Why I Write | Websites | Books on Writing | Queries
If writing is a journey through wide open spaces, then I know I will meet up with many travelers along the way -- other writers who are trying to understand who God is through words. Most of these sojourners are much further down the road than I; others are quickly catching up. But the journey is not a race. Those who get there first will be equally excited when the rest of us arrive. And those of us left striving together have a lot to offer each other. Here are a few things I've learned and a few people I've met along the way. I hope they help you as much as they've helped me.
www.llbarkat.com -- I met Laura Barkat at the Calvin Festival of Faith and Writing. She has a wonderful website with lots of great articles and links for writers. She is finishing her first book under contract with IVPress, and has used that and other writing experiences, along with a lot of advice and wisdom from many writers throughout the last few years, and writes about it all in an entertaining and helpful way. I have found a lot of great stuff at her website. Plus, the site itself is well-done -- a model for other writers preparing to develop their own site! Laura also has a couple of fantastic blogs which you can find at www.seedlingsinstone.blogspot.com and www.greeninventionscentral.blogspot.com.
www.mauricebroaddus.com -- Maurice has been a friend of mine for a long time and is making quite a name for himself as a horror writer/pop culture reviewer. As a Christian, he brings a unique perspective to both of these areas. He's also a very talented writer, and his website is awesome (a haunted house feel). Do check out his site, even if you're not into horror writing or pop culture. There's plenty to make the visit worthwhile.
www.goodwordediting.com -- This is the website/blog of editor/writer
Mark Goodyear. I "met" Mark through blogging and have appreciated his
humor and insight into the writing process, as well as life in general. He
is a professional editor for
The High Calling and
Faith in the Workplace and has a wonderful perspective on what
going to work every day means for our Christian faith. Good Word Editing
is a new space for him, and I've already appreciated his posts there. Also
find some earlier posts at his previous blog,
www.hillcountrywriter.blogspot.com.
www.dictionary.com -- No need to haul your lexicon around with you at all times. As long as your connected to the internet, you have a thorough and FREE dictionary at your fingertips that combines the online power of several resources in one. When I use my PC to write or edit, I always have this site up.
www.biblegateway.com -- If you have any reason at all to use your Bible while you're writing, then you'll also want to have this website up. Biblegateway.com, a GospelCom.Net service, gives you word, verse, and topic search access to 20 different English translations, plus translations in dozens of other languages. This site also has audio Bibles, eBibles for downloading onto your iPod, dictionaries and more. This is an AWESOME resource for students of the Bible as well as writers. Someday, I might actually be able to figure out how to enable you to use Biblegateway.com from my own website, but for now, you'll just have to follow the link.
www.faithstart.com -- A great website for writers interested in submitting to Christian periodicals. This list breaks down tons of magazine into manageable categories, with links to the magazines' sites. It's a really helpful tool.
www.4creatingawebsite.com -- This website is all about creating a website. I used this resource as a starting point for understanding the basic terms of web hosting, domains, web design, etc. I would add that I ended up choosing another host than the ones he suggests, and so far I have been VERY pleased. My host is called 1&1 Internet Inc.
Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life by Anne Lamott. This straight-forward book by Anne Lamott demystifies the writing life, while at the same time making a place for many kinds of writers at the table. Lamott is so brutally honest about both the interior and exterior struggles of being a serious writer that at times I wanted to put the book down . . . and stop writing. But by the end of the book, I realized that her point is to show would-be writers that if you really want to living the writing life, you have to keep going. No matter what. I wrote a graduate paper on this book, comparing its approach to teaching about writing with Stephen King's On Writing. Though both books claim to be inspirational manuals for writers, the differences are stark. You can read the essay here (I'm warning you; it's kind of long).
Write the Perfect Book Proposal: 10 That Sold and Why by Jeff Herman and Deborah Levine Herman. I'm not sure if the recent book proposal I wrote is perfect, but it is finished. And for me, that's a big accomplishment. When I finished my first book manuscript, I knew that I wanted to try to submit it to publishers, but I had no idea how. The only thing I knew was that I needed a proposal. I found this book by following all kinds of links on various writers websites. Now, with one proposal written and ready to submit, I feel like the book was invaluable. This book is really only helpful for non-fiction, however. They have several complete samples of non-fiction proposals, and nearly all the "how-to" information is on non-fiction. When (if) I'm ever in a position to propose a work of fiction, I'll be looking for a different resource.
(NOTE: At a writer's conference I recently attended, books like this one were discouraged because they can make book proposals look like they were produced with a cookie cutter. I would avoid following any "template" too closely. However, this book was instructive in defining the pieces of a good proposal and offering successful samples rather than fill-in the blank forms.)
Whenever I tell someone that I'm a writer, the first question they always ask is, "What do you write?" When I tell them that most of my published pieces have been for a Christian magazine, they always ask another question. "Do you just send them your article?" Well, no. First, I pitch the idea in a query letter.
Queries can vary according to publisher specifications, usually called "Writers' Guidelines." You can find writers' guidelines for most markets on line these days. (I've listed a few of the ones I'm most interested in below.) But there are a few things most good queries have in common.
First, a snazzy pitch. Do your best writing in a query, and make the editor want to read more. I often start out my query with the same hook that eventually becomes my introduction.
Also, the editor will want to know a "working" title. I think this helps them understand your direction a little more clearly.
Good queries usually have some type of outline as well. This shows the editor that your not all bells and whistles but that you actually have done some thinking and planning about your subject. I usually don't provide a formal outline with Roman numerals. Instead, I just break down the sections of the article and highlight the key points.
You'll also want to include a little about yourself. If you're working with a new editor who doesn't know you, you'll want to include some biographical information and maybe even some writing samples (preferably clips of published pieces). But once you have a relationship with the editor, you might just want to include why you, of all people, have anything to say about the topic (your experience, who you know, etc.).
Then, when you get toward the end, make sure you include contact information and a note about how long you're expecting to wait--this is typically what they have published in the writer's guidelines. (I do this so that if I don't hear back from them, I can follow up without feeling like a pest. Also, I can feel free to submit the same idea to another editor if the follow-up is unsuccessful.)
Mostly, writing queries is like all writing -- more art, less science. Rather than provide a lot more "instruction" on the process, here are links to a few queries I've written, along with the article that resulted. Please let me know if you have any questions or need clarification. Happy writing!
"It Takes (More Than) Two" (The article turned out MUCH different than the query suggested -- especially after the editor requested major changes following the first draft.)
1. Query
2. Article
"Discipling from the Depths" (The query was pretty much right on target with how the article turned out. No rewrite requested!)
1. Query
2. Article
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