Errin Stevens's Blog, page 59

Be a sister.

Every year, a student from my alma mater calls our house, I suspect as a requirement for her work-study aid package, to ask for a donation during the school’s annual fund drive. I’m a Katie, which means I graduated from what was the College of St. Catherine (now St. Catherine University), an all-women’s college established by the Sisters of St. Joseph in St. Paul, Minnesota, in 1905.

I love St. Kate’s. I love the old-world character of the place, from the haunting and austere chapel that feels so weighted with humanity, you’d think Christ himself prayed there; to the modern student union and performing arts center, which, despite their fresher architecture, somehow stream 13th century European light through the windows. I love that one of the college’s first presidents, Sister Antonia McHugh, foiled St. Paul’s plans to run a road through campus by ramrodding the construction of a massive building at the precise juncture the city wanted better traffic flow. I love how all the nun presidents, including the one in office now, Sister Andrea Lee, accept no salary, that the money they would be paid cycles back into scholarships and upgrades to the campus. I love the intellectual curiosity the school fosters, and I love how it births, year after year, an ecumenical and activist student body that seems, at first glance, oppositional to its traditional Catholic roots.

Less than half of the undergrad population at St. Kate’s was and is Catholic (as in Roman), but by the time everyone leaves, I like to think they/we all end up catholic (as in universal). I have vivid memories of a sheik’s daughter being dropped off each day via limo, space being made in a common area for a Buddhist shrine, and the regular appearance of sari-clad students, whose brilliant silks were an ocular shock next to us soberly dressed American girls. It was heady stuff for a bunch of nervous, semi-adults embarking on a journey to separate their understanding of “self” from home and hearth. Any prejudices we had were quickly challenged by the need to study together, or share meals or laundry soap, or to lend out supplies when a pencil broke or book got left behind.

Few of the faculty are nuns any longer – I was taught by only five when I was there – but the nuns deserve 100 percent of the credit for continuing to enlarge the world both on and off St. Kate’s campus. They educated themselves to the limits of their own abilities in order to teach, and they taught everyone. Their goal was not to evangelize or convert. It was the St. Joe Sisters who loved what educated women could and would do, who manifested moral and educational values so appealing, girls from all over the Midwest – not to mention France and India and England and Brazil – flocked to learn from them. It was their high hopes for all of society that drove and still drives a thoughtful liberal arts curriculum, one that has turned out thousands upon thousands of smart, engaged women who went on to become doctors, lawyers, teachers, nurses, and social workers – they even produce, I’m told, the occasional paranormal romance novelist…

That aside, show me a Katie, and I’ll show you someone interested and interesting, someone with a refined understanding of who she is and what she needs to do, and who has the discipline to act on that understanding.

A different student calls me each year, but she always asks the question, “Do you have any advice for me as a freshman starting out here?” The marketer in me knows this is meant to play on my loyalty so that, hopefully, I’ll contribute, but I still bite. Katie alumnae do care about St. Kate’s, and the school is smart to have us start a conversation with future alums.

I used to try to give them a “big” answer, something that touches on the soul-edifying influence a St. Kate’s education will have later, when they’re working women, mothers, wives, or artists; but my callers aren’t interested in sermons, and I don’t blame them. When you’re just starting out, you shouldn’t be asked to figure out your beginning AND how you’ll feel about it in thirty years. Instead, I praise them for getting themselves there in the first place, and I tell them to eat well, get enough sleep, and go to class. I don’t have to say what I really hope for them, because if they make it through, it’ll happen. But I think it. I think how this person I’m talking with is learning, at this very moment, to be someone the sisters envisioned when they built that school, and how lucky she is, and how lucky I was to have gone there.

Writing out your imagination.

I contributed a guest post to a friend’s site today, and she actually ran it!

http://www.tashmcadam.com/#!Errin-Stevens-Writing-Out-Your-Imagination-GUEST-POST/cl0b/552aba560cf2aa18119f0d63

A Visit From Tash & Carrie.

Hi All – My publisher, Carrie White, just posted a blog on my colleague, Tash McAdam’s site… perhaps an uncomfortable truth for some, but a valuable perspective:

http://www.tashmcadam.com/#!How-Do-Publishers-Decide-to-Sign-Authors-GUEST-POST/cl0b/552189c10cf21e26bad5d50a

Advice from a failure on getting published.

Since I posted last week that I’ve found love with a small publisher out of California, Glass House Press, I have received a small onslaught of solicitations for advice on how I did it. I find this hilarious, since, for the most part, my efforts to attract an agent or publisher resulted in a ludicrous level of failure. Ludicrous! Moreover, the process was for the most part so unpleasant, I wouldn’t wish it on Satan himself.

But. In case it gives anyone out there any relief (spoiler alert: it won’t), here’s the best response I can give to the question, “How did you do it?” I wrote this to a man I’ve exchanged writing with over the past six months or so. Here ’tis:

Thanks for the kind words, David.

