The History and Future of my Short Story ...

This month I've been revising one of my short stories.

It was originally written as a 1,000 word story for a (new) annual competition at the writers' club back in late 2007. It didn't get anywhere, but I'd had to cut it to get it to the required length, and honestly it lost something.

So I decided to rewrite it and the total went up to about 1,500 words.

It got put aside and didn't reappear for a couple of years, until I decided to enter it in a sort of competition that Writers Forum was running with a few of the weekly women's magazines. I knew it wasn't good enough to be selected for publication- entry was free, but for a few pound you could get a critique from the judge.

The one page crit was really worthwhile and showed me how much I had right and what the niggles were- that I hadn't been able to pin down myself because I was too close to it, and inexperienced.

More time passed and after doing a workshop on short story writing for women's magazines, the tutor agreed to read and critique a story up to 2,000 words. She herself had sold lots of short stories to the women's magazine markets, and I'd read a couple of hers not long before the event and enjoyed them.

It was reassuring that the comments I received were more good news than bad. My story was almost up to a publishable standard, it just had a few minor areas that needed work.

In solving the first lot of weak points I'd created other small issues, but I was quite capable of solving them.

Since then it's gone through a couple of versions, but with time away from it and developing my writing and editing skills, I decided now was the time to make a final push at getting it finished and sent off, hopefully to be bought and published...

There were elements that I needed from three different versions of the story, so began the slow task of cutting and pasting the appropriate sections from each version. The plot was still the one I started with, but my characters had developed, and I'd discovered facts about them which I hadn't known all those years ago.

Yesterday (Wednesday) I finally completed the combining/rewriting as I went along stage. My story has now reached a length of 2, 040.

Now if I can just lose those forty words somehow, I'll be happy. So a final edit beckons.

The womag short story market has changed so much over the time I've been rewriting. The magazine it would have worked best for, no longer accepts submissions from new writers, and it's 50/50 for the second target market.

The other potential home may be the Alfie Dog Ltd short story download website. It's open for submissions and I know the editor won't accept substandard stories.

The writer earns money from their stories being purchased by readers- read the outline of how it works here, and royalty details here. The submission process is all online, so no postal costs are involved.

Whatever eventually happens to my short story, good news or bad, I'll let you know...

Happy Monday-World Book Night, Shakespeare and St. George...

Phew! Today really is busy...

Happy St. George's Day to all those living in England.

Happy Birthday to the greatest and best known playwright in the world, William Shakespeare, who grew up in Stratford-upon-Avon in Warwickshire.

I spent a lot of summer holiday's there in my early 20's, I would book theatre tickets for whichever productions were on at the RSC (Royal Shakespeare Company) during my chosen holiday week, find a nearby hotel or bed and breakfast and immerse myself in the town and Shakespeare's plays.

(It was quite normal to walk past well-known actors in the street, or to be standing in the same queue as them in a shop without anyone bothering them...)

When I wasn't at the theatre, I would stroll alongside the river, sit and read, or just enjoy the calmness away from the traffic and bustle. I even ventured onto the river in a small hired row boat- I did wonder if I would ever get back to land a few times, but I could certainly appreciate how tiring rowing a boat can be.

During the day I did the tourist trail- I've visited his birthplace a few times, and always found something new to learn. You can find out more here.

The other big event today is World Book Night.

You can get a brief overview of some of the events from this Bookseller.com article.

But if you think the hoo-ha is too much then here's a few other ways to celebrate the giving of books.

Nicola Morgan is doing her Complementary World Book Night again this year-after getting a lot of tv and press coverage for her views in 2011. She'll be going to the book shop and buying books to give.
This way the bookshop gets sales (high street bookshops need people to go in and buy books from them, to keep running), the writer of the book earns royalties, and the publisher gets money too.

And if you'd like to support independent authors then do visit Authors Electric who are celebrating WBN by offering a selection of their e-books for free on the 23rd/24th April. A great opportunity to try out some new authors.

Well I'm off to do some writing before chores take over.

Happy World Book Night/Happy St.George's Day. :-)