Do you have any womag news?
Any market news? Are you researching, writing, subbing? Had any acceptances or rejections? Still waiting to hear back on outstanding submissions? Do you have a question? Can you offer tips or encouragement to other writers?
Any other writing related news, questions and comments are also welcome.
Don't forget to check the submissions database for details of which magazines publish fiction under what terms, and how to submit.
Thanks to everyone for your comments. As well as allowing us all to share information, help and encourage each other, comments also show editors, competition organisers and others that the blog is read and will therefore be more likely to provide information for me to share with you.
28 comments:
Love the photos Patsy. My news is that I have no news other than making a couple of submissions recently. Working on a possible 3000 word story which is a bit of a stretch for me but interesting to try. Do you happen to know if Cat magazine is still operational? I attempted to send something a couple of months ago but it flipped back to me.
Thanks Patsy, love the photo from Arbroath, I'm sure you would have visited the Bell Rock, signal tower museum whilst you were there, it's so incredibly interesting.
Not a great deal of news to report except that I've entered a few competitions listed in this blog so thanks to everyone who keeps you up to date with them.
I am in the middle of re-reading my favourite book so I can do my 750-word Love Books entry. Thoroughly enjoying :) I have 11 stories 'out there' which is probably the most I've had - ever. Toasted Cheese tends to do a solstice deadline for their comps: https://www.toasted-cheese.com/ The subject is 'Best friends forever...?' I don't think I have one lined up for that... yet. Yes, Sheelagh... I'm not sure I can cope with 3000 words either! I am trying to gradually increase but it's difficult when you have really come to the end - and you have a natural, say, 1500 and sometimes 750 ish. It's not like you can stretch them!
My first news is that I have had my name on the cover of "The People's Friend", which is very much a "pinch me" moment - so honoured to be part of this much-loved magazine. My second news is that I've been seeing some writing on Twitter about how women aged 50+ are routinely portrayed with great inaccuracy in fiction by younger writers, and how good it is to read such women written by writers who can do it authentically. Since I suspect quite a few followers of this blog are women and men in the 50+ age bracket, and if you ever share this view, can I invite you to read either of my two recent novels, "I Know I Saw Her" (currently just 99p on Kindle) or "Closing In" - both of which feature women over fifty who are complicated and flawed and, I hope, not stereotypical. (Author name E.D. Thompson.)Thank you for this opportunity, Patsy. My tip of the month, if it even is a tip, is to write your story in three acts. I don't really understand why this works, and I definitely don't think it is a formula, but I find it is the basic underlying engineering for many a piece of fiction. Act 1: present character and present problem. Act 2: turn up the heat on the problem. Act 3: resolve, for better or worse. Wishing everyone a productive time until next Womagwriter check-in. I enjoy reading everyone's contributions. Thanks for all that you do for us, Patsy!
I have been busy writing and submitting and I have had a recent acceptance from Yours, which I was very excited about.
I have trouble with 3000 words too, but I'll keep trying!
Thank you to Eirin for your tip of the month - I shall certainly try to use that. This is why I love coming on here because everyone is so generous with their advice. It really helped me when I was starting to submit in 2020.
I agree with Erin about the portrayals of women over fifty - I'm one of the Twitterers tweeting about it. I also get cross about that huge section of society being lumped together as if a 51 year old is much the same as a 99 year old! I recently saw a tweet asking what sort of wine 'older' women drink (research for a novel.) Fair enough question but one answer claimed 'As women get older they often return to liking sweet wine over dry.' Not this one!
My news is that I've sold my first pocket novel to TPF - took over two years from first submission to acceptance - but I'm absolutely delighted as it was a challenge to myself to see if I could do more than short stories.
Otherwise I singularly failed to think of anything good for the sci-cli competitions that were posted on here, so its back to working on the next 3000 word story! I find having an interesting location that takes some description or an interesting job adds to word count and a minor second plot can always help too.
Alyson
Love the photos Patsy! I’m originally from Montrose and my cousin lived in Arbroath, so lots of good memories of there - and the smokies!
Congratulations everyone who’s had work accepted. Always lovely to hear.
My news is I’d a piece accepted for publication on National Flash Fiction Day (June 24) and Amsterdam Quarterly accepted two poems for their online mag and printed yearbook.
I sent PF a 3,000 word story in response to Lucy’s recent appeal. It was 2,500 and originally written for a competition, but felt very PF to me when writing. I shared it with a friend in my writing group who thought one part was dealt with too quickly and wanted to know more, so that really helped me add the extra words.
Thanks, Patsy. Love the Arbroath pic.
Congratulations to Eirin for the cover and to Alyson for the Pocket Novel.
Did I see your name on the Six Word Wonder shortlist, Alyson?
