Why I Write Short

By: R. T. Lawton

Some novelists say they can’t write short stories because that format is too narrow for all of what they want to say. I, on the other hand, have what may be a short attention span, plus, I can see from here to there—picture me with hands held shoulder length apart—but a novel is from here to way over there—hands much, much further apart. 

For me to write a novel, it would have to come out as twenty or more short stories in the same storyline. The other reason I write short can be attributed to a desire for more instant gratification. You see, I can write and submit and get paid for more short stories in a year than most novelists can do the same for novels in that year. Yeah, I know an author with a novel at the top of the heap will make more money on that one book, but there’s not many authors who are up there, and that’s not my game.

Whether you write short or write long, the basic elements are still necessary. You’ve got to have an interesting storyline, strong characters (preferably a likable protagonist), a setting and background that appeals to the editor and readers and an ending that satisfies. Having your characters evoke emotion in your readers helps a bunch. I was lucky enough to make one editor cry over one of my stories. And, you still have to network with editors, other authors and anyone else involved with the publishing world in order to find out what publishing possibilities may be available and to get your name and face out there. 

You may have noticed by now that I haven’t said anything about agents. That’s because agents rarely handle short stories. Doesn’t hurt to know a few just in case you do decide to write a novel after using short stories as a stepping stone, but in the meantime, you can skip the services and fees of an agent.

Short stories tend to have less characters to create and keep track of, and in my experience, I find short stories lend themselves to easy series. I currently have five different series being published in Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine. To keep these going, and as an aid to avoid writer’s block, I usually have two to four story starts on the white computer screen at the same time. If I get tired of a particular character or hit a stumbling block in one story, then it’s no problem to switch to one of the other story starts and keep on writing. Sooner or later, one or more of those story starts will get finished and then submitted to the proper market because my brain will work on story speed bumps in my sleep and I’ll wake up with a solution to one of those speed bumps holding me back. If I were wrestling with a novel, my brain would probably be wasting time going around and around with the same speed bump every night, and thus little progress for me.

Most of my stories come in between 3,500 words and 6,200 words. At Alfred Hitchcock, that’s eight cents a word. Nice paycheck for time invested. Anthologies have varying rates, to include some that pay royalties or even advance and royalties, such as the Mystery Writers of America's annual anthologies. And then there’s Woman’s World magazine that pays $500 for a 700 word mini-mystery. That’s more than seventy cents a word, but you really have to write short for that market. I have ten mini-mysteries published with them. You don’t have much room for many adjectives or wasted words in one of these. I often find myself over-writing and then paring down to meet the word count.

Everyone writes different and has different interests. If you are dedicated to writing a novel, then I wish you well and I hope I get to read your book. Plus, that’s less competition for me. Although, you just might dip your hand into the short story market sooner or later, like some novelists do, in order to showcase your novel’s protagonist. You may see this as a form of advertising your book and getting paid for your effort. And, if you’re one of those writers who’s trying your hand at the short story markets as your main thing, come on in, the water’s fine. Diversify the various markets in your genre, learn what sells and why, and then keep on writing and submitting.

About the Author: R.T. Lawton is a retired federal law enforcement agent, a past member of the Mystery Writers of America board of directors and a two-time Derringer nominee with over 100 short stories in various publications, to include The Mystery Box ( 2013 MWA anthology), And All Our Yesterdays anthology, Who Died in Here? anthology, Deadwood Magazine, Easyriders, Outlaw Biker, Woman's World magazine, and 34 in Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine. He also has four e-books at Amazon.com and Smashwords for other e-readers.

Quote of the Week and the Week to Come

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Flesh and Spirit by Carol Berg

By: Kathie Scrimgeour

In May, Carol Berg’s novel, Flesh and Spirit (adult epic fantasy, -ISBN 978-0451461568, Penguin Random House/Roc Books, 512 pages, paperback, ebook, audio), was listed on BookRiot’s, 100 Must-read Fantasy Novels by Female Authors. Carol is keeping good company with, Marissa Meyer, Usula K LeGuin, Anne McCaffery, and Madeline L’Engle.

