Write Right

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Writers update:

It's been a busy week for my keyboard. Clackity-clack.

I submitted one article to Redbook and the Ladies Home Journal, of which I have not yet received a response. It usually takes about six weeks with the top tier rags, so no worries there mate...just anticipation.

I wrote another that was accepted to a magazine called Journeys, and two more for a newspaper called The Liberty Voice.

I am also making good progress on my novel, which feels great, because as writers well know, "The Novel" always seems to take the back burner to everything else in life.

This is the sixth book for me, well I should say the sixth attempt. The first was just something I put together as a supplement for classes I taught.

The second was a privately published collaboration for an organization I belong to.

The third was a disaster! I made the neophyte mistake of trying to put everything into it, including the kitchen sink. (It was going to be The Great American Novel, yanno.) Good Gatsby that thing reads like scattered pages bound up after a library bombing!

The fourth book is a work of historical fiction based on an Ohio family at the turn of the century. I made a DVD documentary to go along with it that is currently available at several libraries and the Ohio Historical Society. The book never got finished, but the documentary did, so I guess that's a partial success. One of these days, I'll get back to it, but not now.

The fifth attempt was a book I co-authored with a wonderful writer about women in politics. We self published to get it out there quickly for this years election, and even had a University Press lined up for wider distribution, but that one is now a dead horse. Pity. It was actually a respectable little piece of prose.

And now, I'm on number six.

This one is fun. I look forward to spending time with my characters and creating the world they live in. I am hopeful this one just might make it out of the nest and fly. It feels different than the others. It has an excitement and a comical edge to it that none of the others did. It also has a very pointed focus, which helps a lot.

I've learned so much about the craft of writing from this process, and all those lessons are showing up in the pages of this new work. -And really, that's the key...Mamma always said "Practice makes perfect!"

With that sentiment in mind, here's a great little story my fellow scribes might enjoy:

An esteemed Harvard professor and published author offered an advanced writing class all the students were clamoring to attend. On the first day, the lecture hall was packed. The instructor walked in, looked around the room and told the students to take out a pad of paper and a pen. Then he said, "So you all want to become writers heh? Well then WRITE!"

And with that, he left the room.