Unbound Diary Part 11 – Almost There!

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competitions, crowdfunding, literature, mentoring, publishers, Riptide Journal, short stories, short story appraisals, starlings, submissions, The Bristol Short Story Prize, The Fish Short Story Prize, The Manchester Review, Unbound, workshops, writers, writing, writing workshops

A lot has happened since I last blogged here. I was stuck around the 45% mark for what seemed like an eternity, thinking that I was never going to get this thing funded. Last week I had a conversation with a Twitter friend, the fab short story writer Safia Moore, who not only pledged to the book but suggested that the pledge options I should be pushing were the ones for large sums, the short story appraisals and mentoring packages. She pointed out that I am the director of a short story prize, have been short-listed in a few myself, and am a tutor! She is of course right on all counts. It’s funny how when you are in the middle of something you can’t see it for what it is. I started pushing these options on social media and so far someone has pledged for £400 of mentoring and four people have pledged for short story appraisals. I suddenly find myself 81 % funded, so thank you Safia for reminding me of what I have to offer!

If you keep getting nowhere when sending out short story submissions, or entering competitions, perhaps you could do with a little help from the director of a prize, who has been published in Riptide and The Manchester Review and short-listed for The Bristol and Fish prizes. I am an experienced tutor, mentor and editor with an MA (dist) in Creative Writing and an acclaimed novel.

On offer as part of crowdfunding for In The Future Everyone Will Be Famous For Fifteen Minutes are:

Short Story Appraisal up to 5,000 words with full edit and notes – £100

Mentoring,  4 face to face sessions (skype, email or phone for those too far away) up to 20,000 words with full edit and notes. This can be part one manuscript or several short stories. £400

2 hour Short Story Workshop for 5 people (South East and possibly Yorkshire) £200

These packages are offered at a much lower price than my usual rate and at a much lower price than most literary consultancies. Not only will they greatly benefit your writing but you will facilitate the publication of a book of short stories that would not otherwise be published.

You could of course just prove all the people who think short stories aren’t worth publishing wrong and pledge £10 in support of the book. You will be a patron of the arts and I am so very grateful that so many of you have already done so.

 

 

Publications Are Like Buses

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David Garnett, editing, Exeter University, Lady Into Fox, litereature, Michael Rosen, motherhood, Mrs. Fox, rejections, Riptide Journal, Sarah Hall, short stories, submissions, suburbs, Threshold's Short Story Forum, University of Chichester

Just checking in to say that I have had two things published this week This goes some way to making up for all the rejection in my ‘year of submitting to everything.’ My short story Grimaldi has been included in the fabulous Riptide Vol 10 – Imagining The Suburbs. It’s a nasty little tale about mental illness or actual demonic dragons (take your pick). In the foreword Michael Rosen says, ‘these fascinating stories and poems show a diversity that resists’ the picture of the suburbs as “one culture, one class, one type of house’. I am very proud to be part of a collection that resists monoculture!

I am also thrilled that Threshold’s Short Story Forum has printed my essay on Sarah Hall’s  BBCNSSA winner Mrs. Fox. I absolutely loved Hall’s story and wanted to find out about the controversy around it’s similarity to the novella Lady Into Fox. Both journals were an absolute pleasure to work with and it was a brilliant experience to see my work properly edited. I feel like a real grown up writer.

New Year New Submissions

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A Kind of Loving, authors, Brighton, champagne, journals, literary journals, magazines, New Year, Rattle Tales, roulette, short stories, spoken word, submissions, writers, writing, writing competitions

I have ranted about this before and I have no doubt I will again. Blame New Year re-organisation. I started 2014 in a pretty good place. I’m superstitious when it comesto New Year’s Eve and January 1^st believing that it somehow affects the entirety of the following year so I normally try to do all the things I would like to be doing for the next twelve months. This year was a great one, a lovely dinner with good friends during which we drank a lot of fizz (with stars in it!), ate homemade profiteroles and planned our summer holiday, followed by several games of roulette. I started off badly and then won big, by 2am I wanted to lose so I could go to bed and bet everything on black, twice, winning both times, in fact we did stop then because I’d broken the bank. I am taking this to mean that the year will be a slow build but I should take a few risks to reap the benefits. Before sleep I wrote a page of a short story and then read a page of A Kind of Loving. This month I plan on finishing my short story collection (almost there) and ploughing on with my Yorkshire-set novel. 

I have also decided to submit my writing everywhere possible (journals, competitions, events) in the hope that spread betting will eventually pay off. To do this I realise I have to be more organised. Last year I had a very hit and miss approach to submitting work. I’d often send things off on a last minute whim and fail to make a note of doing so, or I’d scribble it down on a post it note and forget about it, sometimes even a line in an obscure submissions folder. I’ve spent a few hours now going through my frankly anarchic submissions files and I can tell you the process is not helped the failure of many organisers to even acknowledge a submission. The number of deadlines passed, journals published, awards presented, all missed by me (and presumably most of the other people who sent work in) is astonishing. Here’s my rant – FFS IF PEOPLE SEND YOU THEIR WORK AT LEAST HAVE THE MANNERS TO A) ACKNOWLEDGE IT AND B) TELL THEM WHO GOT THROUGH!!!!!

Obviously a huge amount of comps, journals and events organisers are just as polite as they should be, some even more so, some even offer feedback or copies of anthologies to their hopefuls but many do not. I salute you if you are one of the good guys. You were probably a struggling author once, deciding if you could have a tin of beans for tea or save the money for that big break competition. Many others out there seem to just want to take your money and pull the shutters down until next year when they send you an email asking for more money. If you can send a round robin email asking for more money you can send one on the publication of the long list. I don’t really get it – don’t you want people to know who has been successful? Why not? What are you hiding for? Some of the organisations I’m talking about here are big ones with equally big entrance fees. Sort it out. Don’t be so fucking rude.

