Writers, Help P&E

From the P&E Website:

Unfortunately, there are those who do not like P&E or its editor because we give out information that they would prefer remain hidden from writers. Usually, they slink away, but not this time. P&E is being sued and we are asking for donations to mount a legal defense in court. Please click on the link below and give if you can to help protect P&E so it can continue to defend writers as it has for the past eleven years.

Thank you.

Other sites are welcome to copy the code for our donation button and place it on their pages with an appeal on behalf of P&E.

From the AbsoluteWrite.com Watercooler:

“Okay, just to further clarify matters. P&E is being sued by Barbara Bauer and by Victor E. Cretella, III, Esq. in two separate courts.

Ms. Bauer is a literary agent who alleges I/P&E called her a scam and a scammer and is suing for libel.

Mr. Cretella is an attorney for PublishAmerica. He alleges I/P&E harmed his reputation by reporting him to the Maryland State Bar Association and his former employer for his actions against a member of Absolute Write and is suing for libel.

If anyone needs the code, you can email me and I’ll email back the code needed for pasting the button on your site.

In the meantime, the link for the page with the donation button is http://anotherealm.com/prededitors/penulist.htm. Our mirror site at http://www.invirtuo.cc/prededitors also has the button.” — Dave Kuzminski

Filed under: writing , Barbara Bauer, Dave Kuzminski, legal, legal defense, literary scams, P&E, Preditors & Editors, scammers, scams

Should Writers Be Grounded?

I have a friend who thinks we should be.  At least as far as submitting manuscripts and queries go.  She is a self-professed “dinosaur” and doesn’t quite trust the computer/Internet.

Her theory is no one should submit using e-mail.  If you have the choice between e-mail and the US mail, then you must use the US mail or it’s pretty much an automatic rejection.

I disagree.  In the times we live and write in, e-mail is pretty much a standard part of life.  It seems to me, if a publication or editor/agent did not want anything at all via e-mail, they would not list that as a possiblity in their guidelines.  I don’t think submitting via e-mail when they say it’s acceptable, as long as you follow their guidelines as with ground mail submissions, will make you any more or less likely to be accepted or rejected.

Don’t get me wrong.  I’m not saying this particular friend is completely wrong, just perhaps a bit outdated.

With the advances in and increasing availability of various e-readers (such as Amazon’s new Kindle), I think it won’t be long before e-queries and other e-submissions will become even more common and preferred.

I would be interested to hear what you all think.  Do you think we should stick with ground mail submissions?

Filed under: writing , Amazon, e-mail, e-readers, ground mail, Jen Nipps, jennipps, Kindle, letters, manuscripts, snail mail, submissions, US mail, write, writers

When Doubt Rises

Why is it that you can talk about a particular project and be confident about it, yet…when you actually work on the project, all the doubt and questions begin to show up.

Is it good enough?
Will anyone actually read it?
Will it ever get published?
Am I really qualified to write this?
I can’t do it.
I’m not good enough. (Not quite the same as is it good enough because I’m/you’re not questioning the material but myself/yourself in general.)

How do you get past the doubt and the questions?  How do you face the keyboard and monitor/pen and paper and work on it?

There’s only one way I’ve found to do that.

Do it anyway.

It doesn’t matter what questions or doubts you have.  You’re the one who thought of it.  You’re the one who gets to write it.  If you don’t, eventually, someone else will come up with a similar idea and your chance will be lost.

That’s the biggest motivator for me to keep going with this current project.  I get the questions and doubts with novels, too, but moreso with non-fiction projects.

If someone has a better way to get past the doubts and questions and face the keyboard, let me know.

Filed under: writing , doubts, fiction, Jen Nipps, jennipps, keyboard, manuscript, monitor, nonfiction, novel, paper, pen, project, questions, write, writer, writing

OWFI Website

The OWFI website is fixed.  It took a little bit, but they figured out the problem and fixed it.  Everything is back up and running like it should be now.

Filed under: writing

Did You See It?

This is a bit off-topic for what I usually put here, but bear with me.

Last night, on the news, they were saying that around 6:45, if you went outside and looked to the northeast, you should be able to see the space shuttle as it headed Florida-way to land. THEN they said if you kept watching, you’d be able to see the space station and the spy satellite the Navy’s going to shoot down in a few days.

Well…

6:45 came and went and we saw nothing. So I came back in the house to help my mom with supper. My dad stayed outside. At 7:00, he came running in and said he saw it. We all went back outside and into the backyard where we’d have the best view.

With my eyesight, I saw a spark of something, but that was about it. I wasn’t sure if I had seen it or a star. Dad got two pairs of binoculars out of his pickup. He used one and I got the other.

I did. I saw it.

If you were outside around that time and looked to the northeast, did you see a red-tinged blue-white light? It wasn’t a star.  (Admittedly, the northeasterly direction was probably for Oklahoma and other states in the general area.)

We didn’t stay outside long enough to see if we could see the space station or the satellite, though. Heck, I just wanted to see the space shuttle.

This morning, they showed it on the news touching down live in Florida.

