PRO TIPS FOR GREAT GENRE FICTION

WRITING W O
RKOU T S

PLUS
 Writing Great Fiction:
Storytelling Tips
and Techniques
Taught by Professor James Hynes
TIME O NOVELIST AND WRITING INSTRUCTOR
ED F
IT
LECTURE TITLES

FE
LIM

R
70% 1.
2.
Starting the Writing Process
Building Fictional Worlds through Evocation
off 3. How Characters Are Diferent from People

7
RD 4. Fictional Characters, Imagined and Observed

E
E R BY J UN 5. Call Me Ishmael—Introducing a Character
6. Characters—Round and Flat, Major and Minor
7. The Mechanics of Writing Dialogue
8. Integrating Dialogue into a Narrative
9. And Then—Turning a Story into a Plot
10. Plotting with the Freytag Pyramid
11. Adding Complexity to Plots
12. Structuring a Narrative without a Plot
13. In the Beginning—How to Start a Plot
14. Happily Ever After—How to End a Plot
15. Seeing through Other Eyes—Point of View
16. I, Me, Mine—First-Person Point of View
17. He, She, It—Third-Person Point of View
18. Evoking Setting and Place in Fiction
19. Pacing in Scenes and Narratives
20. Building Scenes
21. Should I Write in Drafts?
22. Revision without Tears
23. Approaches to Researching Fiction
Discover the Secrets of 24. Making a Life as a Fiction Writer

the Writer’s Craft Writing Great Fiction:

Storytelling Tips and Techniques
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IMAGINE
WRITE
PUBLISH
May 2018 • Volume 131 Number 5

FEATURES
12
Working out
Writing exercises help strengthen
your craft.
BY JENNIFER L. BLANCK AND
MICHAEL KLEIN

18
Tear off the
labels 28
Authors speak out about writing
great genre iction (even if you Game day
never set out to write a genre book 8 pro tips for success in the
in the irst place). tabletop game-writing industry.
BY JACK SMITH BY RYAN G. VAN CLEAVE

24 34
Learning as Story rules,
you laugh plot drools
Graphic noniction books The three crucial storytelling elements
convey facts in full color. every novel needs to succeed.
BY MELISSA HART BY PHILIP MARTIN
 DEPARTMENTS IN EVERY ISSUE
8 WRITER AT WORK
Reading for a literary journal
4 From the Editor

How wading through some- 5 Take Note

one else’s slush pile can Featuring Jen A. Miller, Leslie
improve your own chances Jamison, and more.
at publication.
BY LINDA LOWEN 42 Markets

10 FREELANCE
Parallel work
SUCCESS 47 Classiied advertising

What to do when the words 48 How I Write

Malinda McCollum: “A great short
10 won’t come.
BY PETE CROATTO story is urgent, insistent, and
propulsive. It’s like a whirlwind or
a whoosh!”
38 LITERARY SPOTLIGHT
The Forge Literary Magazine
This inclusive journal offers a
wealth of opportunity for both
writers and editors.
BY MELISSA HART

40 CONFERENCE INSIDER
Kauai Writers Conference
Want a little Hawaiian vacation
with your writing education?
This is the conference for you.
BY MELISSA HART
24

