The L-train debacle flash fiction contest

My normal subway is the L.
The L goes under the East River.
The tunnels were damaged during Hurricane Sandy.


Now they're going to fix them.
And that leaves 300,000 people in a fix.
Cause how the HELL are we going to get to work?

None of us can walk on water, and none of us have jet packs.

This is going to be an EPIC snarl up, and I can't wait to not deal with it.
I'm working from home next week. And maybe forever if this doesn't work itself out.

To give me something to look forward to, let's have a flash fiction contest!


The usual rules apply:

1. Write a story using 100 words or fewer.

2. Use these words in the story:
fix
sandy
tunnel
snarl
east

IF you are Steve Forti, you must also use this phrase which is (I swear!) the Maryland State motto:
Manly deeds, womanly words (Fatti maschii, parole femine)


In that order too! (not in Latin though, unless you want)
(I cackle with glee at the prospect of stymieing Mr. Forti!!)

3. You must use the whole word, but that whole word can be part of a larger word. The letters for the prompt must appear in consecutive order. They cannot be backwards.

Thus: East/Easter is ok, but east/TSA exit is not.


4. Post the entry in the comment column of THIS blog post.

5. One entry per person. If you need a mulligan (a do-over) erase your entry and post again. It helps to work out your entry first, then post.

6. International entries are allowed, but prizes may vary for international addresses.

7. Titles count as part of the word count (you don't need a title)

8. Under no circumstances should you tweet anything about your particular entry to me. Example: "Hope you like my entry about Felix Buttonweezer!" This is grounds for disqualification.

8a. There are no circumstances in which it is ok to ask for feedback from ME on your contest entry. NONE. (You can however discuss your entry with the commenters in the comment trail...just leave me out of it.)

9. It's ok to tweet about the contest generally.

Example: "I just entered the flash fiction contest on Janet's blog and I didn't even get a lousy t-shirt"

10. Please do not post anything but contest entries. (Not for example "I love Felix Buttonweezer's entry!")

11. You agree that your contest entry can remain posted on the blog for the life of the blog. In other words, you can't later ask me to delete the entry and any comments about the entry at a later date.

12. The stories must be self-contained. That is: do not include links or footnotes to explain any part of the story. Those extras will not be considered part of the story.


Contest opens: Saturday, 4/27/19 at 9:25am (sorry for being late!)
Contest closes: Sunday, 4/28/19 at 9am


If you're wondering how what time it is in NYC right now, here's the clock

If you'd like to see the entries that have won previous contests, there's an .xls spread sheet here http://www.colindsmith.com/TreasureChest/
(Thanks to Colin Smith for organizing and maintaining this!)

Questions? Tweet to me @Janet_Reid

Ready? SET?
Not yet! 
ENTER! 

Sorry too late, contest closed!

Do you have a book problem too?

In my econ classes, so long ago I know how to calculate interest rates by hand, the professor taught us that buyers made rational choices. In Row 3, seat A I listened and thought it made sense. I certainly wasn't buying anything but tuition, text books and beer. My folks were frugal. The only time GrandDad (from Scotland, thank you very much) threw money around was the coin toss for a sporting event.

Today, I think that's probably the looniest thing anyone ever said in that class.

People buy things for completely IRrational reasons: they want! Want! WANT!

And I wanted these books.

and all these

Not to mention these

Now, realistically, you'd think I'd breeze through those picture books, but that's not the case. Picture books are not read; they're savored. The art is such an integral part of the story that examining every detail is essential.

So figure it's an hour at least on each picture book.
And a week on those other tomes.

What the HELL was I thinking??

I wasn't thinking, I was just wanting. Want want want!

Do you buy books even though your shelves are full?
What's the last book you bought and where?

An egg-selent blog post today

I'm really hoping this is not a photo of my clients, egg-selent writers that they are.

Today's blog post was waylaid by an editorial project that I wanted to turn around quickly.

 Back to business as usual tomorrow.

In the mean time, offer up an idea for the caption, or a guess on who sent this to me!

Editorial letters

I recently attended a class taught by a debut author who passed around the editorial letter from her publisher. I had never seen one and was eager to read it. Thirteen, single-spaced pages written in dense, long paragraphs. My eyes crossed imaging how difficult this letter would be to decipher. 

Today, I read a different author's experiences signing with her agent. Her editorial letter (from the agent. The book hasn't been shopped yet) was 10, single-spaced pages. Again, my brain nearly melted. 

Questions:
(1) Are such lengthy editorial letters typical from both agents and editors?
(2) If yes, do you have advice on how authors should best tackle them?
(3) Also, why letters? When I beta read, I use the comments function in Word to highlight and add notes. To my novice mind, it's easier to decipher and act upon comments written in the manuscript than a separate letter with page-long blocks of single-spaced text.  

