to make a copy as you type on the typewriter vs copy machines, sending off the manuscript in a huge box through the mail vs. emailing files to the publisher) Ah, the good ole days.

The women’s lives were similar in many ways even though separated by 40 years of time. They both went through the trials and tribulations of  the writing life.  Julia with her cookbook and Julie with her blog.

The movie was cleverly presented allowing smooth transitions from one woman’s story to the other. I giggled at the simple sight gags. Meryl Streep’s acting was right on and made me believe she truly was Julia, not Meryl. It was fun to watch and a great reminder that the more things change, the more they stay the same. (I know that is another cliche, but really people how can you say it any better than that?)