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FROM THE EDITOR
A
s a former food editor (and current food-obsessed writer),
I make frequent pilgrimages to so-called Good Restaurants.
When one goes to enough Good Restaurants, one eventu-
ally learns to speak the language fluently; she can bandy
about terms like house-made, artisanal, locally grown, and grass-fed
without batting an eye. Is the tartare hand-chopped? one asks the server.
And the kimchi shaved ice, is that made with house-fermented cabbage?
But one term that never seems to come up at Good Restaurants is
fun. No one ever says the dry-aged ribeye or fried sweetbreads are
“fun.” Locally sourced or humanely raised, certainly. But fun? Please.
This is serious artisanal food; fun need not apply.
Last summer I had the pleasure of visiting a Boston restaurant that
played anime on loop and served icy tiki-inspired craft cocktails. We
dined by the pool and played Wasabi Roulette, a wicked game in which
one of six tuna rolls comes packed with an eye-watering spoonful of
wasabi. The “winner” drank soothing sweet horchata from a pink baby
bottle as the staff cheered. The fish was fresh, the service impeccable;
each dish was crafted with care, and I had a truly wonderful meal. I
haven’t ever laughed that hard while dining out.
It was delicious. But it was also fun.
Recently I read Ben Dolnick‘s Lit Hub essay, “Why I’ll Never Stop
Reading ‘Junk’ Fiction,” and wanted to stand up and cheer. After a life-
time of studying literature, he realizes his favorite genre books
“respected an aspect of my readerly life that Nabokov, in all his lordly
brilliance, might never have deigned to consider: that I didn’t have to
be reading. That I had, in my pocket, a device that stood ready to play
every episode of Breaking Bad; that I might not have slept well last
night; that the kid in the seat behind me might be playing a video
game whose soundscape was engineered to scatter my attention.”
Genre books were fun, which was just as much an “act of authorial
love” as creating well-developed characters and verbal acrobatics.
We talk so much about beauty, art, theme, and metaphor in literature
that I sometimes wonder if authors forget why they started reading in
the first place: Because it’s entertaining. Because it takes us somewhere
new, because it moves us and makes us laugh. Writers, don’t ever feel bad
for wanting to author a story that moves, that leaves us frantic to keep
turning pages. This is true for all categories of writing, but especially for
authors of genre fiction, who often confess embarrassment when they
tell me they’re writing horror, sci-fi, or romance, as if it is some shameful
secret or form of lesser writing. As the authors in “Tear off the labels”
(page 18) show us, good books come in ALL forms. A ghost story can be
a beautiful story; the best prose can star aliens, giants, or secret agents.
Good writing lies in the telling, not the subject matter.
Never feel ashamed for wanting to write fun fiction. It isn’t junk. It’s
necessary. And anyone who tries to shame you for it should be tossed
from your life like the rubbish they are.
Keep writing,
Nicki Porter
Senior Editor
4 | The Writer • May 2018
IMAGINE
WRITE
PUBLISH
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Hear
myself
and I
LISTENING TO
YOUR LIFE,
AS READ BY
SOMEONE ELSE.
BY JEN A. MILLER
R ight about the time I couldn’t tell if my eyes stung from
sweat or tears, when I tried to wipe whatever it was
away and left a streak of Rust-Oleum across my forehead, I
realized that I made a mistake.
Not about the Rust-Oleum, which was labeled as a
primer for heavily rusted metal. The railing I worked on
was, indeed, heavily rusted.
No, the mistake was my chosen listening material. I use
audiobooks to eat up the time it takes to get from point A to
point B of boring tasks like long road trips, long marathon
training runs, and long bouts of depositing sweat equity into
my house to get it ready to put on the market.  hometown just slightly wrong. When she used a different
For the front railing, I’d listened to Mrs. Robinson’s Dis-
grace: The Private Diary of a Victorian Woman by Kate Sum-
merscale. For the back railings, I thought it’d be fun to listen
to Running: A Love Story, by someone I knew very well: me.
QQQ
despite my discomfort at listening to a sample of the
audiobook of my memoir back in March (that’s not how I
world of vector/Shutterstock
sound, that’s not how I would say that), I thought that by
May, after the initial blush of publication, when the “is
anyone going to read this book/are the critics going to like
this book/will my parents hate me/will I get sued?” terror
had passed, it could be fun.  experienced all these things and shifted to being a writer
¾“My perfect day is sitting in a room with some blank
paper. That's heaven. That's gold, and anything else
is just a waste of time.” —Cormac McCarthy
How would Randye Kaye, a 60-something, red-headed
Jewish New York native and narrator of dozens of audio-
books, who I had chosen from three potential narrators,
read the story of a 35-year-old blond Catholic writer from
South Jersey whose memoir starts in high school?
It could be fun, I thought as I picked up a piece of sand-
paper to smooth the railing for primer and a new coat of flat
black paint and hit play.
Or not. Kaye, of course, does not sound like me. She says
“time” like she has all of it in the world, whereas my pro-
nunciation is clipped. She pronounced the name of my
tone for the angry father, when she described a nun as hav-
ing little gray teeth, I sucked in a breath. She sounded a bit
too mean. I was about to add “statistics drone on” to my list
of grievances until I remembered that this was my fault, not
Kaye’s. I’d gotten so deep into listening that I forgot, briefly,
who wrote those words. She had the right to interpret them
as she saw fit. In that space, in that format, Running: A Love
Story became Kaye's. And I listened. 
I wrote the first draft of the book a few years earlier,
before I had an agent or editor. That draft was raw, all emo-
tion, anger, and rage. When I went back it to edit it into a
proposal, though, I stopped being that hurt person who
writermag.com • The Writer | 5
who thought she could take this pile of pain and shove and
scrape and mold it into a readable – and sellable – form.
And I kept being shoved in that direction with every
hand that touched the manuscript: agent, editor, copy editor,
lawyer, designer, an entire marketing team. I didn’t like all of
their changes, and I registered some of the battles I lost as I
listened to Kaye’s narration.
But that’s publishing, and that’s what turned my story of
10 years of running from an extended diary entry into a
book. This is my third book, too, so I expected this, and
after one last clinical scan of the manuscript to check for
errors before it went to the printer, I accepted this in its
final, fine-tuned, and crafted form.
When Kaye read the story, though, I couldn’t change the
product. I couldn’t be the writer trying to make it just a little
bit better, but I could listen – really listen – to what had hap-
pened. I flipped back and landed into that pile of pain and
felt it all, all over again: the anger, grief, and rage.
When Kaye read my words about how I fell into a rela-
tionship with an alcoholic, I remembered what it was like to
be a sad, emaciated, tortured 26-year-old again. I hadn’t felt
so bad since I banged out the angry first draft more than
two years before. That’s when I couldn’t tell if I was sweating
or crying. That’s when I smeared a streak of rusty metal
primer across my forehead. Right before the conclusion of
chapter three, I hit stop.
Writing a memoir is an upheaval, a tearing down of the
scaffolding you put up around some of the worst parts of your
life, and I did it in the hopes that, through reexamination, I
could make sense of what happened. Deciding to publish it
meant building a more permanent structure, one with win-
dows and an observation deck so that someone, somewhere
could look in and say “I’m there” or “my sister’s there” or “I’ve
been there, too,” or even “what’s the matter with you?”
That night, a dream I hadn’t had since March came back
to me: my alcoholic ex came into my bedroom and tried to
embrace me. I couldn’t decide if I should let him or beat in
his face. I woke up, heart racing, before I could make a deci-
sion. I deleted the book from my phone.
“Yes, it can be really weird hearing your own words come
back at you, especially when they remind you of moments
and decisions you have, shall we say, outgrown?” Kaye wrote
to me in an email after I told her I’d listened to part of her
work. We hadn’t spoken before she did the narration, and I
was curious as to who she was, but not curious enough to call.
From what I heard in the first three chapters of the book,
she did a wonderful job. But I’d heard enough of her voice –
and my story, too. I had outgrown those decisions – and the
anger and regret. I could step off the observation deck and
finally move on.
—Jen A. Miller is author of Running: A Love Story.
6 | The Writer • May 2018
WRITERS ON WRITING
Leslie Jamison
Leslie Jamison’s
latest book, The
Recovering:
Intoxication and
Its Aftermath,
published in April
2018, mixes
journalistic
reportage with memoir and literary criticism to
explore the experiences of those who have
recovered from addiction. Jamison is also the
author of the novel The Gin Closet and the
essay collection The Empathy Exams, a New
York Times best-seller. She is a columnist for
the New York Times Book Review, and her
works have appeared in publications including
Harper’s, Oxford American, The Believer, and
elsewhere. Jamison is an assistant professor at
Columbia University in New York City.
WHAT’S THE MOST IMPORTANT THING
YOU’VE LEARNED ABOUT WRITING? 
I used to believe that the best writing had to
emerge from a life that had been carefully
sculpted to produce the perfect conditions for
creativity: long stretches of uninterrupted time,
days cleared of logistics and obligations, dentist
appointments and school lunches and cardboard
boxes waiting to be unpacked. But eventually I
learned that no beautiful writing comes from an
impossibly perfect world; it all comes from this
one: cluttered, obligated, distracted.
HOW HAS THIS HELPED YOU AS A WRITER?
After I came to accept that beauty comes from
the imperfect mess of living, rather than the
impossible ideal of an unencumbered life, it
asked me to stop seeing life and writing as
antagonists, locked in combat, and to start
seeing the ways that even the logistics and
obligations of life might ultimately feed into the
compost heap of creativity, and certainly that
the obligated, beholden life is the only one from
which we work – that so much beauty has come
from it.
Adam Golfer
—Gabriel Packard is the author of The Painted Ocean: A Novel
published by Corsair, an imprint of Little, Brown.
 ¾ “A library is not a luxury but one of the
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writermag.com • The Writer | 7