See the full list at: http://bookriot.com/2016/05/02/100-must-read-sci-fi-fantasy-novels-by-female-authors/


The rebellious son of a long line of magical cartographers and diviners, Valen has spent most of his life trying to escape what society—and his family—ordained for him.  He despairs when a companion abandons him in a rainy wilderness half dead, addicted to an enchantment that converts pain to pleasure, and possessing only a stolen book of maps.  But when the renegade is granted sanctuary in Gillarine Abbey, his book - rumored to lead men to the realm of angels - admits him to a world of secret societies, doomsayers, monks, and madmen, all seeking to unlock the mystery of a coming dark age.

Flesh and Spirit is available online and in brick-and-mortar stores everywhere.

Learn more about Carol and all her publications at: http://www.carolberg.com
Twitter #cbergwriter
Facebook: http://www/facebook.com/carolberg
You can email her at:carolberg@sff.net

Buzz Words & White Room Syndrome

Lots of phrases, buzzwords, slang, jargon, and perfectly cromulent words are thrown about critique groups on a regular basis. Newcomers to critique groups can mentally stumble when they hear something along the lines of, "The POV in your WIP head hops through white room syndrome, and all of the narrative is written in passive voice with lots of tense shifts."

POV? WIP? White rooms? Is there padding on the walls of these white rooms? I feel like I'm going insane! I know I'm tense, but how is that shifting around?

Well, have no fear. I'm here to help expand your vocabulary into the writerly world of the critique group.

This month, I'm going to cover white room syndrome.

Over the months I've been doing this series, you've seen me mention "white room syndrome" in the intro text. Enough people have asked me about what the heck that means, I've bumped it up to the top of my list for this month. This has nothing to do with straight jackets and padded rooms. It has nothing to do with the sterility of hospital rooms or the blank page staring back at you when you start writing a fresh story.

White room syndrome is, quite simply, a severe lack of description in all areas. This can be a major problem for the readers when they can't picture the setting or characters.

The Setting

Readers love to immerse themselves in the worlds we create. Even if the setting is Small Town, USA in modern times, they want to feel like they're there with the characters. If the area surrounding the characters lacks detail, the immersion (and suspension of disbelief) will fail miserably. You want to draw the readers in and make them feel like they are actually there with the characters. By leaving out sensory details of the setting, the readers are left with nothing more than a white room to picture.

When describing a room, restaurant, coffee house, mansion, playground, or some other setting, we tend always to start with the visuals. We are visually-driven creatures, so this only makes sense. However, by leaving out temperature, smells, textures, sounds, and tastes, the world will feel flat and two-dimensional. We don't want to leave our readers with the impression they are experiencing a grainy animation from the 1940s. We want them to experience the world we're creating. Give it all to them! In some cases, you want to start with a non-visual description.

As an example, when I came home one evening, my wife was already there and had started dinner. As soon as I opened the door, my first sensation was the smell of chicken from the soup she'd prepared. I didn't hear the jingle of my dog's collar first. I didn't see my son running my way. The sense of "welcome home" came in the form of a wonderful smell.

Set up your scenes with senses, and your readers will always come back for more.

The Characters

Characters can also suffer from being too blah or bland. Like your settings, they can feel two-dimensional if there isn't enough detail about them. I'm not just talking about physical descriptions. We need to know their desires, fears, goals, motivations, hatred, loves, quirks, habits (good and bad), and their general outlook on life. Getting your characters from being flat does take some effort (and pre-planning for some), but it'll pay off in the long run.

As another example, one of my critique partners accidentally edited out the opening description of a character. The only impression I had of this character were her perfectly manicured fingernails for most of the book. Then one nail got chipped during an adventure, and the character didn't seem to care because of the dire straights she was in. This told me volumes about how extremely overwhelmed the character was at that point in the book. Unfortunately, I had to give a comment along the lines of, "This character is nothing more than talking fingernails," because of the lack of physical description. Fortunately, this was a quick fix for the author to go back to older versions of the manuscript and snag the description that had accidentally been dropped.

If you've heard a phrase or word in a critique group and you think others should know about it (or you're not sure what to think of it), drop me a comment below, and I'll add it to my list of Buzz Words to talk about.

J.T. Evans writes fantasy novels. He also dabbles with science fiction and horror short stories. He is the president of Pikes Peak Writers. When not writing, he secures computers at the Day Job, homebrews great beers, spends time with his family, and plays way too many card/board/role-playing games.

