MAKE DREAMS COME TRUE

Isn't it time you made your writing dreams come true?

Several years ago I read this question and it has haunted me since. I love to write, have been published many times but for the past two-three years I have involved myself in volunteering and life matters that continue to crowd out fruitful writing time. My dreams of completing a novel has been reached but the revisions have slipped to the back burner, and finding an agent or publisher has become second banana in my life's schedule.

Making fiction writing dreams come true in today's market is not impossible but it sure is difficult. The success rate for me finding an agent is nil to impossible mainly because agents more and more want a tried-and-proven author to represent. Two self-published books, two newsletter columns, inclusion in seven recent anthologies, and hundreds of articles, essays, short stories and poems in print does not constitute a "name" as far as an agent is concerned. And, it doesn't always depend on how well we write as many of us know by the books that do make it into a bookstore. But we have to keep trying to get there.

If we write good fiction, we briefly place ourselves and our readers in lives other than our own. We experience the pleasure of the romantic story without the ups and downs of such a relationship. Without the terror, running through dark streets and dodging bullets, we can thrill to a mystery. We can give our characters the traits, the good looks, the perfect dialogue that we don't, and probably will never, have. The world we set these characters in can be an imaginary one or can be the streets of San Francisco, Paris, or Tatum, Texas. Even by doing all of this well, we are continually met with challenges.

As a writers who yearn for our work to be read, we must keep our story plots in motion, allow our readers to hear and see the characters as if they were real people, and show them through open eyes, the sense of smell, and feel of texture what the scene/setting is really like.

We authors must fill in the missing pieces, fluff up the descriptions, give a voice to our story people and figure out what is going to happen (and make it seem you knew it all along). Because you are not bound by the truth, you can allow your imagination to fly.

You, as well as I, will face rejection. Many of them before we see our work in print. Rejections do not turn your dreams into nightmares unless we allow them to. We must be able to accept them and go on. Having our work rejected is not the end of our writing life. It is merely a delay in the dream of being a published writer.
++++
Write about a new character you would like to place into a unique setting; write the first scene you hope will hook your readers into the next 250 pages.

LOVE THOSE BOOK FAIRES

Do you go to book faires? I don't mean "go" to them, I mean "participate" in them. If you have written a book, published your own booklets, or have a comb-bound selection of poetry, you need to be at a book faire. Being a part of the authors group, meeting other authors, and facing an audience with a brief spiel on your creative offerings, is good practice and an excellent way to sell yourself as well as your writing.

Today I was one of a list of thirty-two authors who spoke about their books at a museum in Escondido, CA. It was an event I had attended in the past but had not been a part of. There is a wonderful difference in the two--I could sit at the table with an award-winning, many-times published romance writer and a firt-time author of a unique young adult book about a girl hired to be a Pony Express rider. I could speak with the men who wrote and spoke about their experiences in war, primarily the last war we actually won. I renewed acquaintances with poets who were once a part of a monthly "performing writers" group I was a mmeber of. And I sold books!

It may seem funny to show that as the last item in my list of good things about the day but I feel it was merely icing on the cake. The comradeship with other writers, the sharing of information about agents and publishers, the warm feeling of making new friends and the "feel" of being with (and one of them) true professionals was worth far more than the dollars I collected in sales.

Today was a day I would not have missed. It was enlightening, helpful, and interesting. If you have the chance, don't fail to sign up to be a part of a book faire. Forget the nerves--we all have had them. Forget the lack of confidence--we have all learned to overcome that and you can too, maybe by just being there and speaking about the love of your life--your writing. There is a place for you at a local book faire.

There are always people behind the scenes. Mary Quigley and her always exuberant husband, Patrick, and her extra pair of arms and legs as Mary describes Mona Jones-Owen, were the angels who set up everything. Thank you so much for a wonderful day! We all look forward to doing this again--for the Fourth Annual Book Faire of the North County Authors and Poets (NCAP). We authors are forever grateful to your efforts to give us a venue.
**************

Please attend events that support writers. If you aren't ready to showcase your own work, you can support writers by showing up, listening to their lectures, purchasing their books and/or telling an author you enjoyed meeting them.

GETTING READY TO DISCOVER

"The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes." - Marcel Proust

All writers (and individuals) should always be open to discovery--have a willingness to be open to new ideas, new adventures, even new avenues of creating. I hope I am such a person.

But I often find that I need to take care of today and not look for new things in the 'morrow. This week I completed a brochure or pamphlette to use as a selling tool for a collection of short stories I would really like to sell. It took an amazing amount of time for me to type this up, get my brain around working with a template, and then figure out how to print them off, fold, and staple. Luckily, I decided to proofread my little production one more time before I printed off a zillion copies.

Why is it that we can type and proof and never find those pesky typos, grammarical errors, weird phrases--everything that is wrong with our work? I was horrified with the boo-boos I found in that first run. I was so sure I had prooofed fairly well. This has certainly been a good lesson in realizing that all of us as writers should practice what we preach--print off our work, put it away for several days (or weeks or months!), then go back and look at it with a fresh eye. I have been told I have four eyes since I wear glasses but they sure as heck weren't seeing a heck of a lot when I proofed the first time.

My search for new adventures, the pursuit of my love for sharing my minute knowledge about writing with others, is consuming me recently. I have responsibilities, deadlines, book faires, family obligations--so I should not be out and about discovering much of anything right now. But I have a list of books I want to read, a few notes on new articles I'd like to pursue and tomorrow I will overhear a conversation or read a line that will tickle my interst so I will be chomping at the bit to learn more.

I will get beyond this crunch. I will meet the deadline with my proofed, corrected pamphlette. I will have lunch with relatives tomorrow, teach my memoirs class on Friday, spend seven hours at the Book Faire on Saturday, and possibly fall asleep in church on Sunday. Then, next Monday, I will begin again--seeking new discoveries with words that I have seen with my own eyes.
*****
Never let the opportunity to discover something new pass you by. Your old eyes will offer wisdom to see the new in each opportunity.