A Step in the Write Direction--July 29, 2013

A Step in the Write Direction

July 29, 2013

Update:

Finally—after working for a good part of 5 or 6 days, I have my marketing records reconstructed from the last 3 years. Now I have a list of what’s been sold where and what’s been turned down where, so now I can start sending out reprints again. Also have copied all my documents onto five flash drives: books/calendars; miscellaneous manuscripts (fiction/nonfiction/devotionals/ poems/book reviews/newspapers, etc.); conference material; personal; and pictures….Have one book here to review for Amazon, and then need to get started on a 409-page editing job. It’s been a good week—free from coughing for the last three days! Thanks for your prayers! Such a relief!

Thought for the Day:

“I’m not out to please this whole world around me; I’ve got my mind on eternity” (from “I Am Not Ashamed of the Gospel”)—sung beautifully by our music minister’s wife this morning. This should be the motto of every Christian writer!

Laugh for the Day:

A minister was awakened one night and saw a burglar going through his dresser drawers.  "What are you doing?" asked the minister. 

"I'm looking for money." 

"Wait a minute," the minister jumped out of bed. "I'll look with you."

Quiz:

I don’t think I ever gave the answer to the last group of questions. Here they are:

·        The Canary Islands in the Pacific are named after what animal? (Dogs)

·        What was King George’s first name? (Albert)

·        What color is a purple finch? (Crimson)

·        Where are Chinese gooseberries from? (New Zealand)

·        What is the color of the black box in a commercial airplane? (Orange)

Free Writers Newsletter:

Subscribe at: workingwriters@aol.com. I’ll be having a couple of articles coming out in this newsletter in the near future. Edited by Moira Allen, it has a lot of good material in it.

Fun Puzzle:

7H15  M3554G3  53RV35  7O  PR0V3  H0W  0UR M1ND5 C4N  D0  4M4Z1NG 7H1NG5!  1MPR3551V3  7H1NG5!

1N  7H3  B3G1NN1NG  17  WA5  H4RD  BU7  N0W,  0N 7H15  LIN3  Y0UR  M1ND 1S  R34D1NG 17  4U70M471C4LLY  W17H0U7  3V3N  7H1NK1NG  4B0U7 17. 

B3  PROUD! 0NLY  C3R741N  P30PL3  C4N  R3AD  7H15.

Writer’s Tips:

Here are some tips on formatting your manuscript;

Left-Hand Upper Corner

·        Name you want check made out to (important if you’re using a pen name)

·        Address

·        Phone

·        Email address

·        Web site and blog, if you like

·        NO Social Security number (if publishers need it to send you a 1099, they’ll ask for it).

Right-Hand Upper Corner

·        The rights you’re selling. (We covered this some time ago, but if you have questions, let me know and I’ll send you the information.)

·        Word count (don’t need this for poetry

Will discuss choosing a title next week!

Have a great week spreading the

gospel through the printed page.

Donna Clark Goodrich

dgood648@aol.com

www.thewritersfriend.net

http://donna-goodrich.blogspot.com

 
"A Step in the Write Direction--the Complete How-to Guide for Christian Writers"

"The Freedom of Letting Go"

 

A Step in the Write Direction--July 22, 2013

A Step in the Write Direction

July 22, 2013

Update:

I always kept all my sold/rejected records in folders with a hard copy of my manuscript. A few years back a friend talked me into putting everything on CD, which I did, and also threw away the paper records. Then my computer crashed, so for months I’ve hesitated to send out reprints as I couldn’t remember who all I had sent them to. So the last few days I’ve been reconstructing all my records. Have gotten to the “Ns.” Only problem: I had copied a huge bunch of manuscripts from Documents to a CD, and then couldn’t find the CD. Put out a prayer request on Facebook last night, and during the night I woke up and remembered that I had copied that CD onto a flash drive. Found it! Hopefully can finish up within the next two days, then can start a 400-page editing job and a 144-page proofreading job before starting to send out reprints.

Had a really good sermon in church this morning from our children’s minister who admitted she was fighting a spiritual battle. She talked about Joshua facing the wall of Jericho (Joshua 5:13-15). A few notes:

·         Joshua thought he could fix it himself. Instead of looking up, he looked inside.

·         He forgot that God was the Commander-in-Chief. It was His battle, not Joshua’s.

·         We build up a wall of doubt and discouragement.

·         No one could go in or out of Jericho. When we have a wall up, we don’t let anyone in or out. Share our battles as well as our victories.

·         The march around the wall didn’t bring the victory; their faith did.

·         What is the Jericho in your life today? Are you letting God fight your battle for you?

·         There’s no limit to what God can do if we surrender everything to Him.

Thought for the Day:

DREAMS

Hold fast to dreams

For if dreams die

Life is a broken-winged bird

That cannot fly.

— Langston Hughes

 

Laugh for Today:

1. Jokes about German sausage are the wurst.
2. I know a guy who's addicted to brake fluid. He says he can stop anytime.
3. I'm reading a book about anti-gravity. I can't put it down.
4. Velcro—what a rip off!
5. I stayed up all night to see where the sun went. Then it dawned on me.

Writer’s Tips:

Are you discouraged over rejection letters you’ve received? (Our group calls them “pre-acceptances.) Perhaps the following will encourage you.

·         About 15 years ago I put together 7 booklets on various aspects of writing from workshops I taught over the years: poetry, devotional writing, marketing, personal experiences, writing your first book, how to get started, and starting and running a Christian writers’ club. Tried for years to sell these booklets with no luck. Eventually I put them all into a book, along with other material, and this sold as A Step in the Write Direction—the Complete How-to Book for Christian Writers.

