Insights from Judging a Writing Contest
Hemingway Birthplace Home, Oak Park, IL I just wrapped up serving as one of the judges in the Hemingway Shorts contest sponsored by the Hemingway Foundation of Oak [...]
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Jun, 2016
11
Jul, 2013
A Lesson in Submitting
...or: How I got published in the Wall Street Journal. I'm a guest at my friend Nancy Kopp's blog today, so please head on over to discover her blog and [...]
6
May, 2013
Patience, A Writer Must Have
Patience, the trees seem to say, we're not ready to be green yet. My kids have been into Yoda lately, thus my inverted title, but I really feel that Yoda's [...]
1
Apr, 2013
The Many Lives of a Story
Today I bring you what I think is a most inspiring post: My longtime student Diane Hurles has shared here before how she managed to find her voice as a memoir [...]
26
Feb, 2013
Some End-of-the-Month Submission Opportunities
I haven't written much about submitting work to literary magazines lately, mainly because I've been slacking off in that department. But yesterday I got back in submissions mode and came [...]
13
Feb, 2013
That Satisfying Plop of the Mail Box
Today I mailed off two photos to the Starved Rock Photo Contest. Sounds straightforward, but it was quite a production. First, photos could not be submitted electronically. Rather, you had [...]
15
Oct, 2012
How to Submit your Writing to Literary Magazines
Every so often, when my students' work reaches the stage where workshop participants say, "You should send this out," the initial joy turns into bafflement: How do I actually do [...]
11
Jun, 2012
Literary Magazine Layout
The past few days I've become obsessed with creating a book in blurb, as I am handling the layout of the literary magazine my son's school is publishing. It's been [...]
29
Oct, 2011
Blog Mash Up: Submission Opportunities, Interesting Insights and Memoirs
Tracks in the snow on our cabin's deck this morning... While I've been trying not to freeze (see photo) at the writers conference I'm attending in northern Virginia where it [...]
6
Oct, 2011
Write Your Story and Publish It: One of my Students Shares her Journey
A story might catch you unaware but if you stick with it, it might lead somewhere! Congratulations to my longtime student Diane Hurles who stuck with her story through many rewrites [...]
29
Sep, 2011
Submissions: My Worst Submissions Story Yet
Since I'm always waxing about how to get the submissions process done right, I thought I'd share, for a change, the story of my own worst mishap. In February of 2010, [...]
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Sep, 2011
Submissions: Cover Letters
Many of my students wonder how to write the cover letter to send along with a submission to a literary magazine, so I thought I'd devote a post to that aspect [...]
15
Sep, 2011
Submissions: Follow the Guidelines
It might be obvious to follow the submission guidelines of each literary magazine you submit to, but I've been tripped up myself because I wasn't diligent enough, or thought I knew [...]
9
Sep, 2011
Submissions: The Beauty of Snail Mail Submissions
Don't get me wrong: I love online submissions. But this morning, after submitting a few manuscripts online in a manner of minutes, I came across a literary journal that is not [...]
8
Sep, 2011
Submissions: Best Literary Magazines for Nonfiction that Don’t Accept Simultaneous Submissions
In my opinion, a literary journal that does not accept simultaneous submissions is the bane of a writer's existence (to use a cliché) because this means a journal is arrogant [...]
1
Sep, 2011
Submissions: All You Need to Know About Submitting to Literary Magazines
I haven't written about submissions to literary magazines for a while because many of them are published by universities and thus adhere to the academic calendar of taking the summer [...]
12
Jul, 2011
Submissions: A Word on Writing Contests
My take on writing contests was first published in Tiny Lights, but it's been a while so I'm offering this update. A few years ago, at one of my MFA residencies, a panel [...]
29
Jun, 2011
Let’s go short: Creative Nonfiction’s Tiny Truths Daily Contest
Creative Nonfiction magazine has really spruced up its looks and contents, and they are currently running a micro essay contest on Twitter that's fun to watch: Tiny Truths Daily Contest. Once [...]
23
Jun, 2011
Submissions: Submitting is Like Dating
If you’ve been lucky enough to receive “ink” from an editor on a rejection slip – ink meaning a handwritten note saying something like “nice work, send us more” – [...]