WRITER AT WORK
BY LINDA LOWEN

How wading through someone else’s slush pile can

improve your own chances at publication.

S
ending your work to a literary magazine or online
journal for consideration is not for the fainthearted.
The outcome can feel as random as a coin toss: Heads
you’re accepted for publication, tails you’re not. 
When you’re on a submissions streak, optimism fuels
every story and cover letter, but that high wears off once the
rejections roll in. In theory, you’re not supposed to take it
personally. In reality, you do. You ruminate, agonize, sec-
ond-guess. Was that opening too weak? Did I miss by a
comma or by a mile? The standard response provides few
clues. You’re left wondering: What do “they” want? Why
didn’t my piece make the cut? 
Want answers? You can get them by reading other peo-
ple’s work – not the stuff that’s published but the stuff that
isn’t. When you read for a literary magazine or online jour-
nal, you’re exposed to the good, the average, and the awful.
The more you learn to identify each and separate out the
three, the more you’ll understand what to do – and what not
to do – in your own writing. 
Nearly all publishing outlets are swamped by hundreds,
even thousands, of submissions. Many rely on first-level
readers to wade through the slush pile and net a manageable
handful for consideration by an editor or next-level reader. 
To do this type of winnowing on a large scale, it’s not
necessary to be a New York Times literary critic, but you do started reading submissions for Solstice Literary Magazine as
need some experience.  part of a six-month internship. After it ended, she contin-
Training acquired through writing classes, workshops, and ued in that role. 
conferences is helpful for getting the gig, as are examples of “In the beginning, I was vigilant about reading all the
your own published pieces. Aside from bragging rights among submissions. After becoming seasoned, if the first para-
writer friends, there’s no glamour in reading for a literary graph didn’t grab me, I stopped reading,” she says. Some
journal. The work is unpaid and reading hundreds of pieces topics prompted an immediate rejection: “Extreme violence
can be tedious. You’ll have to put in long hours (especially as [or] super-raunchy stuff didn’t cut it for me, either.” When
the submissions period ends), reliably meet deadlines, and – considering a piece, Carota took into account the writer’s
in the case of close calls and squeakers – trust your gut. credentials but ultimately, “the editor had full control of
Literary magazines are typically affiliated with university what went into the magazine.” After four years of reading
MFA programs, arts collectives, or regional writing centers. submissions, “my brain seized from reading too much,” and
If you are or have been enrolled as a student, that’s an in – she stepped down. 
Nadia Buravleva/Shutterstock

