Learn Writing with Uncle Jim, Volume 1

Status
Not open for further replies.

Ken Schneider

Absolute sagebrush
Kind Benefactor
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Mar 27, 2005
Messages
1,977
Reaction score
414
Location
location,location.
Jim, Could you list certain points that need/should be covered in a query letter, and those points one should stay away from?
 

Grey Malkin

Moody Member
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Oct 11, 2005
Messages
155
Reaction score
30
James D. Macdonald said:
Titles can't be copyrighted, but songs may be special cases if, for example, the title is also one of the lines.

Just wanding about, and noticed this. In the UK charts, back in the eighties there was a time when there were three different versions of "The Power of Love", in the top 20 at the same time. They weren't cover versions, either, each one was different to the other. The artists were, Jennifer Rush, Huey Lewis and the News, and Frankie Goes to Hollywood.

I wonder who held the rights to the title, and if they had any claim to profits of the others.
 

James D. Macdonald

Your Genial Uncle
Absolute Sage
VPX
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Feb 11, 2005
Messages
25,582
Reaction score
3,785
Location
New Hampshire
Website
madhousemanor.wordpress.com
Ken Schneider said:
Jim, Could you list certain points that need/should be covered in a query letter, and those points one should stay away from?

What should be covered?

Genre and length.

What one should stay away from?

How much you need the money, and how certain you are that this book will be a best-seller.
 

Ken Schneider

Absolute sagebrush
Kind Benefactor
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Mar 27, 2005
Messages
1,977
Reaction score
414
Location
location,location.
James D. Macdonald: Happy Twelfth Night!

Those of you who are playing along at home now have a manuscript for a Frankenstein Mystery Short Story, one that doesn't contain any trademarked/copyrighted characters.

Your next assignment is to get your usual group of beta readers and have them read and comment on your story. Don't tell them anything about this story other than "Here, please scribble all over this" or words to that effect. No mention of the background of the story, why you're writing it, or what you expect from it. If you don't have a usual group of beta readers, get some.

Between now and 05FEB06, you are required to find the addresses of five paying markets that might possibly publish the story you've written. Print publications are definitely preferred.

The next part of the assignment comes on 05FEB06.


Only a few more day to polish the story, folks.
 

Ken Schneider

Absolute sagebrush
Kind Benefactor
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Mar 27, 2005
Messages
1,977
Reaction score
414
Location
location,location.
When a publisher says no simulations submissions,

Do they mean the same ms/ short story sent to different publishers?

Or, does that mean you can only send that publisher one ms or story at a time?

If your first story is in the pile, and you wait a week to send the second story, wouldn’t that be like just waiting in the Que?
 
Last edited:

jules

Bored fanatic
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Feb 16, 2005
Messages
311
Reaction score
17
Location
Coventry, UK
"Back it up in a way that if your office goes up in flames you still have your work somewhere. N.b.: it is that last step I still haven't accomplished to my satisfaction, but I am thinking hard about off-site backup (in addition to local backup and local hard copies)."

I encrypt a disk of my work, and keep it in the greenhouse in my back garden. If somebody steels it, they get a useless DVD-R. If the house burns down, hopefully it will be safe. It's only if both happen within a week or so of each other that I have a problem.

If you don't have a garden you can keep stuff in, you could e-mail it to a webmail account. I wouldn't describe it as being as safe, but it works.
 

Lady of Prose

Member - the "Sting Gang."
Kind Benefactor
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Jul 26, 2005
Messages
512
Reaction score
101
James D. Macdonald said:
Offsite backup is a good thing. But you really don't need to worry about people stealing your manuscript.

I have 3 offsite backups and a CDR in my disk file. My big thing was remembering to back up every few minutes while writing. I've lost some good work that I never could duplicate exactly, because I hit the wrong key. Very frustrating.
 

(grasshopper)

Super Member
Registered
Joined
Jan 22, 2006
Messages
166
Reaction score
16
Location
Los Angeles
James D. Macdonald said:
Offsite backup is a good thing. But you really don't need to worry about people stealing your manuscript.

