Woman's Weekly Workshop

Yesterday I went to London Bridge, to the Woman's Weekly Workshop on writing a short story. I've been to a couple of them before, but now I am v serious about writing for womags, I wanted to go again and listen properly. As I had been before, I didn't know if Gaynor Davies the Fiction Editor of WW would recognise me. She did and said hello to me. I was chuffed. She co-presented the workshop with Della Galton. We had a theme to go on for the writing exercises, which as Freedom. I remembered something a friend told me in December about being free at last so used that as the main point for a story. We wrote the beginning,  then had to read our first sentence out. We filled in Della's character development sheet, which gave me an idea about the main character and how to end the story. We also wrote the last sentence of the story, which we were all congratulated on, esp me personally by Gaynor when I said goodbye. Before that, we were given handouts about the common ways that stories are rejected eg predictability and solutions to them. We also got the guidelines.
I really enjoyed the day despite being tired and my head doing a spin during the day from thinking.
I shall write the whole story when I have completed the ghost story for a competition. I already have an idea how it will pan out, I jotted notes down during the day.

I can't wait to go to the next one in April which will be on serial writing.

New writing goals

I have recently decided to have two different writing goals for next year: 1.Write serials for either Woman's Weekly and/or The People's Friend. 2. Write pocket novels for My Weekly. Here is why I have now chosen these goals, esp the latter one when I know I previously said I didn't want to write pocket novels.

I have been working on a first instalment of a serial for The People's Friend serial writing competition, and I really like doing it. You have to write the outline first to work out where the story goes, which I did for the competition. I have lots of ideas jotted down for novels, so next year I might go through them to see which ones, if any, can be used as a serial instead. I have found I really like writing romantic mystery stories, which is what the story I'm working on is about.

I have also been working on a novel, which I originally wrote in 2010, that I want to be a My Weekly pocket novel. I have submitted this already for the RNA's New Writing Scheme. I have a couple of chapters left to read through and possibly work on, then I will let it rest until I get my critique from the RNA. I have a few mss up in my bedroom wardrobe that I had sent to the RNA over the years and not done anything with, and I now think could be worked as pocket novels. So, my plan next year is to work on one of those alternately with an Aspiekid book. There are two reasons I now want to write pocket novels. They are: 1. If you get a pocket novel published, you can then later on get it published with a mainstream hardback publisher who sends it to the libraries. If this happens, you can then apply for PLR. Another opportunity to get money for your writing. 2. If you get a pocket novel published by My Weekly, there is a chance that you can get short stories accepted by them, too. This is the only way I know how to write for My Weekly, as they don't take stories otherwise, only from their established writers.

Along with these two goals, I am going to continue writing and sending short stories to womags. I have yet to get an acceptance this year so far, so my goal for this year possibly won't come to anything. Roll on next year.

Have an alternative plan

For what, you may ask? For whatever you're writing. I have an alternative plan for what I want to do with the entry for the People's Friend serial writing competition, if it doesn't win (which is likely because I know of a few others who are entering it). I really like this story I am writing; it's a romantic mystery. I have a Plan B and a Plan C for it. If it doesn't win, then I am going to try it with Woman's Weekly as a serial. If that doesn't work, Plan C is to put it on hold and write it later on as an ebook, which I will publish myself.

You can have alternative plans for most things you write. If you write short stories for women's magazines, then have an idea which other magazine you could send it to if it's rejected. This is a v good idea as there aren't many womags out there now that take stories.

Also, you can have a Plan B for the novel you are writing. I know most authors want to have their books accepted and published by a publisher, but in this day and age it is so hard to get that. You have to have an exceptional story to be taken on. So, the alternative is to self-publish it, and these days that is easy to do. It is also more mainstream and viable. So many authors are successful with their ebooks. And it's far quicker to get out to the readers.

The People's Friend Serial Writing Competition

After much thought I have decided I will be entering the above. I saw the competition in one of their magazines the other week and thought, no, I haven't got an idea for that to enter it, so decided to stick with short stories. But then I read an article in the latest issue of Writer's Forum magazine all about writing serials for People's Friend, and the fiction editor, Shirley Blair, said that she doesn't  mind mysteries. Aha. A light bulb moment. I had an idea written down for a possible serial for Woman's Weekly but might be OK for PF now. So, I changed my mind. I have begun an outline for the serial and know what is going to happen in the whole serial as I've already had a few ideas which I've jotted down.

The winner gets publication, the illustrations that go with it, £400 and a free entry to one of their workshops. They want an outline of 1500 words. Basically a synopsis detailing the characters, their ups and down, what happens and the end. They also want the first instalment of 6K words. But you have to send in the coupon that was in either the 15 or 22 August copies of the magazine, both of which I have.

I can't wait to get started properly, which will be after I've sent a short story to my editor, hopefully later this week.

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