readers are frequently chosen from their ranks. Contact Today, Carota teaches writing at the University of Massa-
these programs to ask about their policies and express inter- chusetts at Lowell. While reading for pleasure, “I really
est in serving as an early-stage reader.  notice the writing,” she says, but reading for a literary maga-
While earning her MFA in Creative Writing at Pine zine is entirely different. “With the submissions slush pile, I
Manor College in Brookline, Massachusetts, Joanne Carota was not reading as closely for the perfect openers as if the
8 | The Writer • May 2018
piece actually grabbed me. Most sub- Serving as a reader for a literary a family’s summer cottage could be so
missions were well-written, so that was magazine over the past four years, I vivid and bittersweet. As the submission
already a given.”  now know what it takes to stand out deadline drew near, more of these
Poet Phil Memmer oversees Stone from the slush pile. In my first year, I remarkable stories surfaced. I thought
Canoe, a literary journal that showcases questioned if I was being too picky. The my Spidey sense of language had been
the work of writers with a connection to initial wave of submissions seemed dulled, but the opposite was true. No
upstate New York. To cull submissions, unremarkable, and I struggled to find matter how slight the facet, a first
he relies on first readers who “narrow pieces to approve. The most common reader can distinguish the brilliance of
down the field of manuscripts for the error was the result of laziness; writers diamond from cut glass.
issue’s guest editor.” In each genre – who hadn’t bothered to read the publi- If being a reader sounds interesting
poetry, fiction, nonfiction – he selects cation didn’t realize their tone, style, or but you lack any college or university
three first readers to review each sub- voice wasn’t a good fit. Submissions affiliations and no writing programs or
mission. For Memmer, three is a delib- that were too academic, esoteric, or centers are nearby, see if you can read
erate number: “One or two wouldn’t amateurish were the easy rejections.  for an online literary journal or genre
give us the breadth of responses we The difficult ones were more subtle. fiction site. These internet-only outlets
wish to provide the guest editors, while Some contained passages of insight operate similarly to print publications
more than three might bog down the and intelligence; others featured by relying on their communities –
editorial process.” intriguing characters. What they all engaged, active followers – to provide
After reading each piece, each lacked was forward momentum: a rea- potential readers. If you’ve been previ-
reader weighs in with a ranking of yes, son for the reader to continue. Like ously published, or you submit on a
no, or maybe. “All manuscripts are then Carota, if I wasn’t grabbed by a piece, I regular basis and are active in these
passed to the appropriate guest editors, passed on it.  online groups, you have a good shot.
who may choose not to review any Several times during that period, I Reach out to the editors and see. In the
manuscript that has already received thought, I’m the problem. I’d rejected a long run, the effort is bound to be
three no votes.” former Pushcart Prize winner, an essay- worth your while.
Memmer finds potential first read- ist I’d followed and admired, and a good
ers through his full-time role as execu- friend whom I knew could do better. Linda Lowen teaches craft workshops at writ-
tive director of the YMCA’s Downtown Then came a piece I couldn’t let go of. I ing conferences and festivals, and is the
Writers Center in Syracuse, New York, lingered over the language, trying to founder of AlwaysWantedToWrite.com, a writ-
one of the most successful YMCA figure out how a simple narrative about ing studio in Syracuse, New York.
community-based writing programs in
the country. “We select first readers
from amongst our advanced students,
our faculty, and our board of directors.”
He looks for writers “who are well-
read, serious about their own craft, and
interested in learning about what goes
into publishing a literary journal.”
Those who are chosen know it’s an
unparalleled opportunity to see the pro-
cess from the inside. “Every first reader
has told me that the experience was
valuable for them,” Memmer notes.
“Most have not had past involvement
with literary journals, so it can be eye-
opening to see the quantity and variety
of submissions we receive. It’s also
directly relevant experience for anyone
seeking to get their own writing pub-
lished...the behind-the-scenes vantage
point is a great learning opportunity.”
writermag.com • The Writer | 9
FREELANCE SUCCESS
BY PETE CROATTO

Parallel work
What to do when the words won’t come.

I
can’t write every day. Writing is hard. It’s thankless.
Only a few good hours exist to crank out quality sen-
tences – usually on the day the electric bill is due or
when the internet is on the fritz.
Since freelance writing is a business, what you do daily
should improve the business. Writing is part of that, of
course, but it’s a solitary, personal endeavor – what’s on the
page comes from you. Some distance is crucial. Enter the
important concept of parallel work, a phrase I first heard
from my writer pal A.C. Shilton, which buoys your personal
and professional self.
Most importantly, it gets you in the mood to write. Here
is what to do to shake things up without losing precious
momentum.
walk outside. Take a yoga class, with a side of meditation. To
paraphrase noted legal mind Elle Woods: “Exercise gives
you endorphins. Endorphins make you happy. Happy writ-
ers just don’t create bad story ideas. They just don’t!”
Seriously, getting outside can get forgotten while staring
at a blinking cursor. Suspending the hermit’s lifestyle to
become a human being will lead to a sharper focus and bet-
ter writing. Another plus: People won’t find you insufferable
at dinner parties anymore.
3 Take a trip to the local library. Find authors whose
prose inspires, educates, and enthralls. Research back
issues of a magazine to polish up a pitch letter. Sign up for a
program to feed the creative furnace. Also, many libraries
have access to online catalogues such as LexisNexis. A

1 Change location, find inspiration. Ah, the essence

of parallel work. Every tip originates from this concept.
Tethering yourself to a computer screen in the same
library card, that invaluable, wallet-sized resource, can help
sharpen or fortify your reporting chops for free.

secluded space day after day, willing the brain to work and
the fingers to move, is madness. Interact with the world,
and you’ll be amazed at what comes forth. I have come up
with story ideas while shooting hoops on an empty basket-
4 Run errands or do chores. The day always ends with
you lacking the energy to take care of personal matters,
right? Time to remedy that. Start the laundry. Unload the
dishwasher. Change the water filter. Pay bills. At least you’re
Daren Woodward/Shutterstock

ball court, feeding my daughter before dawn broke, and accomplishing something, and with today’s technology,
meandering through a used bookstore. answering your editor’s worried email in the dairy aisle has
never been easier. Plus, it feels good. My wife works full

2 Practice self-care. Going to the gym, or embarking

on a physical activity beyond typing, is vital. Go for a
time. I work at home. On slow days, I try to pick up the
domestic slack, because I possess the flexibility she doesn’t.
10 | The Writer • May 2018

