My writing year in focus

One problem with this: my year actually begins on 10 March 2007, when my old submissions database crashed beyond recall, so it’s not a full year – these figures are just all submissions since March, plus any that I’ve been able to remember as being out. NB – buy a hard drive in the sales if you’re reading this and you don’t have one – losing your data is a complete misery.

Otherwise, here’s how my year worked out for me, bearing in mind that it’s three months short, more or less:

• 81 submissions still out (the 'most senior' of which went out in 2005, and is still being peer-reviewed in a journal about working women!)
• 110 rejections
• 32 sales (which break down into 2 sales to non-paying markets – one because I love the concept (Liars League) and one because I love the stories they publish (East of the Web), 7 anthologies, one short story for podcast (The Late Late Show), one for national radio broadcast (Radio 4) and the remaining 21 to paying magazines and zines).

What does this mean? Well it’s an improvement on last year, which is what I’d hoped. The only downside for me is that I still haven’t found an agent yet, although the progress on that is at least steady. The next novel is around two months from being ready to send out, so if I have to retire the first one, I’ve got my follow up in hand. I’ve worked exactly three days as a non-writer this year, every other working day has been words, words, words, words. And it means I still love what I do enough to wake up grinning every working day and that I wander around at weekends feeling a bit lost if my family won’t let me write.

Anybody else care to share their stats?

A sustainable career in writing

I notice that JA Konrath has a New Year’s Resolution thread on his blog: A Newbie’s Guide to Publishing. It’s not often I disagree with JA, but I have something of a hatred of the ‘resolution’ process and its results.

The main reason for this is that I’ve been lucky (or unlucky) enough to have three careers, only the last of which is a sustainable one, and I wish more people could be brought to understand that one of the keys to working happiness is not achievement; not ‘success’ (whatever that may be); not income; not promotion – it’s sustainability.

1. My first career was as a model. It means you are aware, from day one, of your short shelf life. Many young women (and increasingly, young men) develop behaviours designed to try and extend that shelf life. Those behaviours almost never work, but they do wreck health, relationships and bank balances. From bulimia to botox, they are ways of denying the reality of your physical being and that means denying your own, absolute reality. It’s not surprising models are neurotic, it’s actually surprising more of them aren’t suicidal, given the way the industry works.

2. My second career (don’t ask how I got from 1. - 2. it’s too long and boring a story) was running international think tanks. Charity work seems to many like a great thing to do. It is. But at the top, it kills. It kills with stress, guilt, unlimited demands on your time and temper and intellect and the knowledge that no matter how much you do, you can never, ever do enough. A great charity CEO and thinker, Nicholas Hinton, died in his fifties of a heart attack while I was running my first charity – and I do believe that the incredible pressure of leading a world class charity contributed to his untimely and much lamented death. Those pressures are exacerbated if, like me, you have to travel the world for the job. I had: bleeding stomach ulcers, pneumonia, three kinds of tropical fever, septicaemia and finally some kind of ME, before I finally realised the job was going to kill me too.

3. Writing is my third career. On Friday I shall do my annual summing up and see how many stories I subbed this year, how many got published, how many got rejected etc – and it’s always a bit of a shock to me. But the goals I set are very simple and I always meet them. They are:

• To earn a living from writing fiction
• Never to ignore my instincts when assessing a proposal or project
• To enjoy what I do every day
• Not to worry about my reputation or progress

That’s it. Nothing more, but also, nothing less. No grandiose ideas about writing a bestseller or winning the Booker, but no self-defeating cudgels to beat myself with either, like writing every day or having seventeen submissions out at once. Of course, every one of these goals has sub-goals: to earn a living from fiction I do need to have a lot of submissions out there at once, but I haven’t got a predetermined number of them in my head – I just sit down every Friday lunchtime and if I haven’t sent out around five pieces, I scour the markets until I find five places to send stuff to. And that means having quite a few more than five pieces of work ready to go out at any given time … but I don’t say that I must complete thirteen, or thirty, or three hundred stories a year (I’ll tell you on Friday how many I did complete because I don’t know myself!).

