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I won the Georgia Romance Writers’ Maggie Award. I still have to touch the necklace to believe it sometimes. Until Stephanie Bond called my name, the Maggie had been something other people, including several of my friends, won. I’ve had good luck, gotten terrific advice, and had wonderful, supportive results from the RWA contest circuit, and I appreciate all of it. As a GRW member, though, I have a special soft spot for the Maggies. I’ve wanted one for a long time, and winning it provides invaluable encouragement on the road to publication.
Publication, you see, is still something other people attain. It’s tempting, sometimes, to think they’re just luckier than I am. Of course luck enters into the equation. The right book, the right editor, and the right time, as the mantra goes, are all essential ingredients luck frequently influences. The late Cheryl Ann Porter (quoting someone whose name I can no longer remember) said, “Success in publishing requires talent, persistence, and luck. You can get by with any two as long as one of them is luck.” But luck, alone, isn’t enough. You need talent and/or persistence, too.
The people I know who’ve leaped the bar to publication demontrated both of those as well as luck. A friend of mine said, after selling her first book, “I’ve been lucky.” While I can’t argue with that, I also think she made her own luck. She kept working to improve, taking advantage of opportunities like contest finals, and even making opportunities by submitting everywhere she could. I firmly believe that all of those–plus an element of luck–went into my Maggie win. I never expected to win, but I hoped I might and worked toward the possibility.
My friend kept trying. So am I. By persisting, I think, we grab for ourselves some of what appears to be other people’s luck.
What about you? Was there any luck that appeared to favor someone else that suddenly swung to favor you?
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by Loucinda McGary
 Nancy has very generously let me take over her blog today and when I asked for suggestions on what to blog about she suggested I give my “Call Story” and “Advice for Writers.”
I never get tired of relating my “Call Story” because it proves beyond a doubt that truth really is stranger than fiction!
It actually started in an elevator at the 2006 RWA conference in Atlanta. My roommate and I were on the 20th floor. One morning when we got in the elevator to go to breakfast, a man and a woman were already in the elevator. The woman introduced herself as an editor. She noticed the Golden Heart Finalist ribbon on my name badge, and asked about my Golden Heart manuscript. I told her it was a romantic suspense and she said she would really like to read it and gave me her business card.
I sent her the manuscript and eventually she rejected it. But since it took her awhile, I sent her a “nudge” email asking for the status of manuscript. While I was at it, I pitched my current work-in-progress.
I distinctly remember when I emailed her because it was Valentine’s Day 2007. Three months to the day later, May 14, 2007, she emailed me and asked for a partial of my WIP. Then on July 27th (see above) she called my house and asked for the full manuscript. My poor DH was so rattled when he answered the phone (I wasn’t home) that he wrote down every word she said because he knew “Cindy will kill me if I screw this up!”
On September 14th at 8:45 am, my phone rang. Since everyone knows better than to call me before nine in the morning, I picked it up expecting bad news. Instead, it was my editor, Deb Werksman calling to say she wanted by buy “my Irish book!” I started screaming and jumping around! My DH wasn’t home, but my two dogs thought I’d gone crazy. I spent the rest of the day phoning and email everyone I knew. I had also planned to meet three friends for lunch that day, so I got to tell them in person and we all screamed and jumped around some more!
It was such a fun day that I swore from then on I would have my major holiday celebration on September 14th. And this year, I celebrated on board a cruise ship!
My advice for writers is this: Keep writing and keep submitting!
There are many things in the publishing business that are beyond the writer’s control, but these two you very definitely can control. As long as you keep writing and keep sending your work out, eventually you will get there! You must believe that and believe in your work.
 I also encourage all writers, but especially beginners to find a good critique partner or group. Getting another (and at least somewhat objective) perspective of your work is invaluable. Finding a good partner or group can be difficult and take some effort, but is well worth it. My first book, The Wild Sight, is out now from Sourcebooks.
For more information about the book and about Loucinda, check out her website.
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 Did you have imaginary friends when you were a kid? You know, that special someone that only you could see. The perfect ‘person’ to share your secrets with, to confess breaking the cookie jar when you were sneaking a treat, or to tell fears in the dark. A playmate when nobody else was available. That kind of imaginary friend.
I had a few. The first ones I remember were “ghosts” and they hung out in my bedroom walls, coming out at night to visit with me as I fell asleep. Then there were the ones who came to listen to my stories, or to share stories of their own. We’d talk, I’d make up an adventure, again – as I fell asleep.