US
5 Clean your desk. It’s hard to do
interviews if you can’t find the
phone – I think it’s under that wobbly,
dusty two-year-old archive of New
Yorkers – or if you knock over 10 cof-
fee mugs while trying to find a pen
that’s older than Betty White.
6 Get ready for tax season. Cor-
ral those stray receipts, expense
reports, and paychecks so that you’re
not hyperventilating come tax time,
which comes despite our fervent
prayers. If you’re dreading another year
of tackling columns of difficult figures,
solicit suggestions for an accountant.
Trust me: A thorough, responsive CPA
is worth every penny.
7 Research writers’ groups and
organizations. I joined the
American Society of Journalists and
Authors (ASJA) in late 2016. It was not
an easy decision, since I can’t buy a
pair of jeans without feeling like I’ve
pushed my family into a financial
black hole. But I made back that year’s
membership fee (and more) when I
landed a pitch thanks to an editor I
met at ASJA’s annual conference in
New York City. Attending that confer-
ence led me to my agent, who revived
my long-dormant proposal into my
first book contract. The biggest gains
were not financial. Spending two days
swapping war stories with other writ-
ers was priceless.
This year, my spending spree con-
tinued when I joined Freelance Suc-
cess, a popular writers’ forum run by
Jennie Phipps. For just $99 a year, I’ve
accumulated advice and vented with
other seasoned writers. It’s been
awesome.
Speaking of which…
8 Talk to another writer. Forget
DM or email or texting. Pick up
the phone and talk to a real, live
human being who’s also in this crazy
business. Even better, meet for coffee
TRAVEL
TRANSFORMS
and fortify your soul over muffins and
gentle complaining. A new destination
can take your writing
9 Tackle other projects. Jot notes
for an essay. Write a pitch for a
long-admired magazine. Touch base
in new directions.
with editors who have gone radio
silent. A week ago, I sent a pitch,
applied to an online job, and emailed
some editors to follow up on pitches
before boomeranging to this column.
Work leads to more work.
10 Practice the timeless art of
(self-)promotion. Besides
mom, who else is going to brag about
you? Perhaps your LinkedIn profile is
accumulating dust. Maybe it’s been a
while since you’ve written a blog post.
Consider revamping your website – or
look into hiring someone to create one.
11 Bag the day. Some days you’ve
got nothing. That’s OK. The
glorious part about freelancing is not
having to feign working to avoid the
boss’s disdain, because you are the boss.
So, go to the movies; catch up on sleep.
Do this long enough, and you know
what’s required to get the job done. I
promise: You will not backslide into
binge watching Grace and Frankie or
sleeping until noon because you
© Erik Unger
knocked off at 2 p.m. Recharge, come
back tomorrow. The work will still be
there – ready to have its ass kicked.
Immersive Writing
Yes, creating a routine to keep your Workshops in
writing on track is integral to your suc- Santa Fe, New Mexico
cess, but all routines (no matter how
self-gratifying) lead to boredom and
complacency. The writer who does not
break free every once in a while will
eventually break down.
Aside from The Writer, Pete Croatto (Twitter:
@PeteCroatto) has written for the New York
Times, Publishers Weekly, Columbia Journalism
Review, the Christian Science Monitor, and SantaFeWritersLab.com
many other publications. He and his family live
just outside Ithaca, New York.
-- ext 
writermag.com • The Writer | 11
 By
JENNIFER L. BLANCK
and MICHAEL KLEIN

WORKING
OUT
Writing exercises help
strengthen your craft. Agor2012/Shutterstock

12 | The Writer • May 2018

W riting exercises inspire, educate, build self-
awareness, jump-start a person’s writing,
and help writers hone their craft. They are all, at
their core, about writing, but some of the best
exercises take a writer someplace new.
“A good exercise should push you up against a limit or take you to
a place you’ve not been before and are uncomfortable with. And
then afterwards, you can go there, and it becomes comfortable,”
says fiction writer David Gould.
Gould is also an assistant organizer of Virginia’s Arlington Writers
Group (AWG). We also belong to the all-genre AWG that started in
2006 and meets in person every Wednesday for two hours. The
group alternates each week between critiques and other planned
activities, which range from craft discussions to author talks, social
events, and writing exercises. After more than 600 meetings, AWG
has refined a set of exercises that are effective for maintaining
momentum and helping writers of all levels strengthen their craft.
Here are some of our favorites.