I think you’re a talented writer, and I do believe you’ve got something with your story. Your genre is not one I’ve studied, so I don’t know that my advice on how to approach getting published will be very helpful to you… but in case my experience can save you any angst at all (and I’m very much afraid it will not, David), here’s what I would do in your shoes:

– Finish your story, since all we non-Beyonce’s of the world cannot get by pitching an outline or story idea/must needs have a full ms ready to provide an agent or publisher.

– Study the query letters on queryshark.com, and search both your soul and the internet to come up with the most incisive and gripping pitch you can on this front. It’s tricky, so dig in and play with it… and you’ll also have to develop a synopsis, which you can also nose around the internet for information on. Both of these devices are their own animals, David, and I found their development extremely challenging, so don’t feel bad if the prospect depresses you. I know you can do it! If it is of any use to you at all, I’ve attached the ones I wrote for my first and second manuscripts, because they did prove to be the primary reason I got the attention of my new publisher. I got a ton of interest off these otherwise, too, so I know they were effective… although it still took me almost five years and about 900 pitches (I’m not kidding) until the stars aligned for me.

– When you’re ready to pitch, check out Chuck Sambucino’s New Agency blog on the Writer’s Digest web site for announcements of new agents, agents changing houses or genres, and for protocols to pitch these agents. Otherwise, consult Querytracker. I always cross-checked information for a pitch with the agency’s or publisher’s web site, too, which can give you a feel for the kind of work they do. I found my current publisher on a site called Preditors & Editors.

– Establish a blog on WordPress (it’s free); a Facebook account; and a Twitter account. Feed them as best you can.

– Consider subscribing for a while to Publisher’s Marketplace, an online conglomeration of info reported to and consulted by industry professionals. It’ll give you a feel for who’s acquiring in what genre, how many books you need to have written to get their attention, and how much they’re offering for the work they sign.

– This process is miserable and impossible. I really can’t adequately describe just how miserable and impossible it is, but even though I now have a contract, it makes no sense to me that I do because of all the many times it should have worked out for me and didn’t. When you think you might die of grief going through this, please, please try to remember that all the rejections you’ll get are really not about you, because they really aren’t. And I’m stupid to even say this, because I never believed it when I was going through it, but there you are.

And that’s all the worthless advice I have to offer, worthless because, for the vast, vast majority of the time, it got me absolutely nowhere, and I cannot tell you why it worked when it finally did. It’s a pretty crazy thing we do, David.

Let’s do stay in touch, and thank you again for your time and support. And for your kind words. I sincerely wish you the very best of luck, David.

Hugs,

Errin

Self-proclaimed experts.

A writer friend in Atlanta sent me this link, and I found the article fascinating. In this age of online-ness, where we often don’t ever meet the people we rely on professionally, I found this cautionary tale especially salient. The author was nuts, of course, and way, way out line going to the extent she did… but part of me is glad she did it. Maybe the rest of us won’t have to? See what you think: http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014...

Self-proclaimed experts.

A writer friend in Atlanta sent me this link, and I found the article fascinating. In this age of online-ness, where we often don’t ever meet the people we rely on professionally, I found this cautionary tale especially salient. The author was nuts, of course, and way, way out line going to the extent she did… but part of me is glad she did it. Maybe the rest of us won’t have to? See what you think: http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014...

Still a New Age?

I was doing a bit of research this morning as I dither over a possibility I have with a smaller publisher (I’m tentatively excited!). I used to follow Nathan when he was an agent, and I think the guy’s a terrific member of the online community and not just for writers. Anyway, I found his analysis on ebook sales pertinent enough to share. I also clicked on his Freelancers Union link, ’cause I think that’s interesting enough to share, too! Hope you found the following as useful as I did:

http://blog.nathanbransford.com/2013/...

Still a New Age?

I was doing a bit of research this morning as I dither over a possibility I have with a smaller publisher (I’m tentatively excited!). I used to follow Nathan when he was an agent, and I think the guy’s a terrific member of the online community and not just for writers. Anyway, I found his analysis on ebook sales pertinent enough to share. I also clicked on his Freelancers Union link, ’cause I think that’s interesting enough to share, too! Hope you found the following as useful as I did:

http://blog.nathanbransford.com/2013/04/no-e-book-sales-are-not-declining.html

“Writer without permission.”

Someone really liked my tagline on my LinkedIn page and wrote a post about it. How sweet!

“Writer without permission.”

errinstevens:

Someone really liked my tagline on my LinkedIn page and wrote a post about it. How sweet!

Originally posted on conversation is an engine:

Write On Your Own Dime

A new LinkedIn friend in the Minneapolis/Saint Paul area has a job title “Writer without permission.” The genius of her title is to say out loud what most every writer is thinking—nobody asked for this, nobody gave me permission, and frankly, no one is waiting for me to finish it. The whole thing is entirely self-motivated.

Let there be more of her tribe.

Writers without permission may encamp here as needed–not that you need permission.

Writers often stop mid-sentence and think,

I am entirely unqualified to write this. When will someone knock on my door and say, ‘Hey—Stop it: You got no business writing that.’?

When those Philip Glass moments occur, whether real or imagined, the writer without permission pauses and then continues the sentence. And the next sentence. And so on—breezing past the “No Trespassing” signs posted around the perimeter of the topic.

If…

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