The second and third goals help me to remember that I’m supposed to enjoy every day, not just the pay cheque, so if an editor gives me a bad vibe, or somebody wants me to write an article that I’m not happy with, or a review for a book I didn’t enjoy I just say no. Why suffer even for an hour if I can be happy? Most of those folk will be happy with some kind of counter proposal and that makes both of us happy …

And the point is …?

The point is, when setting goals, make them as much about what sustains you as what you want to achieve. That way you’ll always be working towards your own wellbeing, as well as your desired success.

PS - that's me with a man whose career was not sustainable; the wonderful but short-lived Phil Lynnot, who statue in Dublin is a reminder that sustainability really does matter, even for the most successful and wonderful people.

That word you keep using – I don’t think it means what you think it means …

Apologies to Princess Bride fans, but I couldn’t think of a better way to start this post!

This sign is displayed in a Costa Coffee toilet, and whatever they think it says, it actually states that the staff will (a) pull the cord and (b) enter the toilet. The implication is that, at any moment, a staff member lost for something to do will merrily yank the string and then surprise the customer by popping in and asking if they’d ‘like anything with that’ (apart from privacy, obviously).

It resonated with me because I’m in the middle of a nasty little battle with an American writer over the phrase ‘I could care less’. He insists on using it three times in a 3,500 word story. I am insisting it is changed to ‘I couldn’t care less’ or removed entirely. He says it’s acceptable street talk, I say that it may be, but acceptable street talk and the place I’m editing for have nothing in common. I will win, simply because our house style backs me up (language that is ambiguous or likely to confuse will be changed at the editors’ discretion) and because if I don’t edit his story, my co-editor will ask me why I’ve passed it over, and he’s even more of a stickler than I am!

The really annoying thing about this fight is that the writer just doesn’t understand that our publication isn’t a good fit for that kind of dialogue. There are plenty of places from McSweeney’s Internet Tendency down, where you could probably get such argot published without anybody demurring, but not with us. We do have an obligation to the writer: not to mangle or bowdlerise his story, but we also have an obligation to our readers: not to obfuscate language to the point that they have to stop and scratch their heads in dismay. Our readers expect a reasonably traditional style from this publication, and while the writer is entirely justified in putting up a case for his language use, anything that confuses the reader, inhibits the flow of the story, or damages the meaning of the piece is just wrong. I’ll win, but I hope he’ll come to see that I’m not ‘down’ on him, just down on sloppy writing.

And in other news, I have a short story live at East of the Web which is generating its own small controversy, it seems …

Business is Business ...

Or is it? Three recent experiences make me wonder.

The first: I had to hand back a piece of rush editing to a client. I thought, no, I was 95% certain, I could get the work done on time, but I was having pestiferous broadband problems and I wasn't utterly, utterly certain that I'd meet the deadline. So with great regret I contacted the commissioning editor and suggested they assign the work to another freelancer. As it turned out, I could just have sneaked the job in under the wire, but I've sat in too many meetings to take the risk. Meetings where somebody's name comes up as a potential hiree and somebody else says, 'Ah yes, but remember X once let us down'. The fact that X may have not let them down several hundred times doesn't matter - once is enough to get X's name taken off the list. If you're a professional, running a business, you can never afford to let a client down. And if you think you might, you have to tell them so, and let them take back the work. It's the only ethical way to proceed.

The second: one of my nicer clients emailed me earlier this month to say his bank account had been hacked and my payment would be late. It worried me, to be honest - like many another freelance writer, a margin is something I make notes in, not a comfortable financial cushion for situations like this. But I decided to pitch a series of articles to somebody else, just in case there was a more serious problem than he anticipated, and I adjusted my workload to take on a couple of other bits and bobs, to cover the money that wasn't going to turn up when I'd hoped. Now we're all back on course, and everybody is happy, and I have more confidence in that client as a result of his honesty.

The third: I had a piece of work published in a literary venue, with whom I signed a contract. I guaranteed several things: that it was previously unpublished etc, and they guaranteed to pay me thirty days after publication. Sixty days after publication I queried them and was told they didn't have all the financial information they needed to process the payment, so I sent it. Eighty days after publication I queried again to get an email saying 'one of our funders hasn't paid us yet, so we can't pay you until January. Now please leave us alone as we have enough to worry about'.