writermag.com • The Writer | 13

GROUP WORK
Beginning, Middle, and End
Beginning, Middle, and End
is an exercise designed for
groups – ideally groups of
three. Writers choose indi-
vidual prompts, take a pad
of paper, and write the
beginning of a story – and
only the beginning. After 15
minutes, everyone stops,
and passes the pad to some-
one else. Writers now have
20 minutes to read the
opening they’ve been given
and write the next part of
that story (the middle).
When time is up, the pads
are passed again, and within
30 minutes, writers supply
the ending of the new story
they’ve been given.
AWG members then read
the stories aloud. The results
are entertaining, and writers
of the first sections typically
report that the story did not
end up where they expected.
Writing under this tight
time pressure can be liberat-
ing; there’s no time to over-
think. The exercise also
challenges a writer to explore
different paths and voices for
stories, and maybe even
write in a new genre.
You may have decided to
turn your prompt into a dra-
matic coming-of-age story,
but one of your partners
may have gotten the same
14 | The Writer • May 2018
prompt and gone the sci-fi
adventure route. If you are
writing her middle, you
can’t ignore what she’s done
and keep telling your story –
you need to respect her
choices and help tell the
next part of her story.
And when you are writ-
ing the last installment of
the story, two other writers
have started you on the
journey – now it is up to
you to tie it all up. “The
exercise forces you to get
into someone else’s head. It
makes you approach scenes
in a way you wouldn’t nor-
mally. It’s helped me as a
novelist,” says Gould.
Flaming Fragment
AWG, like many writing
groups, has a policy of not
rewriting members’ work
that is presented for feed-
back. It’s a good policy. You
can tell the writer what
works or what doesn’t and
why, but saying, “you should
have character X do such
and such” is generally bad
form. But during a Flaming
Fragment session, all bets
are off.
This is really a brain-
storming exercise where
writers present any kind of
idea they are hung up on. It
could be an entire novel that
needs a better ending or an
isolated detail such as a
character name, a profession
that would make for an
engaging protagonist, or an
interesting world to explore.
Writers are given 60 seconds
to share their fragment with
the group, and then the
group pitches ideas – trying
to “fan the fragment into
flames.” The amount of time
dedicated to each depends
on the number of fragments
you have, but AWG attempts
to give at least 10-12 min-
utes per author.
Marichka Melnyk, a
writer and radio producer
in Toronto and former
AWG member, conceived of
the exercise. “I have a ten-
dency to idly come up with
scenes or scenarios, or see a
real-life exchange between
people and start to imagine
the backstory. Or I meet an
interesting person and
begin to spin them into a
character with no particular
story in which to place
them,” says Melnyk.
She felt like her creative
energy was being wasted and
found she wasn’t alone.
“Others were also collecting
these fragments, and we were
inspiring each other anyway,
so we formalized it with the
Flaming Fragment session.”
FLEXING INDIVIDUAL MUSCLES
The remaining exercises are
focused on the individual.
While better in a group
environment – for both
learning and fun – the exer-
cises can be conducted on
your own.
Written Prompts
These prompts provide
launch pads for the writer.
They can be a phrase,
rhyme, or maxim meant to
get creative juices flowing,
or they can be much more
prescriptive. For example,
writers are given a sentence
that must be the first line of
their piece (or the last line).
One AWG favorite entails
putting a dozen random
nouns and six verbs on slips
of paper in a hat. Members
draw three and are ran-
domly assigned a genre.
Then the writing begins.
Visual Cues
While AWG often uses writ-
ten prompts to stimulate
ideas, inspiration can come
from many other places.
Photographs, graphic
designs, and other visuals
are great sources. Visual
Cues treat photo prompts
just like written prompts.
Multiple copies of five or six
images are pulled from
stock photo websites, and
writers take 30 or 45 min-
utes to tell a picture’s story.
What happened right before
it was snapped? Or what fol-
lowed? Sharing the pieces
aloud is illuminating when
you hear how differently
people see the photos.
One memorable AWG
meeting featured a picture
of a beautiful house on a
cliff with a staircase leading
down to clear blue water.
One writer used the setting
for a love story. Another led
readers down the stairs to
join someone dumping a
body into the ocean.
Inspiration Field Trips
AWG has also taken field
trips to area museums and
art galleries and tasked
writers with finding one
piece to inspire a story.
Afterward, writers are asked
to share a 150- to 200-word
piece within one week of
the visit. In more than a few
cases, members reported
expanding the exercise into
a new project.
Non-Visual Description
When establishing a set-
ting, many people rely
solely on one sense: Sight.
To challenge this, AWG
uses an exercise that goes
beyond visual cues. Non-
visual Description tests
writers’ abilities to establish
a setting using senses other
than sight. Think about
entering a bakery or sitting
in a noisy bar. Visual cues
probably aren’t the first
things you notice.
“By nature, we are a visu-
ally oriented species and, as
writers, our first impulse
when creating a scene is to
paint a picture. But if you
are working to evoke an
emotional response in the
reader – and you should be
working very hard at that –
then you must include the
other senses,” says fiction
writer and AWG assistant
organizer Dale Waters.
“Smells are known to be the
strongest trigger for feelings
of nostalgia. Likewise, an
unexpected sound – a
human scream in the night
or the howl of an unnamed
beast in the forest – can cre-
ate a terror response far
beyond simple visual
description.”
This exercise gets writers
to close their eyes and hear,
smell, feel, and taste a scene
and can be adapted in a
variety of ways. Writers can
select from any of the senses
or be assigned one to focus
on. After writing for 30
minutes, stories are
swapped for small group
exchanges or read aloud for
group discussion.
Overheard Conversations and
Missed Connections
While some exercises focus
on creating a realistic
scene, others rely on the
fact that great stories hide
in plain sight. In fact, jour-
nalists and memoirists will
tell you real life is quite
often much stranger than
fiction and can be hum-
writermag.com • The Writer | 15
bling to even the most
imaginative writers.
For Overheard Conversa-
tion, AWG members share
snippets of real dialogue
they overheard on the bus,
at lunch, or walking down
the street and challenge each
other to tell the story behind
the conversation.
AWG also uses missed
connections or personals
from different publications
that serve up wild glimpses
into actual lives. Glimpses
that need to be explored –
stories that need to be told:
“Tall, Dark, and Silent. I
stood in front of you on the
train this morning. You
were holding some brick
samples on your lap. We
made eye contact a few
times and you smiled. I
wanted to say something
but I couldn’t without
removing my costume.
Email me…”
How can you not tell this
story? And whose story do
you want to tell? The brick
carrier’s? The costumed
traveler’s? Your own story as
an observer of this scene?
Both of these exercises
entail 30 minutes of writing
and lots of sharing. Like
other prompt-based exer-
cises, the assignments get
people writing without
spending too much time on
plot development and creat-
ing character arcs. They’re
intended to be fun and jump
start creativity.
NO PAIN, NO GAIN
Two-Sided Argument
There are also stories from
our own lives that serve as
inspiration. Two-Sided
Argument challenges writ-
ers to honestly depict an
actual personal conflict
from two different perspec-
tives. First the writer takes
30 minutes to tell the story