I've heard this said before, but I'm not sure of the reasoning. Could you expand on that?
 

James D. Macdonald

Your Genial Uncle
Absolute Sage
VPX
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Feb 11, 2005
Messages
25,582
Reaction score
3,785
Location
New Hampshire
Website
madhousemanor.wordpress.com
(grasshopper) said:
I've heard this said before, but I'm not sure of the reasoning. Could you expand on that?

An unpublished manuscript is, essentially, worthless. The only things that get plagiarized are published works. I can think of only one case where an unpublished work was stolen and published ... and in that case the two authors were partners who were working together, but only one of them put his name on the manuscript when submitting it.

Suppose someone did steal your manuscript. What would they do with it? It would take them just as much trouble to sell as it would take you, then they wouldn't be able to revise it when the time came.
 

Berry

Super Member
Registered
Joined
Oct 3, 2005
Messages
187
Reaction score
30
Location
The Heart of the Groove
(grasshopper) said:
I've heard this said before, but I'm not sure of the reasoning. Could you expand on that?

Why woulkd anyone want to steal it? Would YOU go out and steal random novel manuscripts from wannabe writers? Well, no, you or I wouldn't, but consider this:

Evil person steals random wannabes bottom-of-the-slushpile MS, has worthless pile of crap he can't do anything with. Who cares?

Evil person steals berry's or grasshopper's brilliant debut novel MS, tries to sell it, finds out agent has already seen our submissions, retires in confusion.

Evil person steals well known author's MS, submits it, agent says "Foo! You are not Steven King! Away wi' ye!"

Evil person steals MS, puts it on website, author finds it with Google, has Evil Person arrested.

So, there's really no profitable reason to steal a MS.
 

James D. Macdonald

Your Genial Uncle
Absolute Sage
VPX
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Feb 11, 2005
Messages
25,582
Reaction score
3,785
Location
New Hampshire
Website
madhousemanor.wordpress.com
James D. Macdonald said:
The workshop organizers usually send the first batch of submissions to the instructors in mid-March, then every month thereafter until we've filled the class.

Things are moving quicker than expected. Here it is first week of February and we've already had two batches sent to us.
 

Ken Schneider

Absolute sagebrush
Kind Benefactor
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Mar 27, 2005
Messages
1,977
Reaction score
414
Location
location,location.
I know I'm a pest. I can feel it in the written word, and replies. Don't ask me how I can feel it, I just can.

U.J. has a lot of things going at one time, I don't.

At the risk of facing his rath, which he hasn't displayed to me as yet, It's Feb 05- 06, Jim, and the next step in the Frankenstein excercise is due.

I'm just excited. If it is delayed a few days for some reason, so be it. I'm working on my WIP so I do have something to do.

Excuse my enthusiasm.

Ken.
 

SeanDSchaffer

I wouldn't be too worried about it, Ken. I think Uncle Jim's a pretty patient guy. In the year or so that I've been a member here I remember him getting openly angry on the forums once.
 

James D. Macdonald

Your Genial Uncle
Absolute Sage
VPX
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Feb 11, 2005
Messages
25,582
Reaction score
3,785
Location
New Hampshire
Website
madhousemanor.wordpress.com
For those who came in late:

http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/showpost.php?p=415062&postcount=4768
http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/showpost.php?p=431719&postcount=4855
http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/showpost.php?p=436157&postcount=4859
http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/showpost.php?p=443407&postcount=4880


Well, folks, here it is the 5th of February. You have a story with a beginning, a middle, and an end.

You have your beta readers comments, you have your list of five paying markets.

The deadline is close of business tomorrow!

Take the beta readers' comments, and re-write your story to the best of your ability, making use of those comments. Then print it out in proper manuscript format, put on a cover letter, add an SASE (self-addressed stamped envelope), and PUT IT IN THE MAIL.

By five p.m. tomorrow, Monday the 6th of February, you'll have a story out there.

