T-SHIRT

Good news today - my t-shirt arrived from Necrotic Tissue (they only accepted my story Monday of last week!).

The t-shirt is really cool, with "published" on the sleeves, and their name on the front and logo on the back.

I'd like to wear it but I don't want to wash it - would hate the text to fade!

Maybe I'll frame it, the first t-shirt of many!

DISAPPOINTING MONDAY

For the first Monday in - oh, weeks! - the DNs have received no exciting news (to the best of my knowledge, anyway).

Have to get back submitting again, slowing up here!

TO ALL THE DOGS...

The house was empty this weekend without you all.

I expected Rags to be gracefully curled up on the couch, Janna to whine excitedly when she saw me in the hopes of me taking her out to play, and Toffee to lick my face to pieces!

I also expected Woozer to drag herself up to greet me, and I still thought of our doggie friends who have moved on (Angel and Muffin) as well as Cino and Sheba.

It was nice to see Blueberry & Fudge still in residence!

INKPOT VS VALPOT

I know in our anxiety to get published, it may come across as a competition, but it's not. At least, not against each other - against the world maybe!

Recently I was musing on our success and drew a few similarities.

Both Inkpot and I had the same experience with our first acceptance - publication was a long way away but we would both be paid for our work afterwards (yet to happen for both of us).

Our second acceptance - for both of us - was for unpaid Micro Fiction.

We have also both sold Micro Fiction.

Necrotic Tissue has accepted both of us, and we will both be in the January 2009 edition!

So far this April, we have both had three acceptances (if I count Toffee's photo).

For both of us, the majority of our publications have been paid ones.

Now the differences. Inkpot has sold a short story (I've only sold micro-fiction).

Three of mine have already been published. Inkpot has to wait until May 20th for her first.

I've been paid twice, Inkpot once so far.

All Inkpot's acceptances are fiction. Almost half of mine aren't.

All these things are accurate (as far as I know!) as of this moment, but we both have a lot of other things out there, so who knows what will happen by the end of this month.

I know acceptances will come pouring in for Inkpot in the near future. I only hope I'll be able to keep up with her.

CRAZY APRIL

April has been such a busy month. Inspired by the success of Inkpot, I submitted 6 stories this month. As you know, dear reader, 1 microfiction has already been published, and another will be published next January.

As if that wasn't enough, I am trying to enter a competition with a closing date next Thursday, edit a novella for next Wednesday and get a lot of work done on my chapbook. Other competitions and deadlines are looming up in May so May will be busy too.

There is also the tiny matter of doing some MOS exams and getting a job to fund all this writing. The only problem with that is that a job will leave me with little time or energy to write (that was the case with my last job anyway, I know lots of people can do both.)

I hope I can keep up this productivity!

THANKS, TOFFEE

Got a cheque in the post today from My Weekly. I hadn't expected it because some of the letters had £25 on them, and others - including the Toffee pic - hadn't.

So thanks, Toffee!!

£25 plus a contributor copy for a readers letter and photo - not bad! Who needs to write fiction?? (Only joking)

First Fiction Sale

Those lovely - no, those WONDERFUL people in Necrotic Tissue have accepted my micro fiction tale 'Reflections' for their January 2009 issue.

This is my first PAID fiction publication. Better still, the stories of both Inkpot and I will appear in the same issue!

Yippee!

NEXT WEEK

I wonder what writing successes lie ahead next week for the Nodpots?

There's been so many in the last couple of weeks that I expect every week to bring at least one piece of good news!

CONGRATULATIONS TO INKPOT ONCE AGAIN

This is getting to be a regular post, which is great!

Inkpot has done it again - see her blog for details.

Her third acceptance within less than two weeks! And two of them are paying markets, which is really excellent.

CONGRATUALTIONS!

MANY THANKS TO INKPOT

Just wanted to thank Inkpot (Inkpoy to her friends) on all her help she's given me, especially regarding my recent submissions. I look forward to sharing the proceeds of their sales with her (some year!)

Thanks, Inkpot! I now have 5 pieces out there, waiting to be snapped up.

CHAP BOOK

Started my DN chapbook Wednesday evening.

As they are due for the anniversary on July 27th, I have perhaps two months to get it done.

I hope to be finished much sooner than that!

I am also tempted to keep a running total of all my submissions on the blog - I'm just so happy to have stuff to submit that I want to encourage myself to have something every week. For instance, last week (as I told you already) I submitted three micro-fiction (one already available on line) and a short story. This week I have so far submitted one micro-fiction, and have a short story just about ready to go.

I hope I can keep this up!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY POPE BENEDICT

Today is the Pope's birthday. He is 81, and celebrating it (well, I doubt if he is actually celebrating it) it in Washington.

Rumour has it that there is a party in his honour but he isn't attending, it's not his thing.

Happy birthday anyway!

Tiny pic of the party earlier today where 13000 people sang Happy Birthday.

Happy Tuesday

I had a good day yesterday.

I wanted to write a micro-fiction tale for a certain magazine (a paying market!!!). I thought of something in the morning, wrote it by lunchtime, got approval from my fellow nodpot in the afternoon and submitted it by evening.

It would be nice to finish by saying "Accepted by night" but no, not quite. At least it's not "rejected by night".