of a dispute from her own
perspective. Then she writes
the same story from the
opposing person’s perspec-
tive – taking 30 minutes to
get into that person’s head.
For AWG assistant orga-
nizer and essayist Colleen
Moore, this exercise made a
difference for her as a writer
and a person. She wrote
about a decades-old fight
with her then-new stepsis-
ter, painting her in the
worst possible light. Then
Moore wrote from her step-
sister’s perspective. It was a
viewpoint Moore the Person
had never considered, but
Moore the Writer was
forced to.
She came to realizations
about her stepsister and the
situation that influenced
how Moore interacts with
her now. “It completely
changed our relationship,”
says Moore.
16 | The Writer • May 2018
As a writer, the exercise
helped with her personal
essays. “It makes an essay
resonate with people when
you’re willing to go deep
into yourself,” she says. The
experience also made her
think about how to fully
flesh out believable antago-
nists with their own stories
and motivations.
Point-of-View Exercise
This is another opportunity
for writers to consider differ-
ent perspectives – this time
by writing the same scene in
two different basic narrator
points of view (POV). The
exercise begins by telling
people to write a scene or a
story from a prompt or
theme. No other guidance is
necessary. In fact, you don’t
want to tell people what’s
coming next, because you
don’t want people to write
with a specific goal in mind.
Everyone is given 30
minutes. Next, the task is to
write the same story again
using a different narrator
POV. So if a person wrote in
third person, the next ver-
sion could be in first or sec-
ond person. Only 15-20
minutes are given for the
rewrite. Afterward, the
group discusses how their
stories changed, reading
samples of sections. The
exercise demonstrates the
power of different perspec-
tives and challenges writers
to try a POV they might not
usually use.
When AWG first con-
ducted the exercise, one new
member hated the idea.
When asked to write in a dif-
ferent POV, she thought it
wasn’t worth her time. But
she did it anyway. During the
discussion, she admitted her
surprise; the change to first
person made a powerful dif-
ference in her story. She
planned to rewrite other sto-
ries to see if they might bene-
fit from a new POV, too.
Gender Switch
Another exercise that uses a
similar structure and offers a
different perspective is Gen-
der Switch. After writing a
story, everyone is instructed
to rewrite it by changing the
genders of the main charac-
ters or everyone in the story.
This offers a new way of
approaching a story and can
challenge writers’ abilities to
write multidimensional char-
acters. It can also reveal if a
writer defaults to stereotypes.
Writing exercises foster your
ability to be creative, write
quickly, self-reflect, and try
new perspectives.
SWEAT THE SMALL STUFF
Then there are exercises that
compel people to focus on a
single message and be con-
cise. This is never easy, as
immortalized by 17th-cen-
tury inventor, mathemati-
cian, physicist, and writer
Blaise Pascal: “I have made
this letter longer than usual,
only because I have not had
the time to make it shorter.”
Plot Summary
Whether it’s a short story,
personal essay, or novel, Plot
Summary forces writers to
find the central idea of a
piece. This exercise is par-
ticularly helpful when devel-
oping materials writers will
use in pitching, such as syn-
opses and query letters.
First, writers are given 30
minutes to summarize a
piece they’re working on in
200 words. Next, they work
for another 20 minutes to
pare the description down
to 100 words. Finally, they
have 20 minutes to shorten
it to no more than 50 words.
All three can be read aloud
for comparison and critique.
If writers find this exercise
too challenging, it could
indicate a greater problem
in the story itself.
Six-Word Whatever
Last, but not least, is Six-
Word Whatever. Writers are
often advised to strip out
adverbs, but what if they
have to remove everything
but six words and still tell a
compelling and complete
story? While the true origin
of the Six-Word Novel may
not be as romantic as Ernest
Hemmingway winning a
bar bet with his famous ver-
sion – “For Sale, Baby
Shoes, Never Worn.” – the
exercise is an effective one.
AWG has featured Six-
Word Science Fiction, Six-
Word Romance, and
Six-Word Memoir. This is
more challenging than it
may seem. While the first
successful result can take
some time, it usually leads
to many variations. Giving
writers 30 or 40 minutes to
writermag.com • The Writer | 17
pen several versions and
asking them to read their
top three always makes for
fun sessions.
Writing exercises foster
your ability to be creative,
write quickly, self-reflect,
and try new perspectives.
Whether in a group or on
your own, try these exer-
cises to give your writing the
workout it needs.
Jennifer L. Blanck is a freelance
writer who has been a member of
the Arlington Writers Group since
2008. Her writing has appeared
most recently in Christian Science
Monitor, Entropy, Toastmaster,
Whole Grain, and Wine Business
Monthly. You can find her on Twit-
ter and Instagram @jlblanck.
Michael Klein is a founding mem-
ber of the Arlington Writers Group
and has led it for more than 10
years. He has penned and ghost-
written hundreds of articles and
speeches and is interested in
hearing about your writing exer-
cise experiences @mkleinwrites
on Twitter.
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 ,Ⱦ
you’re a genre writer, do you
pin down exactly what you’ll
write beforehand: romance,
mystery, sci-fi, fantasy, horror? Many
writers do; their genre is their brand.
But this isn’t true of every writer who
writes a book that falls into a particular
genre. Maybe their novel shifts toward
science fiction as they write it. Maybe,
as their imagination runs full steam
ahead, they find they’re writing horror.
If you find yourself writing such a
novel, how closely should you pay
attention to traditional conventions of
that genre? Can you still find success if
you depart from typical genre conven-
tions as needed to tell a good story?
And, finally, what’s all this fuss
about literary genre novels: Literary
thrillers, literary sci-fi? Literary histori-
cal novels? What makes these so-called
“literary-genre hybrids” literary in the
first place?
Let’s start by considering genre
itself, its appeal, its conventions, and
how to handle said conventions. Let’s
hear what the experts say about four
types: thrillers, speculative fiction, his-
torical novels, and YA.
)ɁQȼLɆJ\ɇXɊJȽQɊH
What attracts writers to different genres?
According to Tom Franklin, the
two biggest influences for his thriller
Cafe Racer/Shutterstock
Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter were
George Pelecanos and Dennis Lehane.
“Both are ‘crime’ writers, but both use
‘crime’ as a lens through which to
study human behavior,” says Franklin.
“Their books are not about ‘who done
it’ as much as about ‘why did they do
it?’” He goes for the latter as a writer,
plumbing psychological depths in his
characters. Still, he wants his book to
be viewed as more than a thriller. “I
don’t really like being pigeon-holed
into being one kind of writer or
another,” he says.
Audrey Niffenegger’s The Time
Traveler’s Wife is catalogued as several
genres: fantasy, science fiction, and
romance. Niffenegger sees the novel as
closest to science fiction, and, yet, she
says, “the most correct (and vague) cat-
egory would be speculative fiction. But
fiction that sits firmly in the [sci-fi]
genre could also fit that description.”
What drew her to speculative fic-
tion is her enjoyment of what-if
thought experiments: “What if a lady
married a time traveler? What if your
aunt is a ghost? What if the afterlife is
an enormous library?” She values
speculative fiction for the way it
“allows writers to play, to be very free.
It mutates, it is rebellious.” Influenced
by such writers as Richard Powers,
Henry James, and Donna Tartt, all of
writermag.com • The Writer | 19