Last night I went to the Rattle Tales selection meeting for our first show of 2014. We had a huge number of submission for this show, many more than ever before. It was quite a stretch to read them all but everybody did, notes were taken and decisions were made. When anyone submits to Rattle Tales, they get an acknowledgement right away, when the stories have been selected everyone who submitted gets an email telling them if they have been successful or not and then (if they want it) we give them feedback. It’s just good manners really. Lots of people do it. The first two emails are standard so don’t take that much effort to send. I’m not taking the credit for this, I’m not the one whose job it is to send them out, but I don’t think it takes hours to do a quick reply.

Think about it – what sort of reputation do you want amongst potential submitters?

Rant over.

If you would like to submit to Rattle Tales or find out about our very exciting news head over to the website and sign up for our mailing list. We really value you.

Six Rules For Submitting Stories

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cliche, Cormac McCarthy, dos and dont's, narrative, Rattle Tales, shock, short stories, similies, spoken word, submissions, The Road

This is a short version of guidelines I came up with for submitting to Rattle Tales. I think it works for most short story submissions be it competitions or readings.

1. It has to be a story. It has to have a resolution; even if it is open-ended something has to have happened. This does not mean that it should be a conventional beginning, middle and end tale. Surprise works. But not too much. There is a tendency to simply build up to a punch-line but you’re not doing stand-up here, try and introduce a few hints early on in the story otherwise you’ll end up like Bobby Ewing in the shower. It was all a dream scenarios just don’t cut it. Likewise don’t just write pages and pages of philosophy, show what you think of the world by telling a story, readers don’t need a lecture.

2. Watch the similes. The biggest mistake made by new writers is the over use of the word like. Use similes sparingly (if at all), reading a piece with ‘like’ or ‘as if’ in every other sentence, sometimes two or three times in a sentence, it’s like being stung by angry wasps as you try to eat an ice-cream (see what I did there?). You may think you are being clever and imaginative but it actually constant comparison really grates. In this case, less is definitely more. Consider this sentence;

‘Then they set out along the blacktop in the gun-metal light, shuffling through the ash, each the other’s world entire.’

Cormac McCarthy – The Road

The light is not ‘like’ gun metal it is gun-metal light, they don’t shuffle through ash ‘like’ dirty water or some such, it’s just ash, it is not ‘as if’ each is the other’s world entire, they just are. The sentence is so much more powerful because it is not diluted by comparisons.  Simple descriptions often work best. Simple doesn’t mean your writing is boring; ‘gun-metal light’ is wonderfully evocative and it certainly isn’t ordinary.

The only exception is if it is in a character’s nature to use simile in direct speech or thought. You can use one or two in a piece but not one or two in every paragraph.

3. Don’t try to shock. Extreme use of profanity, drugs, sex, violence etc. only works if it’s essential for the story.  Edgy is fine but these days most readers can tell if it’s authentic or gratuitous.

4. Cliché sucks.

5. Plagiarism sucks. Use your own ideas. If it’s too much like something else then it’s copying. Of course, there is a difference between theft and influence and most art resembles art that has gone before it, but an overt rip-off won’t do, you have to bring something new to the table.

6. Keep it simple. Particularly if it’s for a live reading. If it’s too complicated you will lose your audience. If people can’t keep up easily they may not try.  Don’t have too many characters and don’t have too many backstories.

 

Rattle Tales Gets A New Home

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Brighton & Hove Camera Club, photographs, Rattle Tales, short stories, Stephen Hawking, submissions, The Brunswick, writing

Next Thursday Rattle Tales put on our first show at The Brunswick. Everyone is really looking forward to it because we’ve been looking for a permanent residence since we grew too big for The Marlborough Theatre. The Brunswick is roomy but intimate in a cabaret stylee so we really hope it’s going to work out.

We had the selection meeting for the event last week and I was struck by how good the submissions were this time. There wasn’t a single story without merit. As we saw last week democracy takes time, and each member of Rattle Tales (10 in all) has to be happy with the programme before it is finalised. As is often the case I would have been equally happy to include stories that didn’t make the final programme. Balancing the show is key to the event, you can’t have too many stories about the same things. I have noticed with each call for submissions that people tend to submit similar themes, this time there were a few Alzheimer’s stories and several coming of age tales, when this happens we tend to pick the story the majority think is the most original. Originality is key – if you are thinking of submitting to Rattle Tales (or anywhere!) try to be as original as possible.  We also need to have confidence that our audience will be able to follow the story, simple structures work best and first person does too because you can really hear how it will sound when it’s read onstage.

Rattle Tales likes a good story and on Thursday we have stories about storytellers, epitaphs, punks, invisibilty,Stephen Hawking, avatars and a real tearjerker about a warrior dog. There is literally something for everyone.

Normally the authors choose images to illustrate their writing but this time the stories are being illustrated by photographers from Brighton & Hove Camera Club. We have had some interesting comments already about the stories allocated and I can’t wait to see the interpretations and hear the explanations on the night. Living with a photographer means I have had my stories interpreted in this way before. My husband produced this image to illustrate my story Tea & Frankenstein, set in this Whitstable tea room.

This time I don’t know the photographer so I am wondering what sort of picture my words will inspire. If you want to see this fantastic collaboration come along on Thursday, tickets available on the door or via The Brunswick box office here.