Excuse me?

I don't like being told not to contact people because their problems are more important than mine. I don't like the fact that they failed to communicate the problem to me, leaving me to contact them, and then snapped at me for asking, and I don't like the idea that I have to honour my part of a contract and they can blithely disregard their part. It's not just alarm bells ringing right now, there are sirens and klaxons and flashing lights going off in my head - because I can't help feeling that their earlier request for more financial information was just a stalling tactic to get me off their backs.

I hope their funder comes through. I hope I get my money. And I will never submit anything to them again.

A very sad day

Terry Pratchett has been diagnosed with a rare form of early onset Alzheimer's disease.

In a statement to his fans he said, "I would have liked to keep this one quiet for a little while, but because of upcoming conventions and of course the need to keep my publishers informed, it seems to me unfair to withhold the news."

Like many another fan, I'm gutted. Whatever you think of genre fiction (and actually, at this moment I don't care about your opinions very much) there's always room for a writer with as big a heart as Pratchett. My Christmas celebration, for many a year, has been taking the latest Terry Pratchett hardback and a bar of Toblerone to a quiet corner for half an hour of sheer bliss before rejoining the family and being sociable again. It's hard to accept that this may not be my Christmas happiness for many, many years to come.

Lots of people will be wanting to tell him how much they care. I once knew another famous person whose degenerative disease became semi-public knowledge. I can't pretend to know anything about how Terry Pratchett will cope, but the one thing that stuck in my mind, after the famous person died, was that person's partner telling me that 'the best letters started I don't want a reply ... because then we could relax and enjoy them, otherwise X felt it was necessary to at least sign a form letter to every correspondent. I was angry at the lost hours spent replying to those letters for a long time. It was as if X's fans stole the last few months that could have been spent away from the desk'.

So if you are going to write, and why not let the man know how much he means to you, think about starting your letter, I don't want a reply ... so that you can give Terry Pratchett the one thing he deserves - time to enjoy himself.

Short fiction reviewed

Today I’m talking to Tania Hershman, who has launched a new project which is very interesting to those who write short stories. Her background and the way she got to this point is fascinating too, and this is what she told me …

You used to be a journalist - how did you get into writing fiction?

I've written fiction since the age of six - beginning with a novel about triplets that fortunately never saw the light of day. I never ever dreamed I'd be able to be a "writer", so I went into journalism as a way to earn money from some kind of writing. It was a great job, but in the end it didn't satisfy the creative part of me.

What's the best thing about being a fiction writer?

Getting to know all the new characters that pop into my head.

And what's the worst thing?

Not being able to get a story down on paper the way it sounded in my head.

What made you decide to start The Short Review?

My short story collection is being published next June, and so I started looking around for places where it might get reviewed. What I saw was very disappointing, with novels getting many more column inches, and I realised that most people don't read short stories not because they're not being published but because they are not being reviewed. I wanted to do anything I could to redress the balance.

What are your aims for this new project?

The site is called "The Short Review - where short story collections step into the spotlight." That's all I am aiming for. I am not trying to sell books - all I want to do is help people find something good to read, and for that "something" to include short story collections and anthologies as well as novels. For readers to see that "short stories" means anything and everything from literary fiction to horror, thrillers, magical realism, comedy, chick lit, new voices and classics. There's something for everyone.

Who do you most admire as a writer, and why?

I have to cheat and name two: Lorrie Moore and Ali Smith. Their stories are a great inspiration to me - reading them showed me that short stories aren't "mini novels", they are an entirely different beast, where every word is vital. Their stories are perfect examples of how you can do so much in such a short space.

What advice would you give somebody who wants to be a reviewer for The Short Review?

Right now, all my reviewers are short story writers themselves, they have a love for the short story and a desire to see collections and anthologies reaching a wider audience. I may take on non-writers too, but passion for the short form is a prerequisite.

And what advice would you give writers hoping to get short stories published?