When it comes back (and it will), THAT SAME DAY put it in an envelope and send it to the next place on your list. Do not let a manuscript sleep over.

YOU MUST DO THIS FOR ALL FIVE ADDRESSES YOU'VE FOUND (unless it sells first).

When it's come back from those five, put it in a file folder, with a disk copy, plus the sheet with the five addresses. Put that day's date on it, and put it in your file cabinet.

One year from that day, take the story out and re-read it. Then, and only then, can you make any changes from what you have written and revised by tomorrow's deadline. (Exception: If the story sells, and the editor requests changes, I leave it to your conscience whether to make those changes.)

SO:

Tomorrow at five p.m. send it out. Tomorrow at six p.m. start your next story. Your quota is 250 words. They don't have to be good words; all they have to do is exist.
 

blacbird

Super Member
Registered
Joined
Mar 21, 2005
Messages
36,987
Reaction score
6,158
Location
The right earlobe of North America
James D. Macdonald said:
When it comes back (and it will), THAT SAME DAY put it in an envelope and send it to the next place on your list.

Okay. I've made a vow to myself to be less negative, so this is not intended to be so. But I have to question the "and it will" here. My return rate, of any sort, on short fiction submissions is only about 50%. I've had many many many submissions simply disappear into the ozone, even with follow-up letters after several months. And, before anybody asks, yes, I ALWAYS send a proper SASE.

Which again brings up the question of simultaneous submission vs. sequential submission. Comments?

caw.
 

scribbler1382

Write For You, Edit For The Reader
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Mar 10, 2005
Messages
1,429
Reaction score
161
Location
Toronto
Website
www.soderstrom.ca
Have you tried SASP (Self Addressed Stamped Postcards) so you can be notified when your manuscript arrives? Granted, sometimes the envelopes don't get opened until they're reading the manuscripts, but you could at least improve your information, if not perfect it.

50%? Unless you're not sending out that many, there's definitely something wrong there. I've had manuscripts go missing over the years, but it's more like 5%. And most of mine are usually mailed to a foreign country.
 

James D. Macdonald

Your Genial Uncle
Absolute Sage
VPX
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Feb 11, 2005
Messages
25,582
Reaction score
3,785
Location
New Hampshire
Website
madhousemanor.wordpress.com
blacbird said:
Okay. I've made a vow to myself to be less negative, so this is not intended to be so. But I have to question the "and it will" here. My return rate, of any sort, on short fiction submissions is only about 50%. I've had many many many submissions simply disappear into the ozone, even with follow-up letters after several months. And, before anybody asks, yes, I ALWAYS send a proper SASE.

Which again brings up the question of simultaneous submission vs. sequential submission. Comments?

caw.


First, limit yourself to top-tier markets. Less likely things will get lost that way. Second, the postcards: Why do you care when the thing was opened? What will you do differently on the day you get the postcard back, if you included one? Either they offer to buy the story or they don't. Anything else is a waste of your time and theirs. Third, simultaneous submissions. Only do this if the market clearly states that they accept simsubs, and clearly mark that this is a simultaneous submission in the cover letter.
 

Jeneral

Cat wrangler
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Jan 11, 2006
Messages
1,512
Reaction score
274
Location
Florida
I came in too late for the story exercise, so this is a more general question.

Only do this if the market clearly states that they accept simsubs, and clearly mark that this is a simultaneous submission in the cover letter.

How would you word this? In the submission guidelines for a few agents, I've seen things like "let us know whether you have submitted this project to the entire publishing community already," or "simultaneous submission is okay, just let us know." Do they really want to know "you're the fifth agent I've sent this to" ?
 

James D. Macdonald

Your Genial Uncle
Absolute Sage
VPX
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Feb 11, 2005
Messages
25,582
Reaction score
3,785
Location
New Hampshire
Website
madhousemanor.wordpress.com
In the last paragraph of the cover letter, where you might put "this is a disposable manuscript," you put "this is a simultaneous submission." That's it.

For some reason that I've never figured out, some writers include copies of their prior rejection slips with their submissions.

Please don't do that.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.