November 14, 2007

Letters To The Editor For November 14th

Patricia Fry's Article

Dear Angela,

Thanks for the great article on publishing success. I've sold well over 100 non fiction articles and even did a book for a non profit local organization.....but my own fictional children's books are going nowhere.

The statistics are astounding but at least now I know the mountain I still have to climb!

Pat

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Looking for our Archive of Paying Markets?

I'm looking for your archive of markets for writers.

KM

EDITOR'S NOTE:

Or, you can see them by date posted here:
http://www.writersweekly.com/markets_and_jobs/summary.html

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GATHER AROUND MY SOAPBOX

Dear Angela:

I hope you don't mind my soap box, but...

I can't believe the stupidity and deceitfulness of some editors. Guess what I've been hearing back on over the fact that some editors won't put whether they pay or not in their website guidelines. An excuse that goes like this:

"Well, our guidelines are at (another website), and they state that we don't pay yada yada yada."

or

"Well, if there's nothing about pay in the guidelines, the writer should ASSUME there's no pay."

What does that have to do with anything? If editors are going to put a guidelines link at their website, then why can't they state if they pay or not? And since when has the rule come out that writers have to go to some other website full of markets to get answers that should be at the publications' websites?

And some publications actually pay even though they don't state such, which I find out after asking.

Another thing that makes my skin crawl is that when a publication states they want First Rights to an accepted work, but then state no exclusivity period. I've been hearing this gem, too, when I ask some editors about exclusivity periods desired after publication:

"Well, with First Rights, writers SHOULD ASSUME that means we don't want them re-selling their work."

It's obvious many editors deliberately or ignorantly try to decieve writers about the issues over rights. First Rights alone means no exclusivity at all after publication unless an exclusivity period is stated in the contract or guidelines. I ask before submitting just to be on the safe side, and/or in case they have me sign a contract as well as to prevent misunderstandings if these issues aren't addressed in the guidelines.

It just goes to prove that many people have no business being editors. The non-paying editors often come up with far-flung excuses for not being open about their pay issues and often want more rights and exclusivity than paying markets.

This "writers should assume" garbage that many so-called editors espouse may cost writers money and the loss of the rights of the writers' works if they don't take the initiative and find out firsthand before sending their works off.

Writers have got to "submit defensively" in the same way that drivers are to drive defensively.

Sincerely,

Roy A. Barnes

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Bookocker.com Author Sends Warm Fuzzies

Dear Angela,

I want to thank you for doing a great job on my book: Waiting to See the Principal and Other Poems. The cover, text, and drawings turned out splendid. Thumbing through the book and seeing the delightful pages was a dream come true! Sometimes I stare at the cover and say to myself, "Ah, that book looks so kid-friendly!"

Thank you for working with my wife and I on a one-on-one basis to create this poetry book. Because we had some problems getting the book with many pictures through the system, you did some extra work to produce the bookóand you never charged me extra! I can't imagine another company responding in that manner.
You rushed me 25 copies of the book so that I could sell them at the Rochester Children's Book Festival. They came on time, and I sold 22 books to some very happy customers.

I could tell you several stories about how much this event meant to me, but I'll pick just my favorite. A ten-year-old girl and her mom were shopping at the festival. The girl had $20 to spend. She liked my book a lot. Mom told her, "Okay, let's look some more." They disappeared in the crowd featuring 46 other authors and illustrators at various tables. An hour or two later, they came back and she asked for the book. While signing it, I found out that she had $20 birthday money and she bought one book: mine. I took her photo to post it on my website next month.

I also put my hand over my heart and said to her, "YOU made my day today! Thank you very much for buying my book."

When kids make choices like that, you know you're a success.

Thank you, Angel and Richard, for making my dream come true.

Write on,
Joe Sottile

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You Never Know Where Exposure Might Come From!

I have written an article titled Is There Integrity in Gas Prices which is posted on http://www.americanchronicle.com and its' online family of newspapers. This one article has received almost 600 hits in 4 days. When I searched in Google for my name a different site came up that was previously not listed in the results. It appeared on page 4 of the search results and identified my article and the Trenton Gas Prices.com/forum. This site provides a portion of the beginning of my article with a link to the full article and has over 130 people that have made comments about the topic. This is something that I had never expected from a site of this type. It goes to show you that you never know where your exposure may come from. The link below is a direct link to the site.

http://www.trentongasprices.com/forum_msg.aspx?fav=&master=1&category=1357&topic=282750&page_no=1&msg_pg=1&FAV=

Dennis AuBuchon
Author: Integrity: Do You Have It? 2nd Edition
http://www.myqualitywriting.com