I told a friend this morning I am such a nerd. She said, “No, just interested.”

OK. So I’m an interested nerd.

Filed under: not writing , Flordai, space shuttle

OWFI Website Information

If you’re someone I have referred to the Oklahoma Writers’ Federation, Inc., website, and you’ve experienced some problems with the site, you need to read this by OWFI President Amy Shojai.

In a nutshell, the website has been hijacked.  They’re working on getting it fixed.  Amy has posted some conference information at other sites, one of which is www.thrillerwriters.org.

Filed under: writing , Amy Shojai, hijacked, Oklahoma Writers' Federation, OWFI, website

A Line for New Line Cinema

PAY UP!

A couple days ago, on NPR, I heard a news article about how New Line Cinema, the company who produced the Lord of the Rings trilogy and is now at work filming The Hobbit, has yet to completely pay for the rights agreed upon with the estate of J.R.R. Tolkien.  After exhausting other avenues of getting the money, Tolkien’s estate has filed a lawsuit against New Line Cinema.

It doesn’t matter who you are or how big you (think you) are.  You can’t expect to use another writer’s work without paying for the right to do so.  Even if that writer is deceased.  But particularly so if there is a trust established that is run by the writer’s heirs

I hope the Tolkien estate wins.

As much as I enjoyed the LOTR series, it would not disappoint me one bit for New Line Cinema to lose the right to continue work on The Hobbit.  If they do, perhaps someone else who will pay the agreed fees and who respects the work of the original author will come along and pick it up sometime in the future.

Besides, with the proceeds from the LOTR series, it’s not like New Line can’t afford to pay for it.

Filed under: writing , J.R.R. Tolkien, Lord of the Rings, LOTR, LOTR trilogy, New Line Cinema, NPR, The Hobbit, Tolkien, write, writer, writing

Return of the Clue Stick

No, this time the clue stick isn’t about The Idea Pocket, which is coming along rather nicely.  (I have a presentation for it on Sunday at the local writers’ group.)

This time, the clue stick is for not having at least something to write with in my pocket.  True, a notepad won’t fit in my pocket — ok, so it will in the back pocket — but a pen will. 

My thought process went a bit like this:  Well, we’re just going down the street.  We won’t be gone long.  I don’t need any business cards or pen & paper or anything like that.

Now, much like a family reunion this past fall, I was wrong.  You’d think I would have learned my lesson the first time the clue stick hit me.  Actually, you know that’s not true since I had to be beaten with the whole clue tree over the Idea Pocket stuff.

But still, I like to think I’m at least half-way intelligent, so why does it take so often to learn to do something I know I should do anyway?

It is possible to network among family.  It’s also possible that even if it’s not networking per se, someone might want an e-mail address or blog URL.

Next time I’ll remember.  (I hope.)

Filed under: not writing , family, family reunion, Jen Nipps, jennipps, networking, pen and paper, thought process

Writers Helping Writers

Many people, non-writers for the most part, don’t realize how much of a community there can be around writing and writers.  We are in competition with each other, so why would we help each other?

For the most part, writers have been some of the most caring and generous people I know of.  As with everything, there are exceptions, but we’re not talking about that here today.

Yesterday morning, I saw an entry by P.N. Elrod on her LiveJournal blog about James Reasoner, a writer in Texas who lost everything because of wildfires.  I won’t go into detail here, since she did such a good job of it.  Instead, please follow the link.

I think I’m a little late with this one, but there’s a writer with cancer — Patry Francis.  SHe’s a debut author and because of her illness, she can’t do the promotions she’s supposed to do.  There’s an effort underway to help her as well.  Kristin Nelson has talked about it on PubRants, as well as numerous other bloggers, some of which she links to so you can get more information about it.

Those are the two big ones that I know of at the moment.  If I hear of something more, you’ll see it here.

Filed under: writing , cancer, community, James Reasoner, Jen Nipps, jennipps, Patry Francis, wildfires, writers, writing

Making Progress

Today is the postmark deadline for a contest I’m entering.  There are 33 categories.  I have 14 entries.  That’s pretty good.  It’s the most I’ve ever had.  I wonder if the increased numbers will help any.  It’s possible, but I’m not going to hold my breath on it.

 

In addition to the contest, I’ve also sent in my registration for the Oklahoma Writers’ Federation conference in May.  It’s not in as early as I had originally intended it, but it’s in today’s mail too. 

 

There’s something rather motivating about getting two big writing-related things checked off my to-do list.  (OK, 15 if you count each contest entry separately.  )  I would much rather spend the rest of the day writing instead of working on day-job stuff.  Unfortunately, I have to pay for new glasses somehow, so I’ll be plugging along and write this evening.

 

Oh.  And today’s Friday.  (How can I forget that?)  So I’ll have most of the weekend for writing, too.  How productive can I be before Monday?

 As a side note, I just got a rejection in my e-mail from The Writer for their “Off-the-Cuff” department.  Oh well.  Maybe next time.

Filed under: writing , contests, Jen Nipps, jennipps, Oklahoma Writers' Federation, OWFI, rejection, submissions, write, writing