NEW USERS! INTRODUCE YOURSELVES!

Welcome to the forum!

Welcome, and good luck, Gorandius!

I'm not new of course =) But it's been awhile since I was last on the forum so it feels like it.

Love what you've done with the place Brad! Now I'll have to explore...

For any new folks... I am an Illustrator of Fantasy and Science Fiction! And a winner that will be at the Gala this year in May! It aught to be a lot of fun, can't wait to meet you all in person!

Draw, draw, draw, Write, write, write... as if your life depends on it... cause it does...

Congrats. Well deserved!

YAY JOEY!

Wonderful to hear from you again, Ms. Jordan!!! It'll be so cool to get a chance to meet you at the Event!

Hello Everyone,

I submitted my first entry for the 1st quarter of 2011, and have since been perusing the boards looking for advice and tips. Decided to finally stop in and introduce myself. I have been writing for my own enjoyment for 30 plus years, but decided to finally get serious about 2 years ago. I found out there is a lot to learn.
Thanks to everyone who has posted advice here, I appreciate it. Maybe I’ll be bumping into some of you around the boards some time (as soon as I figure out how it all works a bit better).
ShyB

Howdy,

I've tried to put together a resource page on my site: http://www.jordanlapp.com/writers-of-the-future-resources. Enjoy.

Welcome, ShyB! I'm also a bit of a slow starter. I took my first professional writing class in 1987.

Glad you decided to speak up and join us!

Welcome, ShyB! There's a good mix of younguns and older folk here (I fall into the latter category, at 43, and like you, I've been writing for a long time, though not with any direction until recently). I also submitted my first WotF entry in the first quarter of 2011. Exciting, isn't it? (In an ooh-maybe-I'll-get-REALLY-good-news one minute, oh-crap-I'm-sure-I'll-just-be-rejected the next minute kind of way.)

Thanks for the welcome everyone, and thank you Jordan for the link, lots of info there, and nice page by the way.

ShyB

Hi!

I'm new- working on a submission I've been writing since Sept. Sort of a perfectionist (or ahem fear of failure) and had other projects going, but now I'm focusing one getting this one in sometime this year. Yeah, I know that is a vague goal... I have no aspirations of winning, just want to see what happens with my best effort. Will it crash and fail right out? will it get an HM? Semi? Finalist? I'm going to use it as a gauge of how well my writing is improving. I have a few other professionally published things, nothing in fiction though and that is a whole new ball game

Tina

Welcome, Tina!

And don't let that fear of failure hold you back. Rejection is the norm in this line of work, and those who make it are the ones who decide that rejection isn't failure, the only failure is giving up or never trying.

Oh dont worry- when I talk about fear of failure, it doesn't mean I have a fear of rejection slips That just motivates me more to fix what I did wrong. I'm a rewriter junkie. I mean I have a fear that my storyline will be a complete failure or I missed the point I wanted to make, ect. So I keep rewriting to get it right. It's almost there. I think, hopefully for the March deadline.

Hi, Tina, and welcome!

I have no aspirations of winning, just want to see what happens with my best effort. Will it crash and fail right out? will it get an HM? Semi? Finalist? I'm going to use it as a gauge of how well my writing is improving.

As a general comment (and it applies to me probably more than to most here, so: Note to self) -- I wonder if the ultimately saner and more Success-achieving approach is to not even dream that someone's first or second story will score or to gauge oneself by that happening or not (although I'm thinking that several folks here indeed won with their first or second contest story, though probably not their first or second story they'd ever written) -- but to simply commit to oneself that we won't even begin to draw any conclusions until entering five or ten times (so that's barely over two years' of entering)

There may be innate talent buried in all of us, talent that will ultimately be uncovered and bring us our wished-for Success.

But there's no way of knowing how deep that talent is buried, or how much digging and exploring and discovering it takes to bring it up from the deep, right?

The sparkling shard easily brought to the surface might be broken glass; the sparkle dragged up from deep after great effort might be the entire diamond mine, etc.

The WINNING commitment then is simply to stick with exploring for it until we find it.

A great analogy! The way I see it- if I'm lucky enough to at some point write something worthy of a semi-finalist then I will get a critique and rewrite the story to make it better, hopefully publish. If I get a Finalist I have a good reason to shop it out to magazine to try and get a sale. If I get rejected or an HM then I know I need to get more writing instruction, look for where my weaknesses are, ect.

Also keep in mind that WotF, like any other market, has its specific tastes. Don't get too discouraged if you land a rejection, for example, it may just mean that the story doesn't work for here. And yes, if you land anything short of a win: send the story straight back out to another market.

Oh, and welcome! (waves)

Welcome, Tina!

Thanks!!

I've been at a Dean Wesley Smith workshop out in Lincoln City this weekend, so thanks to the usual suspects for holding the fort down.