I suspect your answer to the third question will be 'tradition' as so often happens in this industry. However, knowing what to expect might help us authors avoid an outbreak of hives when we receive our first editorial letter.

(1) Yes
(2) One sentence at a time!
(3) Tradition sure, but also, narrative.


Editorial notes in letter format allow me more latitude than 1" revision notes on the side of a manuscript.

Also, a lot of my notes refer to over all structure: the middle sags, you're explaining too much.
Track change comments are good for specifics, but not things that apply to the whole ms.

Now, my question for you is why on earth are you worried about this?
When the day comes that you get one of these, it's not as though you're sent to a desert island to figure it all out for yourself.  Your agent AND YOUR EDITOR will help you.

This isn't some sort of antagonistic combative relationship where if you don't understand something, your contract will be rescinded and you'll be sent to Bad Client Dungeon to languish forever more.

Get off your rodent wheel, and write a book that has me reaching for the phone not a red pen.

Including alternate titles in your query

Should you introduce a title and an alternative title in your query?

A good title is an asset.

A list of possible titles is just annoying.

"Working title"attached to any title makes me roll my eyes.
If you're going to have a working title, why not pick "My Big Best Seller" of
"Sox Knocker to the Stars?" 

Let's step back and think about what a query needs to accomplish.

You want your reader (that is, me) to read the first sentence and then want to read more.

In other words, it's the story that's important.

The title is in the subject line of your query, and again in the closing paragraph. It shouldn't be anywhere else in the query (ie NOT in the story.)

Example:

Subj: Query for The Duchess of Yowl Meets Cujo by Quentin Tarantino

Closing paragraph: The Duchess of Yowl Meets Cujo is three words long.

Now, how in the HECK are you going to insert an alternate title there and have it read smoothly and enticingly?

You're not.

I'm not sure why writers fret about this. I've never passed on a book because of the title. A good title HELPS, but a bad title is just fixable.

Any questions?

Revising the snot-green couch

If you've been reading the blog awhile, you may have picked up on how I love love love to move furniture.  It's genetic: mum loved to whisk the sofa around the sitting room; grandmama was known to shift the piano from time to time.

"Where do you want the piano this time, lady?" was a phrase we adopted to signal the other that this was the VERY last time something was getting relocated. It came about, as you might guess, from the workmen who were called in to help grandmama when the piano needed to move up or down the stairs, not just across the room.

My dad, gent that he was, moved a lot of furniture but even he had a limit to his patience. Dad would say "you get one free move" when Mum decided the book cases would look better on the south wall. After that, we were on our own.

Which was ok with us. We moved furniture in the middle of the night more often than not.  My sisters and dad would wake to find a sofa had mysteriously appeared from another room and now blocked their usual path to the coffee pot.

Ah yes, the good old days.

Now that I live in NYC in a sub 500 square foot apartment, there's not only less furniture to move, the floor plan presents some challenges.

Thus, the story of the snot-green couch. (I did not name this couch, but sadly, it's too on the nose to give up.)

I'd always wanted a couch with a chaise.

I fell in love with this thing the instant I saw it. That it was on sale was just a bonus. I loved it so much I didn't even sit on it before I bought it.

But that chaise element added not just length to the required area, it took up more volume than it actually occupied.  There were only two places it fit in the apartment that did not block the path to other rooms.  The day I thought "well, I'll just go OVER it to get to the kitchen" was the day I realized something had to change.

I had three choices:

1. Live with the sofa even though it wasn't quite right for the apartment.

2. Revise the sofa in some major way

3. Move

I don't have to explain about rent control in NYC for you to intuit that Number 3 was not an option.

And you don't have to know me very well to know that Number 1 was also not an option.

Thus: Number 2, revise the sofa.
Which I did.
With scissors.

I think the Lesson of the Snot-Green Couch (revise what doesn't work) applies to your manuscripts as well. 

Sometimes you have a project you LOVE!

Only it doesn't work. Either as a story, or in the marketplace.

Love zombies? Zombies aren't doing well right now.

Love old-fashioned gunslinger westerns? Not much call for that. 

Zombie cowboys? No. Some things should not be written.

Unless you trash it (ie #3 Move) or self-publish it (#1 live with it) you're going to need to be willing to do some drastic revisions.

That you love the manuscript isn't part of the equation. I loved that damn chaise but love didn't make it fit where it needed to live.

Be willing to consider a major overhaul.

Be willing to cut things, revise things, sew a seam (out of sight of course). 

Be willing to sacrifice what you love for something that actually does the job you need.

Sadly, the snot-green couch has now sprung a coil or four.

I think I need to buy a new one.

This time, I'm sitting on it first.

And I'm not buying one with a chaise.

Cause what I really need is a comfy spot to read your amazing novel about zombie gunslingers.