June Letter from the Editor

Invariably when I have the chance to catch up with writer friends, the first question out of my mouth is, “Are you writing?” Sometimes I receive the gung-ho response of, “5,000 words a day.” Oftentimes their response is tepid. Or, as in last week, I received the worst response ever. “I have been, but the scene I wrote today was so bad, it was nothing but filler, so I deleted it.”

Allow me to pause while I bang my head on my desk.

When it comes to writing, I am not a fan of rules. In my subjective opinion, writers should learn the rules, consider the myriad opinions hoisted upon us, then decide when to break them. Rules should be looked at as tools.

However, if I was a literary god, the first thing I would do would be to supply writers with security blankets. Then I would issue this decree. Never, ever delete something because you think that it’s crap. 

I can write something in the evening, go to bed thinking it’s Pulitzer Prize-winning material, and the next morning question my sanity for believing it was worthwhile material. When it comes to my writing, I run hot, cold, hot, cold, (lukewarm doesn't exist for me.)

But the one thing I never do is delete anything. I keep a scrap file on every book I’m writing. Yes, the scrap file is equivalent to the size of War and Peace. Yes, I have gone back and used pages from my scrap file. I could do that, Ladies and Gentlemen, because I've learned it's not always trash. 

Writers are a lot of things, but a good judge of their own writing, is not one of them.

That’s why organizations like Pikes Peak Writers are invaluable. It’s June, folks, we’re six months into the year. We hope you're meeting your goals. If you haven’t had a chance to read Deb McLeod’s post, Know How You Tick as a Writer, check it out. This month J.T. Evans is back with Buzz Words. R.T. Lawton tells us why he prefers short stories over novels (hint: he's written a few). Karen Albright Lin explains High Concept. Jason P. Henry claims critique groups are like diamond miners. Finally, we have a new writing advice column called, Dear Annie. 

I’m not a literary god so I can't  order you to do anything. But I do urge you never to delete pages. Instead, talk to a trusted beta reader or a critique partner. Also, tune in often to Writing from the Peak. Who knows, the advice you receive here might be better than a security blanket. 

Have a fabulous June. 

About the author: Donnell Ann Bell is the managing editor for Writing from the Peak, the coordinator for the monthly Open Critique held on the first Wednesday of every month, and one of Pikes Peak Writer's board members at large. She is a best selling romantic suspense and mystery author. To learn more about her books, find her at www.donnellannbell.com

Quote of the Week and the Week to Come

"Happiness can exist only in acceptance." ~ George Orwell

Source Wikipedia and Photobucket.com

George Orwell, born as Eric Arthur Blair, (June 23, 1903-January 21, 1950), was an English novelist, essayist, journalist, and critic. Orwell is best known for his dystopian novel "1984," published in 1949 and the allegorical novella, Animal Farm in 1945.

This week on Writing from the Peak:


June 6       Letter from the Editor     Donnell Ann Bell


June 8       Buzz Words                    J. T. Evans


June 10     Sweet Success Celebrates Carol Berg

Pikes Peak Writers June Events

June Write Brain

What:  Copyright Basics For Authors
Who:  Robin D. Roberts
When: June 21, 6:30-8:30 pm
Where: Venue@21c (upper floor, to the right if coming in the upper entrance) of Library 21c, 1175 Chapel Hills Dr. Colorado Springs, CO 80920

More Information: Whether traditionally published or indie, authors are actually in the business of licensing copyright. It is important to understand how the law views the author’s rights in their work. Attorney Robin Roberts will discuss the basics of copyright law, copyright terms, the concept of works for hire, copyright assignments and licensing, and other copyright topics important to authors.

About the Presenter:  Robin D. Roberts is an attorney licensed in Colorado and practicing in Denver as the managing partner of Roberts & Roberts Law Firm llc.  A graduate of Loyola Law School of Los Angeles, and with nearly 20 years experience,  he practices in the area of intellectual property law, general business law and civil litigation.

June Writer’s Night

FREE Writer’s Night

Location: Kawa Coffee

Address: 2427 N Union Blvd, Colorado Springs, CO 80909

Fourth Monday of every month

6:30 – 8:30 p.m.

Join fellow writers for PPW Night on the fourth Monday of every month.

PPW Night is two full hours of discussion, laughter, and fun with other local members of Pikes Peak Writers.