More rejections for me, including one within hours from TPF. It probably took me longer to come up with the title!!!!!!!! I prefer the WW time-period cut-off. It feels less disheartening.
HB
I had a piece longlisted for the Brilliant Flash Fiction contest - enough to make me keep on submitting there. My story (but not my name - well done, Eirin!) was featured on the front of BoWW, and they'd found a great photo to illustrate it, so I was pleased with that.
Lots of interesting things on the blog this week. I like the premise of the Toasted Cheese competition, and was thinking of having a go at that, but when I read the rules, it suggested that people sending from AOL email addresses (that would be me) might end up sending unreadable submissions, so that's a bit off-putting. Has anybody else come across this problem?
I like all the tips about expanding stories to meet specific word lengths. I sometimes try to add depth to dialogue to help achieve this. It gives an opportunity to show a little more about your characters.
As an over 60 (!) I'm definitely keen to combat the poorly-written over 50 female character!
No acceptances or rejections to report at the moment. Though I do have several ‘out’ with YF and one with WW. I’m currently writing something for Best’s summer themed short story competition after coming up with what I think is a nice idea. Have another two weeks to edit it and submit. (Hopefully, I’ll manage it!)
Congratulations to everyone who’s had acceptances, short listings etc.
Michael D
I had the green light for a new TPF serial, so have just submitted the second instalment. I also had another feature accepted by TPF. At the moment I’m working on ideas for another serial and a long crime read. I haven’t written any short stories yet this year, but I hope to get back into that again over our winter.
Liz
I know your cat mag accept and publish fiction but I've never heard of cat mag.
I sent a list of mags who have an open list to patsy but I'm not sure if it was received.
No news from me but I'm steadily making progress though!
Thanks Sharon, actually I meant Your Cat magazine. When I tried to email a piece, it came back as 'email address not recognised', although I had copied & pasted the address from their guidelines so I assumed it was no more.
You need to send it to the ed. Their email address should be listed in the mag. They do still accept,consider and publish fiction but as it's a monthly mag, there might be a queue for a fiction slot,even if your story is accepted. Good luck!
Thanks Sharon for your response. I tried again to the listed editors email address but I got a message blocked response as before so perhaps they don't accept submissions from outside the UK. Not too worry.
Congrats to all who have had acceptances recently and especially to Maisie & Eirin for getting their stories &/or names featured on the cover pages of various mags, a real thrill I imagine. I love reading about everyone's successes, it keeps me hanging in there during the fallow periods!! I did have one acceptance recently from Ireland's Own and that was for an article on Lady Jane Wilde, Oscar's mother which will be published over the summer so that was nice to get.
Wow! So many varied and different acceptances from everyone. Congratulations to all who've had sales and successes.
@HB - yes I made the short list of the six word wonder but not the prizes sadly :(
Alyson
Congratulations @ Alyson a lovely publishing credit to have. I'd love to read it if you've willing to share but maybe not allowed on here??
HB
I'm interested to hear about fiction in Your Cat. In the past they've published two of my 'True Cat Tales' and paid me £40 for each one. I've also had a piece published on their blog - no fee. I didn't know they accepted fiction. Does anybody know much they pay for fiction, and what word count they require? Thanks.
Yes.
They pay £100 and the word count is around 1 ,500.
Is this on the database here?
I thought that was the point of it- so we can check all the updated details, instead of me giving out the info here!
Thank you, Patsy, for giving us this opportunity to share our news.
I've just submitted my first pocket novel to Tracey at TPF and I'm somewhat dismayed to hear that Alyson had to wait two years (!) before it finally went to print. I'd be interested (if anyone can tell me) to know if such a lengthy wait is par for the course.
Patricia G
I don't know if anyone else has had this? I submitted a story to Yours Fiction yesterday and received a nice reply this morning, but saying that they are not accepting any more unsolicited submissions for this year and to resubmit in the new year. I did submit one a little while ago, and I didn't hear anything then, so the change must have happened fairly recently.
Thanks for passing that on, Marian.
I've subbed them quite a few recently but I haven't received that message.
I'll just try with one more story today, and see what the response is.
They had a big gap with issues from March until August.
Perhaps there's only 3 more issues for the rest of the year and if these are all filled, then they'd need to put a halt on subs.
Yes, that's what I was thinking, Sharon. They must be swamped!
Masie bishop,your story is in this week's woman mag. Well done!
Thanks, Sharon. Which story is that? I wasn't aware that I had one in Woman this week.... strange! But good!
It was called bag lady.
On Fictionette last month my poem was picked as one of four star ones for the month, and paid £10 for it. Thank you Patsy for telling me about the site on your blog. https://www.fictionette.co.uk/storystore.html
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