Welcome to our new members! Make yourselves at home.

gower, all a rejection from WotF (or an HM, or a Semi, for that matter) means is... "No thanks, not for us"

A rejection from ANYWHERE tells you nothing. It's just a rejection. Don't rewrite because you have no idea what turned the editor away from your story. And what might turn one editor away could be a huge plus for another (Analog would reject a heart-wrenching tale about a magic cat, but F&SF might love it). So for bloody sake, don't "fix" what isn't broken. File the rejection and SEND IT BACK OUT.

Unfortunately, I'm not at that point in my writing yet. I don't have that kind of skill. If I sent a story out to five mags and got five rejections I would take a look at what I could be doing differently - especially if I thought the story was right for the market. That is where I am in my writing. I was mostly referring to the rare chance that my story would make it to semi finalist in this contest. I was under the impression that KDW would be sending it back with a critique and if that was the case I WOULD definitely take a look at what she were to say and make changes accordingly. Some people learn by starting over with a whole new story and I learn by fixing what I did wrong. When I start making fiction sales then I will know I'm getting it down.

BUT you have given me something to think about when I get to that point. I wouldn't be too hasty to rewrite too soon. Thanks for your advice!

Yeah, I dunno. A rejection COULD mean nothing, but that doesn't mean that it DOES mean nothing. Sure your story might be wrong for that magazine, but it could also suck. If you're in doubt, submit it somewhere that gives feedback (you can find a list off Duotrope), or better yet get a pro-published author to look at it (not another newbie, cause if they're not getting published either they don't have any better idea than you do).

Eh, I dunno if I agree with Jordan, sorry. I was just at a workshop with 4 pro editors reading short stories. Some of the stories one or two editors would LOVE and would BUY, and then those same stories would be rewrites or form rejections from one of the other editors. It's so subjective. Yes, your story might suck (I would say if you have 30 short stories out to markets and are writing a lot and not getting ANY personal rejections, you might want to get a pro writer to look at your stuff though a workshop or a convention or something). But your story might also have just failed to hit that particular editor's reader cookies. You have NO way of knowing and you might rewrite and remove what works so that editor B won't buy a story they would have bought if you'd left it alone instead of writing it to editor A's tastes (remember, in this scenario, editor A already rejected you. Make a note if they commented on the story at all and write something more to their tastes next time. But editor A might say something that editor B totally disagrees with).

Write. Finish. Don't rewrite. Send it out. Keep it out. Rinse, repeat. Don't fix what you don't know is broken. You WILL improve and you WILL sell. It just takes time.

It sounds like we do agree actually?

I didn't say to rewrite it after a single rejection...rather if it's constantly being rejected odds are it's the story, not the market.

Thank you both. This is good advice. I am extremely new, so sadly my work falls under the "still sucks" category (and that is not writers depression talking). I have a professional right now helping me with some of the technical stuff. I have sold some non fiction short stories and mostly I write humor. What I was doing was working for those markets and when I tried to go over to fiction I had a different reaction to what I was writing and it was not good... I had a professional take a look at it and pointed me in the right direction with some of the more technical stuff. That is what I am working on. When I can get the technical stuff down then I might not take multiple rejections so seriously. I'm not talking about story idea or voice, I'm talking about really simple stuff like dialogue tags, plot problems, bad character development...these are all things I am working on.

I'm not at the level you guys are at yet and so it is really helpful to get your feedback and hear about your experience.

Also thank you for the information on finding the places that give feedback. I was unaware they existed (see that is how new I am). I'm excited to give them a try.

Tina

True, Jordan, sorry, I'm tired

But honestly, you are better off writing a new story than trying to "fix" an old one. You'll learn more and write better stories (and have more inventory) just writing something new. Don't get stuck revising. Finish and mail it and move on

LOL I just went to your blog earlier today and found Dean Smith's advice on this. It also hits the same point your trying to make to me about trying to avoid rewriting. Just write and sell, keep stories out there. I think it is good advice and one way to go about the business (except as I pointed out earlier I was making a lot of common mistakes...lots of 'telling' and no 'showing' in my stories, believe me when I tell you it is the story and not the market in my case). I don't know what to expect as a newbie. After I sell some fiction I'll just have to see how I feel.

Hello,

I'm new to this forum. I don't really do a whole lot forum posts but I really wanted to know if you were allowed to win for a story and an illustration. Thanks to the previous posts, I got my answer. Well, I love to write and draw. Two things I've been doing for as long as I can remember. Science-fiction and fantasy are my favorites though. I grew up loving almost everything in those genres, so naturally that's what I love to write and draw about as well.

How long does it normally take for winner's to be announced? And if you aren't chosen as a winner, are you notified?

Thanks

Welcome, WFABZDNLDBT, and glad you decided to speak up!

Yes, all entrants should receive a notification of how they fared in the contest, which usually takes the form of a form letter saying that you weren't a winner, though sometimes comes as an honorable mention, etc. As for how long it takes for the winners to be announced, I think the best answer for that is, "too long"