The direction of the meeting is decided by the participants and can include discussions about query letters, obtaining and working with an agent, writing conferences, or other specific points of the craft.  If nothing else, we talk about books!

If you have any questions, or if there is a specific topic you’d like to get on the agenda, send an e-mail to the host, Deb Courtney, or call her on her cell phone at 719-337-9049.

Meetings are scheduled to start at 6:30 and run until about 8:30.  These are drop-in meetings, so feel free to attend all or just part of them.

See you soon!

Know How You Tick as a Writer

By: Deb McLeod

I had the opportunity to teach my 5-point Scene Structure class online to RWA’s Kiss of Death Chapter. A month-long delivery of the process of crafting scenes. It was a great experience. At the end of it, for those who opted into my mailing list, I sent out a brief survey. I always like to know who I’m addressing when I teach. It helps me know what to teach when I know what people want to learn. The subject is vast and I could write and talk about it forever – just ask my clients.

One survey question asked writers to tell me which of several areas they felt they still needed to master. Their responses showed me that most are still looking for a novel writing process. That didn’t surprise me, really, because mastering the writing process was the craft element I needed most myself.

I remember the early days when it was just baffling to me how novels were ever written. I didn’t really have any organizational method and certainly didn’t understand structure. I wrote when the muse struck or there was a deadline. While I learned a lot by studying writing books and getting my degrees in creative writing, I hadn’t yet discovered what worked for me or why that was important.

The novel writing process isn’t simply learning the steps of novel writing, it’s knowing how you work within those steps. Writing is process. Mastering process in writing, and in life, is, in my opinion, the invisible barrier between becoming the author you always knew you were going to be and writing for a very long time before you see any success.

Knowing how you tick as a writer is essential to becoming successful.

Because I didn’t realize I needed a process, and that’s what I needed to learn, I have devoted my teaching to studying the writing process and creating classes and coaching environments to fit.

I have had clients who came to me early, early in their writing careers with the notion that writers sit down and write a novel basically the way they see it on the published page. Learning that there are layers to the process is a bit sobering.

But writing a book horizontally can add years to your apprenticeship. I have done my fair share of mentoring academic students in writing labs. The trend these days is to write one perfect sentence after the next, thinking that it saves time if you don’t have to go back. But that thinking only ended them in the writing lab with me and a next morning deadline. There was no way I could have them write in the layers they needed to see what it was they wanted to say. It was frustrating for one and all.

I know from personal experience and studying my clients' work that writers in general and novel writers specifically save time by writing in layers in a combination of pantsing and plotting.

I teach and monitor process with my clients. And I continually work on my own to understand myself better as a writer.

Here is the framework of my general novel-writing process:

Idea

The first part of the process is key and seems to be best served by pantsing. Freewriting, clustering, mindmapping, all of these exploratory activities flesh out what your book is about. If you do it right, you’re accumulating scenes, exploring character and beginning to see the patterns of meaning while you’re uncovering themes. Basically you’re finding your voice within the story. 

Plot

Once there are enough scenes and explorations from the freewrites, in the next step you have see what you have and create a story. This is where your inner plotter must be honored - even if you’re a pantser. I can say that because I was a hard-core pantser. I had to train myself to first identify and then make friends with the plotter inside. And that has saved me time and headaches. I enjoy plotting now. 

There are all kinds of ways to structure plot – screenwriting structures, the journey model, 3 Acts, etc. Exploring these and finding out what works for you is essential. Creating a well-structured plot means you’re probably right on in your pacing, your story has an arc, and it’s balanced. There’s far less revision necessary when you use a structure. 

Write

I use my 5-point Scene Structure Method to structure and prep scenes before I write them. When I was a pantser I liked surprising myself and was convinced that if I preplanned that wouldn’t happen. But what I discovered instead was that I’m surprising myself when I’m preplanning and when I’m writing. When I’m preplanning I’m right in the scene and able to investigate while beginning to create some sort of order. Then when I write I use my five points to direct the movement of the scene. For some reason that takes some sort of pressure off to figure out the scene as I’m writing it. So I immerse myself into the scene more than I would. When that happens everything is more vivid.