·         I sent my Advent devotional book Preparing Your Heart for Christmas to 11 publishers over a period of 3 years. It sold in November 2012 and came out for Christmas that year—both in printed form and in e-book.

·         I put together a joke-a-day perpetual calendar and submitted it 13 times without a sale. Then I put it in book form and sold it to a publisher a couple of months ago.

·         I sent out my Rhyme-Time Bible Stories to 15 publishers over a period of 2 years, and sold it to the above publisher at the beginning of this year.

·         I sent The Freedom of Letting Go to at least 7 or 8 publishers before it was picked up last year by a publisher. (The reason some rejected it was the reason this particular publisher liked it!)

·         I put out a 30-page booklet on “Letting Go of Grief” which never sold. This became the opening chapter in my Letting Go book.

·         I have two gift books for friends and mothers I’ve sent out at least 13 times. The last time I sent them snail mail to a publisher that I read in Christian Retailing was now beginning a gift and devotional book line. The editor wrote and asked me to send them email so she could present them to a committee where they are now.

Lessons I’ve Learned:

·         They’re not rejecting YOU, just your manuscript. This doesn’t mean it isn’t well-written; just that it doesn’t fit their readership or they’re not accepting manuscripts at the present. If they tell you this, feel free to re-submit it in six months or so.

·         Check The Christian Communicator, the Christian Writer’s Market Guide, or the publishers’ web sites to see if there’s a change in editors. What doesn’t appeal to one editor may appeal to a new one.

·         Look for new publishers. Often they’re more willing to take on an unknown author.

·         Change the format as I did with the writing booklets, the joke book, and the grief booklet, and most importantly,

·         KEEP TRYING!

Have a good week spreading the

gospel through the printed page!

Donna Clark Goodrich

Dgood648@aol.com

www.thewritersfriend.net

http://donna-goodrich.blogspot.net

  "A Step in the Write Direction--the Complete How-to Guide for Christian Writers"

A Step in the Write Direction--July 15, 2013

A Step in the Write Direction--July 8, 2013

A Step in the Write Direction

July 8, 2013

Update: Not much to write this Monday. Worked most of the week finishing the father/ grandfather anthology AND IT’S DONE and off to the publisher’s. Spent Saturday sending more than 30 photographs writers submitted for the cover. I went through all the publisher’s guidelines when preparing the final copy, but forgot that he didn’t want paragraph indents. Thanks to a friend of mine, I learned how to do a global delete so I could take out thousands of them in just seconds! Thanks, Peggy!…Spent a lot of the week watching the tragic events of the 19 firefighters who lost their lives a week ago yesterday in the Yarnell (Arizona) fire. So sad to see all their families and learn all the details….Had a cat scan Wednesday to see if they can figure out a different way to treat my COPD; it’s extra bad in this weather. Will find out results today….Now I have to decide what book to work on next. Still thinking seriously about the caregiver book as it seems so many of you are in that position. In the meantime, I’m going through boxes of books and trying to weed out the unread ones that I want to read, and the already-read ones to give away.

Thought for the Day: Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters (Colossians 3:23 niv).

Laugh for the Day: “Think of it—it took the wagon trains six months to get across the country. Today they send rockets millions of miles into space and back in fifteen minutes, but nobody is watching. They’re all home watching ‘Wagon Train’ on television” (Bob Hope).

Question from reader: I need advice. I prefer capitalizing pronouns for Jesus. I see some theologians do it, but most do not. Dr. Charles Stanley published his Life Principles Bible in NKJV and NAS and he capitalizes the pronouns. Would you kindly advise me?

Answer: This mostly depends upon the publisher and/or the writer. The publisher that I proofread about 50 books a year for sends me an ABC style sheet with each book. (By the way, this is a great sheet to use when you’re writing. As you look up a word in the dictionary, jot it down on this sheet so the next time you use it, you’ll not only remember how it’s spelled, but if it’s hyphenated or not. This will give you consistency in your writing and make it easier for the editor of your manuscript. I use one of these every time I edit someone’s material. I’ll send you one if you want one.)

This style sheet tells me if the editor/writer wants pronouns for Deity lower or upper case, if it’s a.m./ p.m., A.M./P.M., a.m./p.m.; if you spell out number under 10 or under 100, etc. Unfortunately, each editor at this particular publishing house has their own particular style; that’s what this sheet is so handy.

Now, back to your question. I find that most editors and writers capitalize the pronouns for Jesus, God, and the Holy Spirit, i.e., He, Him, His, and Himself, and that is also my preference. I find it makes it less confusing for the reader, especially if you’re also writing about someone else who is a “he.”

Answers to June 24 quiz:

1) How long did the Hundred Years’ War last? 116 years

2) Which country makes Panama hats? Ecuador

3) From which animal do we get cat gut? Sheep and horses

4) In which month do Russians celebrate the October Revolution? November

5) What is a camel’s hairbrush made of? Squirrel fur

Here are some more:

1) The Canary Islands in the Pacific are named after what animal?

2) What was King George VI’s first name?

3) What color is a purple finch?

4) Where are Chinese gooseberries from?

5) What is the color of the black box in a commercial airplane?

Have a great week spreading the gospel

through the printed page!

Donna Clark Goodrich

dgood648@aol.com

www.thewritersfriend.net

http://donna-goodrich.blogspot.com

"A Step in the Write Direction--the Complete How-to Guide for Christian Writers"

"The Freedom of Letting Go"