Still it's a good feeling to write and submit the same day!

DO DOGS GET HOUNDED BY PAPPARAZZI?

Watch out for Toffee in this week's (April 19th) My Weekly magazine.

Yes, the photogenic little cavalier has been snapped taking her first bath. Fortunately, she looks lovely even with her hair all wet!

Well done, Toffee!

(Okay, so I took the photo and sent in the letter. You'll find her in the Pets Corner, page 4).

YEAH! PUBLISHED AGAIN...

My micro-fiction tale The Diary can now be read on line at Microhorror.com

Yes, it's great to be accepted!

REVIEW OF WEEK

In writing terms the week was good.

The highlight was Inkpot selling her first short story - first PAID fiction sale! Yippee! Which was closely followed by her micro-fiction tale being accepted by another publication. TWO in one week - pretty good!


Although I did not have the same publishing success, I did at least submit three micro-fiction tales and one short story - hopefully they will find homes out there!

This was meant to be horror writing week, but I didn't get to it. Hopefully next week.

Otherwise, this was a bad week, with Wednesday's sad events casting a dark shadow over other achievements.

SAD NEWS

Yesterday Woozer - my sister's dog but also beloved family pet - died. She had recently celebrated her 15th birthday, and we hoped she would be with us for a bit longer. Despite her numerous health problems - including tumors and sores, bad hips from when she was knocked down as a pup, and many other things - her great and valiant spirit kept her going. Although she could only move slowly, she was always keen to go outside for a walk and her infirmities never prevented her from begging for food. She always got up to greet visitors and family when they entered the house, and was already to add her mite to any excitement or commotion among the other dogs.

She will be greatly missed.

Above is a photo taken last April when she attended Mungo's book launch of Mango, The Unlucky Monkey.

Below is a photo of Woozer as a pup, playing with one of her siblings.

AND THE NEXT!!

And CONGRATULATIONS once more to Inkpot, who has just got another story accepted for publication - see here for details.

I want to see an acceptance a day from you, Inkpot!! :)

CONGRATULATIONS

Congratulations to Inkpot who has just sold her first story!!!

A very well deserved sale, that's long overdue!!!

Yippee!! Looking forward to the next!!

CLARIFICATION

Just in case anyone thinks that in my previous post I meant that writing micro-fiction is easy, I don't.

It's difficult to think of an interesting scenario that can capture the imagination in so few words.

The good thing about micro-fiction, however, is that it is less time-consuming (ie easier to polish and perfect a couple of hundred words than several thousand) and that there seems to be a good number of markets for it.

If anyone finds a market that pays for micro-fiction, please let me know!

THE DAY AFTER...

Yes, I kept looking at Alienskin all day yesterday, checking to see if it really was my story, my name/pseudonym against it.

Well, I have to make the most of it - it will only be on-line for two months!

It still gives a buzz, so I really recommend all unpublished writers out there to have a go at micro-fiction!

For me, I hope it's the first of many.

PUBLICATION DAY

Thanks to time zone differences, today is really my publication day!

Here is the link for anyone who is interested.

http://www.alienskinmag.com/flashmic10.htm

It's a micro-fiction piece, published by the wonderful Alienskin e-zine. I admire Alienskin - they seem genuinely interested in writing and encouraging new writers, they are a paying market, and best of all, they give feedback with rejections. Naturally they have the highest of standards and recognise genius... :)

Micro-fiction, in Alienskin's case anyway, is a story of exactly 150 words, no more and no less (think of Shylock and the pound of flesh). Very difficult... well, I was lucky with this one (Thanks, Toffee!).

It's weird seeing my name on the site. Great but kind of strange.

TODAY IS THE BIG DAY

I will always remember the day after April Fools Day as the day my first fiction piece was published. Today is the big day when my humble 150 words will be revealed to the public all across the world! :)

Unfortunately, it won't be GMT, so I may not get to see it myself today, but by tomorrow at the latest, I will post the link for all my fan to read.


Other news today - okay, it's not writing news but our Taoiseach Bertie Ahern has finally promised to resign on May 6th.

I felt a bit sorry for him as I listened to his statement, and while I am glad to see him go , I can't but wonder what will replace him.

APRIL - GOOD NEWS!

Technically the good news I received in March but I have decided to attribute it to April.

As you may recall from my February post (it's only two posts below this one!), I submitted a micro-fiction tale. Well, last night I checked my mail - and it has been accepted!! My first accepted fiction piece!

It's a really weird feeling - shock and awe could possibly be applicable words. It will be available on-line from tomorrow and for the next two months - wow, it's really exciting. Okay, I wish it was The Lucky Diamond that had been accepted (co-incidentally, I got another rejection for it yesterday, which Toffee tried to eat before I could read it) but it's still a fantastic feeling. For those of you who have experienced it - isn't it amazing?? For those that haven't - keep going, persevere, it's worth it!!!

Of course, now I'm wondering why I haven't submitted loads of other stuff this year - all I have to show for the three months of 2008 is my (successful *sigh in happiness * ) micro-fiction and a short story that I actually wrote last year.

Still, it's really motivating getting accepted. I have to write lots more shorts and build up that writing CV!

PS This is NOT an April Fool Day's trick - I will post the link to my story either tomorrow evening or Thursday morning!