Revise

Once I’ve written the first draft I begin the method of revision I came up with for myself and my clients. Here we discover what problems there are in the structure or the scenes themselves and more. Here you are your own teacher. The idea behind the revision step is to analyze your work as you might a book you’d like to write. To me this part is like taking a class. And I love taking classes and analyzing fiction.

Edit 

Here, it’s time for a professional. A copy editor and a proofreader. But make sure you pay attention to what they find. Make a cheat sheet for next time of the most typical editing mistakes you make, whether its grammar, continuity, dialogue tagging, or whatever. Many of my clients keep their cheat sheets by the computer.

Ongoing pieces to the process

Organization

I use Scrivener and can’t speak to anything else and probably wouldn’t change even if something else of worth is out there. But you need a system or way to organize all the vast material you accumulate when you’re writing a novel. I love my Scrivener and keep finding new ways to use it in my process. Here is where I will accumulate what freewrites make it into the novel and which are simply notes for the scene I want to tell. I come up with a to do list of scenes.

Discipline

While you’re working on steps 1 through 5, you also need to master writing discipline. I’ve only begun to explore the results of dedicated and consistent writing time. I just started tracking word counts and deepening my relationship with my internal editor. I'm pushing myself harder and seeing results. 

I knew habit was important, and I did have a habit, but it was easily pushed aside for the demands of life. I wasn’t consistent. It’s only now I realize how important it is to my writing, and my clients' writing. I am seeing how we’re changing the more we honor the discipline.

So if you haven't yet mastered your own process, find out what makes you tick as a writer. Certainly you can work with me and I'll teach you a process that works, but even if you don't there are ways you can own each step. 

Honoring the process you discover can cut the time you take to begin the author phase of your career.

By years.

About the Author: Deb McLeod, MFA, practices novel research immersion. For her novel, The Train to Pescara, Deb journeyed to Sardinia to study ancient goddess worship and spent time in the Abruzzi village her great-grandparents left in 1905. Her metaphysical knowledge for the Angel Thriller, The Julia Set, culminates from four years of studying and teaching meditation, clairvoyance and chakra healing. For over fifteen years, Deb McLeod has been a creative writing coach helping other writers to embrace their passion and get their words on the page. For more, see www.debmcleod.com.

Can Meditation Help My Writing?

Editor's Note: I often read self-help books. If it pertains to writing, and I get something out of it, I'll post a review.

By: Donnell Ann Bell 

Hello, my name is Donnell, and I’m an information junkie. Doesn’t matter, newspapers, televisions, Yahoo, Google, if a headline captures my attention, I read it.

Originally, I told myself that this was good for me, because as a writer I want to be well-informed.

But what happens when all this information overloads the senses and kidnaps your muse? That’s basically what has happened to me during this crazy political cycle and okay, long before. I told myself I could quit at any time. Didn’t happen.

I’ve always been a daydreamer, but recently I just stopped. Suddenly I realized that all I had was an abundance of chatter filling my head.

All I knew was that for a fiction writer chatter is the most useless, nay, dangerous thing ever, and I no longer wanted all this sometimes valid, oftentimes insipid information coming at me at the speed of sound. I wanted my muse back, and to get it, I was desperate enough to pay the ransom.

One evening while I was reading my Kindle, Amazon popped up with an ad. It was a headline (or title), and my ADHD-deficit addled brain latched onto it like a man-eating tree before I could save myself and step away. But this time… this time… before I filed it in the mindless chatter part of my brain, I was fully engaged. Want to know why?

How’s this for a title? 10% Happier How I tamed the Voice in My Head, Reduced Stress Without Losing My Edge and Found Self-Help That Actually Works. That was me to a tee and I had to know more. So I bit back and clicked on. And there was the bio of the author. Dan Harris of ABC News. I figured that if Harris, who by far had to surpass me as an information junkie in ways I could never comprehend, found a way to tame the voices, this was a book I should read.

I often wondered where he was going with this thoughts. In truth it reads like a memoir. But it’s a darned good memoir, and one of those books that keep you turning pages. (Also, I felt I had a good vocabulary. Harris has an amazing vocabulary — so if you read it for any other reason, read it for that.) But back to his book: Given that Harris is a public figure/celebrity, I learned fame can be an addiction in itself. Add drugs to it, can you imagine what a mess this guy was?