Then there were my teenage years… I’d make up love stories (what a shock, huh?). I was always the heroine and whichever cutie patootie I was crushing on – be he in school or a hunky actor on screen – would star as my hero. I didn’t spend as much time with my imaginary friends, they were more an audience for my mental fiction than anything else.
 As I started writing, my imaginary friends took on a new role. They became characters, both major and minor. They became my first line story critiques, so to speak. I’ve heard of authors who write for their readers. I admire that. A Lot. I wish I could do it. But I just can’t imagine readers out there – nameless faceless people who buy my books. Maybe it’s because I’m still a new author with only 3 books on the shelves and it hasn’t become real yet. Or maybe it’s the idea of writing to people I don’t know, whose likes, dislikes and experiences aren’t familiar to me. But for me, right now, it’s so much easier to tell the stories to my imaginary friends.
For some, I think this is like writing to the Muse. Having inspiration whispering in their ear, guiding their story. While I do believe in the Muse and her amazing inspiring powers (my Muse has a whip and a stopwatch… she’s a toughie) but she’s there to get me writing. My imaginary friends are there to enjoy the end result. To give me feedback and let me know if a story works or not. They are rarely there while I write, but when I finish and am reading through a book before I turn it in, they are reading over my shoulder. Call me crazy, but it makes me feel much better when I turn the story in to know it’s been read and approved. (and btw, my imaginary friends LOVED Risqué Business!)
So I’m curious… this is just my process and obviously the imaginary process that I write to. How about you? Did you have an imaginary friend as a child and if so, when (if at all) did you outgrow them? How about now? If you write, do you find yourself imagining your readers and their reactions? Do you look to them for feedback?
For more information about Tawny Weber and her books, visit www.tawnyweber.com.
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By Trish Milburn
 It’s been a little more than 13 months since I got the call that I’d sold my first book. That book, Heartbreak River, will come out next April under my Tricia Mills pseudonym. But my first book to be published, A Firefighter in the Family from Harlequin American, written under my real name, hit shelves this week! There’s nothing like seeing your book on bookstore shelves for the first time. All the hopes, dreams, tears, frustrations, rejections packaged together in one 209-page book.
There were definitely times when I’d begun to doubt I’d ever see this day. Back in the early years of writing and submitting, the rejections made me sad and wonder if I had any talent. But what I didn’t know then was that I still had a lot to learn about crafting novels and about the publishing business. Eventually, I began to final in RWA chapter-sponsored contests, even won some. But I couldn’t crack the ultimate unpublished contest – the Golden Heart. Not for eight years worth of entries. But then came 2003 and a call that changed me forever. Someone on the RWA board of directors (I’m sorry I can’t remember who) called to tell me that I’d finaled in the Golden Heart for the first time. And not only did I final, I double finaled. I remember sitting down on the edge of the bed, shaking, nearly crying. And then I went squealing and dancing through the house.
It’s easy to think that a Golden Heart final means The Call is right around the corner. For some, that proves to be true. But not me. I did continue to final in the Golden Heart for the following four years as well. I even won twice – for Romantic Suspense in 2004 and Young Adult in 2007. Neither of those books have sold. In fact, I believe I hold the record of most GH finals with eight. That still seems totally unbelievable to me. I’ve loved finaling in the Golden Heart each time because it’s an honor, an accomplishment, and I’ve gained some of my very best friends as a result of finaling in the contest. But if I’m being honest, there was another side to finaling. I began to wonder if that was my plateau, if the Golden Heart was going to be the pinnacle of my “career” and that I didn’t have that little extra something that would bring about a sale. That was a hard thing to consider.
 But it wasn’t. And when I saw my book on a store shelf for the first time last Thursday, I wasn’t running a fever. But it was a dream – a dream come true.
For more information about Trish and her work, visit www.trishmilburn.com.
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No, this isn’t really about the NBC department that set the tone for the original Star Trek. It’s more about what we ask of ourselves. Sometimes we push hard and reach for the stars. I’d like to think I always do that, but I know I sometimes don’t. Like with dusting. I admit it to taking shortcuts. Proper dusting of a bookshelf requires taking the books down and dusting them as well as the shelf. I’m so not there! I’m lucky if I run the vacuum, with that skinny little attachment, over the tops of the books every blue moon or so. Otherwise, I dust the front of the shelf, give the spines a lick and a promise and call it done.
