The Writer and The Literary Press: The FRCC Workshop

Objective: Provide a basic understanding of the writer's relationship to literary magazines with a focus on the online journal. Knowing many young writers want to published, this brief instructional will walk through the process.

Ice breaker: Q: Why write? (A: Short Stories were made of magazines.) Q: Why publish? (A: Meet other writers and editors, readership, CV building, money.)

Literary Magazines: online vs print. My thought: it's a fickle business. Online has unlimited circulation. Print? Issue oftentimes remain in boxes in the editor's basement. Magazines come and go.

The Nuts and Bolts:

1. Your manuscript. It had better be good. Very good.
   1. For Fiction: 12 pt. Times New Roman, double spaced with 1” margins and clean of headers and footers.(Clean, Not So Clean, Peacock)
   2. Poetry: keep it clean. Strange formatting (spaces, tabs, etc) doesn't translate.
2. Market research. Read magazines, many-many magazines. Read. Follow. Submit.
   1. submittable.com. A great service used by many magazines.
   2. newpages.com. Greatest source for magazine listings. Free.
   3. duotrope.com. Another great resource for writers, subscription based, about $5/mo
       
      Magazines I like because they offer cool features:
      www.everywritersresource.com/ Similar to New Pages but they offer articles
      https://www.redfez.net/ Everything here is cool
      http://www.theflashfictionpress.org/ “self-editing advice” “free ebooks”
      http://collateraljournal.com/ Vets in the room? I love the format and the audience
      
      
3. Unsolicited vs Solicited manuscripts
   1. Solicited. Not likely for you. Only editors you know are likely to ask.
      1. The query letter.
   2. Unsolicited Manuscripts are the norm.
      1. The market research
      2. Following guidelines (Siberian Tiger Handler's Wives)
      3. Your manuscript
      4. The cover letter (brief intro, brief synopsis with word count, etc.)
      5. Third person bio. (50 words or less)
4. Housekeeping
   1. Get organized (who/what/where)
   2. Schedules and timelines (how long/when)
   3. Stay motivated
5. The Response
   1. The rejection. What should you do? Plan on at least ten of these per publication.
   2. The Acceptance
      1. Be gracious and comply
      2. Tell everyone you know.
         1. Promote yourself
         2. The magazine that published you
         3. And all the other writers therein
      3. Connect with everyone: the editors, magazine, writers
         1. LinkedIn
         2. Facebook
         3. Websites
      4. Build your CV

Thank you. Connect with me: my email/LinkedIn/follow my blog