His journey of transformation is epic, and as a romantic suspense writer, I crave a happily ever after. The long title wasn’t the only thing that whetted my appetite. He talks about the value of meditation to silence not only the chatter, but the negative, often paranoid thinking, that enters our brains. And while I read this part skeptically, he seems to have succeeded.

Harris suggests that readers start meditating five minutes a day, and provides some interesting tools to do it. That’s why I’m going to give it a shot. But sorry Mr. Harris, while I’ve become a fan, I have to turn off the TV—that news junkie thing again.

Am I alone? In this day of 24/7 news and the barrage of social media popping up to swallow us whole, do you need to tame the voices in your head? I recommend this book as a tool if you do.

About the author: Donnell Ann Bell is the managing editor for Writing from the Peak, the coordinator for the monthly Open Critique held on the first Wednesday of every month, and one of Pikes Peak Writer's board members at large. She is a best selling romantic suspense and mystery author. To learn more about her books, find her at www.donnellannbell.com

Quote of the Week and the Week to Come

What about the hero of The House on the Strand? What did it mean when he dropped the telephone at the end of the book? “I don't really know, but I rather think he was going to be paralysed for life. Don't you?” ~  Daphne du Maurier

Source: Bing and Google 

Dame Daphne du Maurier, Lady Browning DBE (May 13, 1907-April19, 1989) was an English author and playwright. Her stories seldom feature a conventional happy ending, and have been described as ‘moody and resonant’ with overtones of the paranormal. An obituarist wrote: "Du Maurier was mistress of calculated irresolution. She did not want to put her readers' minds at rest. She wanted her riddles to persist. She wanted the novels to continue to haunt us beyond their endings." These bestselling works were not at first taken seriously by the critics, but have since earned an enduring reputation for storytelling craft. Many have been successfully adapted into films, including the novels Rebecca and Jamaica Inn, and the short stories The Birds and Don't Look Now.

This Week on Writing from the Peak:

May 30         Can Meditation Help My Writing    by Donnell Ann Bell

June 1          The Writing Coach, Deb McLeod

June 3          Pikes Peak Writers June Events

Sweet Success Celebrates Debut Author Aimie K. Runyan

By: Kathie Scrimgeour

In her illuminating debut novel, Promised to the Crown (ISBN 1496701127, trade paperback, 352 pages, young adults and up), Aimie K. Runyan masterfully blends fact and fiction to explore the founding of New France through the experiences of three young women who, in 1667, answer Louis XIV’s call and journey to the Canadian colony. This historical fiction was released April 6, 2016 by Kensington Publishing Corporation and is available on Amazon.com.

They are known as the filles du roi, or “King’s Daughters”—young women who leave prosperous France for an uncertain future across the Atlantic. Their duty is to marry and bring forth a new generation of loyal citizens. Despite their different backgrounds, Rose, Nicole, and Elisabeth all believe that marriage to a stranger is their best, perhaps only, chance of happiness.

No matter how carefully she chooses, each will be tested by hardship and heartbreaking loss—and sustained by the strength found in their uncommon friendship, and the precarious freedom offered by their new home.

Aimie K. Runyan, has been an avid student of French and Francophone Studies for more than fifteen years. While working on her Master's thesis on the brave women who helped found French Canada, she was fortunate enough to win a generous grant from the Quebec government to study onsite for three months which enabled the detailed research necessary for her work. Aimie lives in Colorado with her husband and two children.

E-mail author@aimiekrunyan.com

PPWC 2016 - Collecting Nos and Fighting Bitterness

By: Aaron Michael Ritchey

This year at the Pikes Peak Writers Conference I had a wonderful time. The keynotes were awesome, as always, and I became best friends with Rachel Caine and Jeff Lindsay. Both bought copies of my books, however, thanks to a few of my biggest advocates. I am very grateful for such advocates.

I also loved teaching classes and bonding with so many good, strong, courageous writers.

However, when it came to pitching agents and editors, I just wasn’t feeling it.

Normally, I’m a Go-For-The-No type of guy. Which means I collect nos. One isn’t good enough. I used to go to conferences, pitch one person, get a yes, and then walk away feeling victorious.

Then I read a book called Go for No by Richard Fenton and Andrea Waltz. Getting a yes is fine, but really, this game is about collecting nos. Kevin J. Anderson knows all about this. Remember, he won the award for most rejections.