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Jun, 2011
Submissions: Agent Insight – A Memoir is not the Story of Your Life
Wonderful clarification from Katie Shea of Caren Johnson Literary Agency on what memoir is not: a story of your life (that would be an autobiography). Here's her answer regarding memoir manuscripts [...]
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Jun, 2011
Third Rule for Literary Magazine Submissions: Don’t Give Up
...or as the director of my MFA program at Queens University of Charlotte, Fred Leebron, likes to say: “Writing is a game of attrition. Don’t attrish.” This means don’t give [...]
14
Jun, 2011
Six Words on Dad
Dad's love: "Checked your oil lately?" (As posted by DrumHeart23 on SMITH Magazine) The quote above is my favorite six word memoir contribution so far on SMITH Magazine's dad project. [...]
9
Jun, 2011
Best Online Literary Magazines for Nonfiction
My listings of the best literary magazines for nonfiction as well as the second and third best focused on print magazines. Of course some of these also publish content online but [...]
7
Jun, 2011
Withdrawing a Manuscript Submission
The next best thing after having a manuscript accepted for publication is withdrawing it from other magazines you’ve submitted it to. I’ve been doing that today and I must say [...]
2
Jun, 2011
Submissions: Insights from a Newly Minted Nonfiction Editor
My friend Tracy Crow started as nonfiction editor at literary magazine Prime Number a week ago. Click here to read her insights now that she's on the receiving end of [...]
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May, 2011
Second Rule for Literary Magazine Submissions: Manuscript Editing
This maybe should have been the first rule in literary magazine submissions because before you need to worry about developing a system (see my post of May 27), you need to have [...]
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May, 2011
First Rule for Literary Magazine Submissions: Develop a System
As an aspiring literary writer, you sooner or later need to submit your writing to literary magazines if you want to get published. Having a system helps:1. Develop two lists: [...]
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May, 2011
Second and Third Best Literary Magazines for Nonfiction
Blogger restored my post that fell victim to their May 12 outage, so here it is again: Adding to my listing of the best literary magazines for nonfiction, following are the [...]
18
May, 2011
Submissions: Consider Markets Outside of the U.S.
View from my bedroom at Joyce's house I’m currently visiting my longtime writer friend Joyce Finn in her sunny paradise in Sun City Hilton Head, South Carolina. We met many [...]
6
May, 2011
In Honor of Mothers Day: “Momoirs”
"Pregnancy is poetry. Parenting is prose." (As heard on Twitter May 4 via SMITH Magazine) What a priceless assessment of motherhood! In honor of Mother's Day, check out SMITH Magazine's Six-Word [...]
5
May, 2011
Best Literary Magazines for Nonfiction (Updated)
Following up on my list of January, I’ve just updated my personal ranking of literary magazines with the Pushcart Prize 2011 information. I list magazines that publish literary nonfiction, namely [...]
16
Mar, 2011
Acceptances Never Arrive in an SASE
Today I found three envelopes addressed to me in my own handwriting in my mailbox. I immediately know what those are: rejection notices from literary journals. Because if a journal [...]
3
Mar, 2011
The Journey to Publishing
Listen in – the journey to publishing can take many roads: This recording captures an interesting discussion about the publishing experience that I was part of at an author’s roundtable last [...]
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Feb, 2011
Bluestem is looking for nonfiction
I found this call for submissions on Brevity, an online journal for brief creative nonfiction that I respect very much, and although I didn't know Bluestem before, I must say [...]
27
Jan, 2011
Stories that Keep on Giving
Once a story has been published, you know it’s good. That’s not to say a story that hasn’t been published isn’t good, but at least you’re over the hump of [...]
17
Jan, 2011
Calls for Short Nonfiction
As I was doing my submissions last week, three opportunities for short nonfiction came across my desk, or rather, my laptop:The Bellingham Literary Review is notoriously hard to get into [...]
6
Jan, 2011
Two Acceptances in One Day
How likely are you to receive two acceptances for publication in one day? Highly unlikely, I should say, until the very thing happened yesterday. I checked one email account to find [...]
5
Jan, 2011
Submit More?
My writer friend Nancy Kopp says one of her goals for this year is to submit more, write more, read more. But what does "more" mean? Is that one submission [...]
3
Jan, 2011
Best Literary Magazines for Nonfiction
For those of you whose New Year’s resolutions include getting published or publishing more: The first rule of the submission game is: Be discriminate, meaning don’t submit your writing just [...]
