Who would you like to hear from? and H.I.G.H. 12

Who would you like to hear from?

When I thought about what I wanted to talk to you about today I had this sentence bouncing around in my head. Originally the question was who would you like to hear from in the industry. I'm going to begin to post some editor and agent interviews in addition to the interviews with writers and I wondered who you would most like to hear from.

So what are some questions you'd like to ask editors and agents in the industry? Post them in my comments section and I'll start getting some answers for you. I know from speaking to you that some of you have many connections in publishing while others are just starting out. I'd love to answer questions for both of you. So leave them below.

But then I started to wonder how this also relates to marketing your writing. Who would you like to hear from on your work? On your platform development? Are you actively building your platform and sending in proposals?

Here is one way to build using articles. Do you look inside the cover of magazines you read? There is a website and sometimes even reader guidelines. Check those out. Then decide who you'd like to submit an article to this month. Would you like an accountability partner? Then tell us who you're submitting to in the comment section.

One tip, before you submit to a magazine read some articles out of a few different issues of that article. This will give you a sense of tone. The articles I write for ACFW's Afictionado Feature is much different than the articles I write for the Toledo Business Journal. Each publication has its own voice just like each character in your novel has its own voice. Part of growing as a writer is learning to hear that voice and recreate that voice.

So where are you publishing? Where are you submitting?

Oh, and I'm really excited about the response so far to the Mentorship Program I am starting as part of my Writing Career Coach program. Continue to email me if you'd like to be emailed when it goes live but there's been such a positive response I think I'm going to post the link on the blog as well.

H.I.G.H. 12

The Ambulance was screaming down the road and I was following behind in my car. I was calm. Quite calm actually. I can't explain why. I would guess shock. Over those next five days I would stay at my daughter's bedside as she went through countless tests and she saw more than 4 specialists over the weekend. She had lost consciousness a couple of times in the ambulance but once she got to the hospital she was screaming. The weekend passed and we never did learn what happened.

Life returned to normal and I returned to my writing. My step-mom flew up from Florida for a visit in August. She is an avid fiction reader. She was helping me think of ways to work on my manuscript [remember the writing contest?]. I also showed her my clipping from that first story that had been published in December for the local paper. I had recently written the publisher to see if they needed articles written [even without pay]. A national magazine had contacted me the month before but since I didn't have any clippings that showed my ability to interview a subject and write a good story they had decided not to give me an assignment.

It was the second day of Brenda's visit when the local paper emailed and asked if I'd be interested in writing a story. A local child was going to be featured on the National TV program "It's a Miracle." They wanted to do a cover feature for the paper and didn't have anyone to write it.

OF COURSE I said yes.

It wouldn't be long before I found out the impact that decision would have on the rest of my writing career.