I go to conferences not looking for yeses, but looking for nos. I would pitch every single agent and editor to collect the most nos. I’m also trying to do this when I submit short stories or when I query agents. I’m looking to collect nos.

So what happened this year?

I wasn’t feeling it. Partly, it’s because I have the six books of The Juniper Wars to write for WordFire Press. That’s a whole lotta fiction right there. Four of the six are written and are in various stages of edits, including finished (the first one, DANDELION IRON, is already out in the world and burning brightly).

I’m also working on a trilogy of romance novels with Andrea K. Stein which we are going to publishing independently. So I have eight books to write and polish. Dang, when you put it that way…just…dang.

I have a full plate, yet I do have some projects I want to shop since it takes traditional publishing YEARS to do anything. Once I complete The Juniper Wars and my romance trilogy, I’ll need the next thing. If I start now, in two to three years, I might have the next thing ready.

But I have to admit, all of that is true, but I’m also getting bitter. It's been ten years of querying and going agentless.

However, there’s another reason I was reticent to pitch. I’m questioning the role agents have in my career. The biggest thing an agent can do for me is to get me into the big traditional publishing game. Ideally, I’d sell a book and Scholastic would pick it up and put me in their catalog, which goes out to MILLIONS of readers. Dude, I’d pay an agent fifteen percent to get that kind of action. You betcha. Still, those are some long odds and so many things can go wrong. And I only want an agent that adores me. Finding one of those has been challenging. 

Hence the bitterness, which I will not embrace.

If all an agent will do for me is to sell my stuff to a small or medium-size press? No, thank you, I can do that myself. *Tips hat and walks away*

Pitching to editors can be iffy since they are so busy. They might love my idea, but then it gets buried under their stack and they forget about me.

In the end, I’m surrendering to the will of the universe. Remember, Rachel Caine showed up at a writers’ conference, talked to an editor, wasn’t very gung-ho about it all, and wound up with her first publishing contract. More and more, I’m seeing this whole publishing game as one that is going to happen to me if I keep writing and putting myself out there.

For example, at Pikes Peak this year, I kept bumping into this one agent. I did my homework, read about the agents who represent middle grade, and made a list. I met this person in an elevator, got ready to pitch, but then the irony of doing an elevator pitch in an elevator completely silenced me. This person hurried away. I kept seeing her/him, kept trying to pitch to her/him, but it wasn’t happening. I let go. I surrendered. Wasn’t meant to be.

Then the two people I really wanted to pitch were standing by the elevator again, and this time, I walked up and pitched them both – an agent and an editor.

They were both tired and they both looked upon me with a certain amount of amusement. Or scorn. I couldn’t tell. The agent was interested and I’ll send her/him pages. The editor wasn’t.

Then the agent said that the way the industry works is that writers send queries to agents who send them to editors.

You all would’ve been proud of me. I nodded politely. I didn’t say that if I could pitch the editor directly, the agent wouldn’t get his/her fifteen percent. I also answered politely that, no, this wasn’t my first novel. And, yes, I’ve seen some action, won some awards, and did the Amazon bestseller thing.

Am I getting jaded? Yeah, definitely.

I still believe in collecting nos, but more and more, I want my nos to come from readers themselves, not the publishing industry.

Funny thing about that…most readers say yes to me. Go figure. And those readers become my advocates.

And I love advocates. They help me sell books. Which brings us back to paragraph one.

Ahh, the circle of life.

Will I be at the Pikes Peak Writers Conference in 2017? You bet your butt I'll be there. To collect nos and to fight the bitterness.

About the Author:  Aaron Michael Ritchey is the author of four young adult novels and his short fiction has appeared in various anthologies and online magazines. He is also a dynamic speaker, having taught classes on all aspects of writing fiction around the country. In 2012, his first novel, The Never Prayer, was a finalist in the Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers Gold Conference. In 2015, his second novel, Long Live the Suicide King, won the Building the Dream award for best YA novel, and he spent the summer as the Artist in Residence at the Anythink Library. Dandelion Iron, the first book in his epic YA sci-fi western series, The Juniper Wars, is available through Kevin J. Anderson’s WordFire Press. Aaron lives in Colorado with his cactus flower of a wife and two stormy daughters.