Then there’s ironing. What ever happened to “permanent press?” So many garments require “light touch-up with an iron.” No matter how the vendors dress it up, that means hauling out the ironing board, messing with the iron, and finding space to hang things until we finish. Most of us don’t exactly have a cadre of magic helpers to do these things. So the to-be-ironed pile sometimes dwarfs the TBR pile. Well, occasionally. The TBR pile is now approaching mountain status. Which reminds me of that wonderful movie, The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill and Came Down a Mountain, but that’s a subject for a different blog. Ironing’s one thing that has to be done right if I’m going to do it.
So is revising. If I’m really rockin’ on a draft, blitzing along with everything flowing and that wonderful, creative high buzzing in my brain, I’ll leave things in that I know are inconsistent with other things, mentally marking the inconsistency for later resolution. When I go back through, I’ll decide which way I like better. When I start to revise, though, I become a detail fiend. “Control freak” might be a better term for it.
What about you? Which things do you really home in on, and which do you let slide?
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Some things we read, we forget in a few minutes. Some movies don’t affect us farther than the theater door (or the moment we stand up to leave). Others, however, endure. I still love the Dig Allen, Space Explorer, books I discovered at a school book fair in third grade. Thanks to the wonders of the internet, I located most of the series for our son, who loved them, too. Janet Lambert’s YA romances about the Parrishes and the Jordans, two Army families, engrossed me over a couple of summers. Thanks to book sales through Weekly Reader, I managed to obtain most of those.
On television, I loved to watch Guy Williams as Zorro on The Wonderful World of Disney. I sneaked looks (I can admit this now because both my parents are gone) at Anne Francis’ short-lived series, Honey West, about a woman private detective who kicked serious butt. My mom didn’t approve of that or The Man From U.N.C.L.E. or Star Trek. Just as water has a way of finding its own level, I found my way to Napoleon and Illya and Kirk and Spock and Mrs. Peel of The Avengers.
I also loved Superman and Batman and the Legion of Super-Heroes, all of whom consumed a huge chunk of my allowance every month. Then there was Nancy Drew, whose adventures were my rewards for monthly trips to the orthodontist. I remember being aghast when the books rose in price from $1.00 to $1.25.
My enjoyment of Williams’ Zorro led me to Tyrone Power’s and, eventually, to Antonio Banderas’. Star Trek and Superman led me to science fiction and a stint in fandom. The same daring and determination I admired in Nancy Drew led me to books and televisions shows and movies with strong female protagonists such as attorney-detective Avery Andrews, Stargate SG-1’s intrepid scientist and explorer, Col. Samantha Carter, tomb raider Lara Croft, and journalist Murphy Brown. My interest wasn’t limited to fictional women. I also admired HelenKeller, Elizabeth I, Joan of Arc, and pioneering doctor Elizabeth Blackwell.
How about you? What interests did you form in childhood that remain with you today? What movies, books or television programs you loved remain among your favorites?
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My alma mater made it way far into the basketball playoffs this year. This doesn’t happen all the time. In fact, it almost never happens. I’ve been consumed with basketball mania for the last two weeks, something else that almost never happens. I follow the scores and pay general attention, but with no other basketball fans in my family, I seldom make it to a game. Even games the whole country is watching.
I’ve enjoyed the publicity for the school and for the team, nonetheless. These kids don’t get admissions breaks or, as the national media have noted, special dorms, special dining halls, or special treatment in class. They have to work to be good in school just as they work to excel on the court. Even though they lost last weekend, the other alumni I know are still buzzing over how well they played and how beautifully the students conducted themselves. Winning is seriously way cool, but it isn’t everything.
In writing, we tend to think of selling as being everything. At least, those of us who aren’t published yet do. Those who are published can describe a whole new list of headaches, not least the need to have each book sell better than the one before it lest the publisher perceive one’s career as stagnating. Regardless of where we are, though, most of us have a goal on the horizon we’re striving to reach, an effort that doesn’t give us permission to let up in other areas of our lives.
Sometimes we’re balancing family needs with personal desires. Sometimes the competing interests are professional. Sometimes they’re totally irrational or some combination of all these, but they still require prioritization and time management and the ongoing desire to do our best.
Were you caught up in basketball mania? Is something you follow as avidly as die-hard college hoops fans follow March Madness? Do you ever have trouble tearing yourself away for something else you consider important?
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The path to publication can be a long and difficult one. More often than not, the long road supplants the quick, easy one in our tentative expectations. Sometimes the road is bumpy. Sometimes it’s boggy. Sometimes it has a sharp drop-off in the middle. Frodo and the hobbits had Elvish waybread to sustain them as they trekked through the perils of Mordor. What do writers have?
