California Roll

rewards from a Writing Conference

    I came down from the mountain yesterday--that is Mt. Hermon Christian Writer's Conference in the Santa Cruz Mountains.  Four intense days of learning about writing, places to be published and marketing.  At meals and workshops I met editors and other writers and tried out ideas for magazine articles.  I came home excited and eager to  write some magazine articles and polish the first draft of my novel.  Also, I returned with a sore throat and exhausted.   I've been in bed eleven hours since returning home at 4 pm yesterday!  My throat is about back to normal now..
    A humorist, Phil Callaway, set ripples and waves of laughter going through the auditorium.  After our tension had melted away through our laughter, he'd throw out a gem, such as,
    "Laughter beats Prozaac."
or, the words from his wife,
    "Lord, if you can't make me thin, make my friends look fat."
Or, on the serious side,
    "Courage is fear that has said its prayers."

    In my Fiction Mentoring Track, fourteen of us had sent out the first 20 pages of our novel and three synopses of various lengths before we even met and introduced ourselves.   We read and marked comments/suggestions prior to critiqueing them in our fifteen hours of workshop time.  Our teacher, Gayle Roper, proved both kind and wise in her leadership and suggestions for us.  Each of us received a 2-3 page typed analysis from her:  our original words and then her suggested rewrite.  Very illuminating.

After hearing from editors at Mt. Hermon and speaking personally with two. I'm excited about writing magazine articles also.  I'll enjoy teaching and expressing views and experiences through writing these, and, if published, they'll also bring my name in front of people's eyes, a good preliminary to getting my novel out.

Time to return library books and figure out what's for dinner!

Novel News

Seems like just the other day when  I last blogged, but I discovered tonight that it's been almost two weeks!  What has happened?  I've been busy with attending a one a one day writer's conference, readying a query letter, a synopsis and 20 pages of my novel for  a book proposal due last week (at least in my mind).  I also polished up two poems for use at a women's meeting at my church and three more for sending out to the Sun magazine.  I've been celebrating also that the draft of my novel stands finished.  To reward myself, I baked a cake and went out to dinner to celebrate since I don't have a boss to treat me to lunch or award bonuses when I've reached a goal.

For those looking forward to reading my novel about a Japanese mother and teenager, don't rush to the bookstore.  If I'm fortunate, it will take  three years before it's in a bookstore, maybe actually four or vie. 

The first step is polishing my draft.  I'll be studying books about editing fiction and critiquing and revising, researching agents and developing a list of good matches.   I'll also be needing ten sets of literary eyes to read and give me critical appraisal.   So, well-read friends who know how to be both critical and affirming--I might be calling on you! (Please volunteer if you're so inclined.)

Finding an agent(or a publisher) can easily take a year, so I've heard from those who've gone down this road before.  Then the agent must send it out to a number of publishers and wait to hear back.  If his top level ones (the big companies often), don't want it , s/he does another round of submissions.  Once a publisher accepts it, count on another several years before it stands on any bookshelf.   Writing a novel is a long and circuitous road, and having it published maybe be just as long or longer for a first timer.

But tomorrow--I'll seek immediate gratification and post a poem or two!