A Step in the Write Direction--July 21, 2014--Recycling Your Manuscripts

A Step in the Write Direction

July 21, 2014

Update: Another week. The year is more than half over. Where has the time gone? My mom used to say that the older you get, the faster the time goes—and she was right….This week brought some good news in that most of my tests came out okay. One culture hasn’t come back yet. Doctor still isn’t sure if the coughing is caused by the COPD, or perhaps mold in our mobile home. Will get that checked out this week….Tomorrow we’ll say good-bye to our daughter and family who are going back to Oklahoma after their visit here. They were supposed to leave today but our son-in-law got pneumonia while here, so they’re waiting another day.…Finishing up the corrections on the new “Step” book; trying to figure out how to scan forms on my new printer, then it’ll be done. (If I can’t scan them, will either have to learn how to type them or hire someone smarter than me to do it!)

Thought for the Day: "You are a remarkable gift to this world. What you bring to it is something only you can bring. Don't ever think that you have nothing to offer. You have everything because you are everything God planned for you to be" (Bob Perks); (Gospel Greats Newsletter, 7/15/14).

Song for the Day:

When the world that I've been living in collapses at my feet
When my life is shattered and torn
Though I'm windswept and battered I can cling to His cross
And find peace in the midst of my storm
There is peace in the midst of my storm tossed life
Oh there's an anchor, there's a rod to cast my faith upon.

Jesus rides in my vessel so I'll fear no alarm
He gives me peace in the midst of my storm

            —Steve Adams, written after tornado destroyed their church in Xenia, Ohio, on Good

            Friday, 1974.

Laugh for the Day: A new papa in the Armed Forces received a telegram: "Gave birth to little girl this morning; both doing well."  On the envelope carrying the message was this sticker: "When you want a boy, call Western Union."

Writer’s Tips:

Recycling Your Manuscripts

This is the day of recycling—in your writing as well as in your community. Don't ever be satisfied with selling something once! Continue to send out reprints until you know you have exhausted all the markets for that particular manuscript. Then rewrite it with a different slant.

Recall a time in your life when you struggled with a decision or a trial, but God brought you through. Write this as a personal experience article. Then, using the same incident, change the characters and location, make up a “what if” ending, and turn it into a short story.

If you’ve written this story from a mother's point of view for a woman's magazine, rewrite it from the father's point of view for a male-oriented periodical. If the story involves a family, write it from a teenager's point of view for youth magazines or take-home papers. Or change the dialogue and situations to that of a younger child for children's publications.

After you have sent to all the fiction markets, keep the same theme, do some research, add a few statistics, and turn it into a nonfiction piece. Or develop the main theme into a devotional or poem.

Dennis Hensley sold an article to a local newspaper about a high school boy who began a mobile horseshoeing business. He then sold it to a teen periodical. Because the young man was deaf, Hensley offered it to a magazine looking for stories on the hearing impaired. And since he was a Christian, the story next appeared in his denominational magazine. The teen used a Ford truck in his business, so Hensley then sold the story to Ford Times. And because he had offered only one-time rights to the local newspaper, he sold the story to other newspapers in the state, and eventually nationwide to the Grit newspaper. What a great example of recycling!

What manuscript have you had published that you can rewrite using a different slant?

 Have a good week spreading the

gospel through the printed page.

Donna Clark Goodrich

dgood648@aol.com

www.thewritersfriend.net

http://donna-goodrich.blogspot.com

www.thewritersfriend.net
"A Step in the Write Direction--the Complete How-to Guide for Christian Writers"