Max has been nursing a cold and I was terrified Mason would catch it. After our ordeal with Mason’s hospitalization when he was 12 days old, I was absolutely thrilled when, at his 2-month checkup last week, the doctor said these 6 magic words, “You have a perfectly healthy baby!”
This article is for all those deadbeat editors and publishers out there who owe writers money. Here’s my advice on how you should or should not react when the press contacts you about your deadbeat status.
This Week:
The real secret to success at anything, whether it be riding a bicycle, getting a part in the school play, getting your novel published or conquering the world, is persistence. The act of persisting means keeping on no matter what tries to stop you or who tells you to give up.
Dear Ms. Hoy:
I would like to know what you think of writing for Chicken Soup for the Soul, A Cup of Comfort series, etc. Is writing for them worth my time and effort?
Remember the theme song from Cheers that talks about everybody knowing your name? I like to frequent places where I can network with fellow writers.
We stopped at a truck stop diner for lunch during our trip last week. Richard offered to take Mason to the men’s room for a diaper change, but I am a bit nervous in truck stops so I told him I’d take him to the women’s restroom instead. That was a decision I would live to regret.
This Week:
Do you get newsletters from your state arts or humanities councils? I get fifteen of them, and they come packed with knowledge, jobs, and calls for submission, contests as well as grants. They have no need for scams and do not advertise, so the content in those pages is legitimate and genuine. Since they live to serve artists and writers, they have no need to pull the wool over your eyes. In other words, reliable.
I have found grants I never knew existed, contests for specific regions, jobs advertised on a short deadline, and publications I craved to read. I learned how much money a state had to offer writers and which states loved writers more than others. The best retreats in the world appear in these newsletters.
In regards to word counts for contests, are there rules for what constitutes a word such as “a”, “the,” etc? Two letters or less are not words, Or is basically everything that is typed considered a word.