Ideas. The desire to express them. If we’re lucky, we also have supportive, encouraging friends and relatives. Those of us who’re even luckier have supportive, encouraging friends and relatives who also can help us figure out what we need to do better.
Some of my friends finaled in the big RWA contests, the Golden Heart and the RITA. That means their books wowed five randomly chosen judges. More power to them! Others of my friends, the majority, didn’t make that final cut. That doesn’t mean their books aren’t great. Great books miss the cut every year. It just means the judges who had them didn’t love them quite enough. Still, it’s easy to feel left out, to have a twinge of envy for those who have access to this additional shot at editors. When that happens, the best thing to do is turn back to the keyboard and dig in.
Wouldn’t it be great to have lembas, the Elves’ waybread, to help?
Wouldn’t it be great to have a zillion dollars?
The money wouldn’t help as much as the waybread. If we start focusing on the value of our ideas, believing in ourselves, that’s a form of waybread. It renews our strength and determination. There is no secret elixir, no magic fix, for publication of one’s work, but there is a secret elixir for perseverance. It’s the love of one’s ideas.
As my buddy Cassondra Murray pointed out in a recent blog, letting someone else hold the validation yardstick isn’t a great idea. It can even be crippling. If we love our ideas, though, and stay true to them–while honing the craft of expressing them, of course–we’re more likely to enjoy the not only the destination but the journey.
What’s your secret elixir?
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Last week, we chatted about resolutions. The main part of keeping writing resolutions, of course, is writing. For many of us, another big part is submitting. Which means risking rejection.
Writers deal with rejection in all sorts of ways. Chocolate has legions of fans, of course. Going to the gym and hitting things (hitting things elsewhere generally has major downsides) works for some people. So does brisk, angry striding down the street, sometimes even talking to oneself.
After the first zap or thud, though, comes the need to start over. Revise the manuscript, if need be. Send it out again. Most of us learned pretty quickly that editors weren’t going to hear magically about our work and beg to publish it. That’s a great fantasy, one many new writers entertain, but it doesn’t last very long for most of us. So we have to put our work in front of them in order to see it in print.
One author I know picks his next submission when he sends a manuscript to his first choice. That way, he’s ready if the book or article doesn’t sell. Most people I know have lists of choices in varying degrees of formality, so they know where they want their manuscripts to go. They still have to send them, though. They have to stick them in envelopes, trek to the post office, and send them out to a place where their likelihood of rejection runs high. They do it anyway, time after time, month after month, year after year, and with no guarantees of success.
“Nothing in worth having in life comes easy,” my grandfather used to say. I think all the writers out there submitting are hoping he’s right. They want the prize badly enough to run the necessary gauntlet to reach it.
For me, chocolate, exercise, and a new purse or CD help boost my spirits and put me back on the ladder. How about you?
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How are those resolutions doing? Is February a milestone in the keeping of them or a millstone dragging you down from where you’d hoped to be?
My resolutions (though I prefer to call them plans since resolve doesn’t always play a role) could be doing better. I haven’t made it back to the gym–that’s the bad part. I’m not as far along with my writing as I’d hoped to be, which is a not–wonderful part. On the other hand, I’m producing–a good part. So I guess I’ll call February a milestone. One month down, 11 more to go.
A lot of things can keep us from writing. Sometimes we actually want them to, whether or not we admit it. Got a child whose school needs volunteers? A spouse or significant other whose job requires a social commitment? How about a bathroom that needs cleaning? All those things can take us away from our writing. When we choose to do one of those instead of sitting in front of the keyboard, we’re choosing not to make progress on the “work in progress.” Why?
The child’s school or the spouse/significant other’s social obligations do matter, and we may have to make a choice about time allocation. Occasional such choices aren’t really the issues. Trends in such choices are.
Sometimes we’re delaying the moment when we must send this manuscript into the world, possibly (the odds favor “probably”) to face rejection. Sometimes we don’t know what comes next. Sometimes we’re just sick of working on the darned thing. As a friend of mine once reminded me, though, we can’t sell part of a manuscript. Those of us just starting out can’t, anyway. So anyone who really wants that elusive prize, a book with her (or his) name on the cover, has to stay in the chair and work on it. In How to Write Fantasy and Science Fiction, Orson Scott Card says something along the lines of “ideas are more likely to come to the writer hunched over the keyboard than the one playing video games in the basement.” The wording probably isn’t exact, but the point rings true for those of us who’re addicted to Space Invaders (or Tetris, in my case.)
So I’m working on progressing faster and getting back to the gym. How’re you doing?
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