Having faced a great deal of negativity over the years from people who thought short stories were just practice for writing "the real thing", the novel, I would say, Don't let anyone put you off, and don't let anyone tell you what you should be writing. Don't worry about what the market wants or doesn't want, write what you love to read, what you feel compelled to write, and you will always find people who will share that love when you are ready to send your stories out. Don't be crushed by rejection - it's a necessary flipside to the elation of acceptance. Without one, the other wouldn't be half as sweet!

You have a collection of short fiction coming out soon – how has that influenced the way you look at anthologies and collections?

I am very very lucky to have found Salt Publishing, a small press with a great love for short stories. Contrary to what I was told on my MA in Creative Writing, Salt didn't need my stories to have a "theme" or be "linked" in order to be more commercial. They just liked them. That's the way it should be.

If you were abandoned on a desert island, with just one book for company,what would it be?

Oh god! Difficult one! An anthology with many different voices. Something like The Best American Short Stories of the Century. If there was a British equivalent - but there isn't, to the best of my knowledge - I'd take that!

And issue two The Short Review has just gone live!

Anyone for £5,000?

The only problem is, to get it you have to win The Willesden Herald International Short Story Prize 2008
Judged by Zadie Smith

Go on, you know you want to!

And here's all the gubbins you need to get your entry sorted out:

Closing date for receipt of entries: 21 December 2007.

The competition is open to all aged 18 or over, regardless of nationality or country of residence.

The prizes for 2008 are: 1st place £5000. For nine runners up, publication* of their short-listed stories in the anthology “New Short Stories 2” together with the winner. In addition, up to four commended entries may be announced, which will be eligible for inclusion* in the anthology.

Entry is free.

Entries must be in English, and accompanied by the official entry form.

There will be a prizegiving ceremony at The Space, London NW10 early in 2008.

There is no theme and no word limit other than the highly variable attention span of our short-listing team.

Full rules, entry form and address for entries:
http://www.newshortstories.homestead.com/submissions.html

* Update (29th of October): Inclusion in the anthology is optional for runners-up and commended. We understand that you may want to save your story's unpublished status. This is now the same as in previous years.

Paying It Forward

I'm indebted to the excellent Fiona Nevile-Bowles whose great blog is The Cottage Smallholder, for reminding me about Pay It Forward - which describes itself in a rather tatty-looking website here: Pay It Forward UK

Regardless of the quality of the website, the idea is pure diamond. I've often owed my happiness to the acts of actual or almost strangers and I'm about to name names:

1 - The staff of Epsom Cottage Hospital, who kept me and baby Kai in the maternity ward for six days after we were unexpectedly made homeless
2 - Malcolm Rutter, who heard about our predicament and offered us a home where we lived very happily for a year
3 - Susan Hoivik who heard about our problem too, and got me a job with one of the UK's finest charities, just on the strength of her good name and her friendship with the charity's CEO.

One can never repay such generosity. But one can try.

So this December I'm offering a literary Pay It Forward to my lovely readers, even the lurkers! As you know, I edit fiction as part of my living and teach a course called Writing Fiction to get Published, so I know a little about what makes a short story publishable and one of the services I offer my students is a full edit/critique/submission suggestion package.

This month, I'm giving free edits, critiques and market suggestions to the first three writers to contact me at (sorry, sold out!) if the email address isn't there when you read this, then three writers have already contacted me and arranged to send me their stories.

Caveats: the stories must be under 3,500 words (not because I'm lazy but because longer than that is really hard to get published in most places); I write and publish literary fiction, fantasy, science fiction, a bit of crime and a bit of historical fiction and lots of erotica under a variety of names - I'm willing to edit anything, but the market suggestions won't be as good if your work falls outside those genres because I won't have personal knowledge of the editors' preferences etc; the more you can tell me about your work, where you'd like to be published, what reaction the story has had from other etc, the more I can help you; don't worry if you've never been published, or if you think your story is a bit rough (or a lot rough), you're exactly the person I'd like to work with!

And finally, I'm going to ask the writers who contact me to think about what three acts of random kindness they could perform, so that they Pay It Forward too.