Learning Where You Fall on the Continuum

When I first began submitting my writing for publication, I had no concept of how good I was (or wasn't). I figured I might as well send that short story to The New Yorker because, hey, maybe I'm brilliant and will be discovered at age twenty-three. Then on to a bestselling novel!

I'm sure you can imagine what happened. I did not publish those early stories in The New Yorker or The Paris Review or anywhere else. I did work to learn what could make me better, however. I went to grad school and wrote three novels and a handful of short stories over the next few years.

Most of the stories never got very good (I'm pretty sure at this point I'm just not much of a short story writer). The first novel was a great learning experience, but by the time I finished it as my MA thesis, I knew it was simply that: a learning experience rather than something worth publishing. The second novel I thought was better than the first, and I've gone back and forth on it over the past seven years. Sometimes I think it's worth publishing, sometimes not. I spend months revising it again and then abandon it for years. That's the novel I revisited this summer and have decided to finally submit to small press contests.

I know that novel is not going to take the publishing world by storm. I know it's not going to attract an agent and a six-figure book deal at a major New York press. But I still think it's pretty good. I think other people would enjoy reading it. I can imagine a small press putting it out into the world. So I've submitted it to one contest and intend to try a few others over the next year or so.

My third novel is a departure from what I did before. My first two were written in grad school and were "literary" in the sense that they are not high-stakes, plot-driven stories. They are small, focused on characters, and hopefully sensitive to language and artfully written (especially with my latest revision). The other one is a fantasy story for kids. It's the book I had in the back of my mind ever since I was a kid reading that kind of book. My goal with it is to create something that I would have loved when I was ten.

Like my second novel, I've gone back and forth with the third. After the first draft, I abandoned it for years, figuring I don't know enough about the market or whatever to break into the world of children's books. I continued to focus on literary journals (and shifted my focus to nonfiction), which felt safer and more familiar to me. During that time, I managed to get published. And that third novel has mostly sat on my computer, remaining a rough draft.

But last year, I revisited it in the summer. I revised about half before getting busy with my day job as a university instructor. But I want to finish that revision (and additional revisions after that). I want to try to get this book into the world.

Here's what I know about myself as a writer and where I fall on the continuum of writers: I am decent enough to get some work published in some respectable (if not absolute top tier) journals. I am not about to win the Pulitzer or have something in The New Yorker. But I'm a better writer today than I was fifteen years ago when just starting out. I'm a better writer today than eight years ago when completing my MFA. And while I have high hopes for my second novel and the small press route, I have higher hopes that my third novel (once it's revised and polished) could break into the mainstream world of publishing.

It's sometimes tough to be honest with yourself about how good you really are. We writers tend to have both inflated egos and low self esteem. We think we're brilliant and terrible at alternate moments. But honest assessment is important.

Book Contests

Last week, I saw a Tweet promoting the Brighthorse Books Prizes with a submission deadline of Sunday (yesterday). I was particularly interested in this contest for a few reasons:

1. The deadline worked out.
2. The small press is young.
3. The press has three contests: one for poetry, one for short fiction, and one for novels. 

1. The deadline. As mentioned in my last post, I had failed to meet the earlier summer deadline I'd set for myself with this revision. That happens to me often. Summer after summer, I set large writing goals and wind up falling behind my schedule. But having this new goal worked to motivate me. I completed the revision on Friday, went back through for a final proofread, and submitted my manuscript to the contest Sunday afternoon

2. A young press. I imagine fewer people submit to a contest that is not well known with a long history. A famous press with a long-established contest surely gets hundreds or even thousands of entries each year. But with a press only in its second year, some writers will not have heard or it or will be hesitant. Of course, there is good reason to be hesitant. You don't want to fall for a scam and throw away money on entry fees or to think you're getting your book published by a reputable place only to discover it's a vanity press. From what I can tell from some very limited research, this place seems above board. So while it is small and young, I still feel like I would be happy having my book published with them. Bottom line: better odds with fewer submissions.

3. Multiple contests. Finally, the three separate contests also may increase my odds of winning. Many such contests have a a prize for short stories but not for novels. Or they have a single fiction prize for any book-length works of fiction, including combinations of short stories, novellas, and novels. When those categories are divided up, there are likely fewer submissions in each one.

Also, my impression is that there are fewer contests for novels than for short stories. I think this may be because novels are still seen as the realm of big presses. Short story collections are tough to sell, so small presses have taken up the charge of helping to get those out into the world. Novels can still fight for themselves. But what about smaller, literary novels? Those that won't find a home at a big New York publishing house? Those still need the world of small presses. Certainly there are many small presses publishing those novels, but this type of contest is a great entry into the small press world and from what I've seen, such novel contests are still rarer than short story contests.

I feel good about having submitted my novel. I have no idea what the odds are of winning. What I do know, however, is that people do win such contests. I have friends in my age group who have won contests like this before. It really is a great way to get a book out into the world when it would be hard to find a match with a publisher through the slush pile or when the literary size and scope of the book would likely not be big enough to attract an agent. I still assume the odds are against me. Even if this contest has fewer submissions than some of the big ones, that may mean that they get a hundred submissions instead of a thousand, which would mean only one percent win.

But whatever happens next with this particular contest, I feel good about my book as it currently stands. And the next time I read about a contest or a small press looking for submissions, I'm ready to submit.

Deadlines and Goals

I'm a teacher at a university. I get paid (modestly) year round, but my actual job only requires me to be present in a classroom about eight months out of the year. I have so much "time off" that it seems like a perfect job for a writer. Right?

Of course it's not quite so simple. I don't really have four glorious months with nothing to do each year, but I still have significant time off when I can afford not to teach summer school. I often have a big project in mind, like writing a draft of a complete book or revising an entire book. Typically, August arrives, and I haven't done close to what I set out to do in May.

This summer, I knew I was going to have a tight schedule. I got married in June and then went on my honeymoon. I knew most of that month would be useless to get writing done, but I still set some large goals for myself. I wanted to return to the novel I wrote as my MFA thesis and do a final revision / polish and submit it to some contests and small presses. In particular, Autumn House Press has an annual contest with a June 30th deadline. So I thought, maybe I can take the end of May into June before the wedding craziness begins, and bang out a revision to submit.

I knew that goal was optimistic, but I thought it would motivate me. That's the thing with goals. It's easy to say, "I want to accomplish _____." But it's much harder to do it if there's no pressure to get it done. If I have the whole summer, I work a little here and a little there, and then it's August again, and I have to work on my fall syllabi. But if I say, "I want to accomplish _____ by June 30th, and after that, it's too late," I stand a better chance.

Surprise, surprise! I failed. The wedding stress took more out of me than I expected (though it was worth it!). Then came the honeymoon. And jet lag. I managed to revise half my novel by the end of June, which still felt good. Then July rolled around. I wasn't teaching, but I took a summer class for fun, and other factors of life occupied my time. By early August, I still had about a quarter of the book to revise. The problem was, it didn't feel urgent. The same doubts from when I worked on this book years ago resurfaced again and again: Why bother? Where am I going to send it if I finish this revision? Who will want to publish this? Am I wasting my time on something nobody else will ever read?

Then I found a new book contest from a small press. The deadline is Sunday. With less than a week to revise several more chapters, that goal is a tough one. But it's doable. So I'm back in gear. By Monday, I really need to focus on finishing prepping for fall classes, but for the next few days, I can focus on this book. And I think I'll have it ready by midnight on Sunday.

I wish I were the type of person who could more easily set a personal deadline and just stick to it. But it's nice to realize that there are so many presses and contests and journals out there, that I will be able to find external deadlines to keep me motivated.