Excerpt: Endangered
Concrete can rot. It turns
green and black before
crumbling away.
Maybe only people from
Congo know that.
There was a time when I
didn’t notice that sort of
thing. When I was a little
girl living here, it was a
country of year-round green-
ery, of birds streaming color across clear skies. Then,
when I was eight, I left to live with my dad in America,
and ever since then coming back to stay with my mom
each summer meant descending into the muggy and
dangerous back of nowhere. The fountain in down-
town Kinshasa, which I’d once thought of as the height
of glamour, now looked like a bowl of broth. Bullet
holes had appeared up and down it, and no one I
asked could remember who had put them there. When
I looked closely, the pockmarks overlapped. The Demo-
cratic Republic of Congo: Where Even the Bullet Holes
Have Bullet Holes.
Kinshasa has ten million people but only two paved
roads and no traffic lights, so the routes are too
crowded to get anywhere fast. Almost as soon as the
driver left the house to take me to my mom’s work-
place, we were stuck in traffic, inching by a barricade.
A police roadblock wasn’t common, but not all that
unusual, either. Some of the Kinshasa police were for
real and some were random guys in stolen uniforms,
looking for bribes. There was no way to tell the differ-
ence, and it didn’t much change the way you dealt
with them: Show your ID through the windshield. Do
not stop the car. Do not roll down the window. Do not
follow if they try to lead you anywhere.
A man was approaching each car as it slowed
down. At first I thought he was a simple beggar, but
then I saw he was dragging a small creature by its
arms. I crawled over the gearshift and into the front
seat to see better.
It was a baby ape. As the man neared each car, he
yanked upward so that it opened its mouth into a wide
grin, feet pinwheeling as it tried to find the ground.
The man had a lame foot but got around agilely, his
scabby stump pivoting and tilting as he maneuvered.
Behind him was a rusty bike with a wooden crate
lashed to the back, which he must have been using to
transport the ape.
Excerpt from Endangered © 2012 by Eliot Schrefer. Used with permission
from Scholastic Press.
whom she finds “original and rigorous in their freedom,
language, strangeness, and brilliance,” she feels freed up,
she says, “to pursue my own ends.”
For Rene Steinke, author of the historical novel Holy
Skirts, “It was not so much the genre as the fact that I fell in
love with the baroness and the [early 20th century] time
period.” As a graduate student, Steinke was captivated by
the Baroness Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven’s intriguing
mix of personae: “a poet, collagist, Dadaist, nude model,
fashion avatar, sexual libertine, and provocateur,” who was
“ahead of her time in the ways she thought about gender
and sexuality and poetry and art.” Steinke felt compelled to
tell her story.
Some of Steinke’s favorite historical novels are Jeanette
Winterson’s The Passion, Toni Morrison’s Beloved, and Peter
Carey’s True History of the Kelly Gang. “Each of these novels
translates the historical events/time period in a way that
speaks to a contemporary reader; each novel has a particular
kind of language that seems invented for this purpose, and
so the novels strike me as both historical and contemporary
at the same time,” she says.
One final genre – or is it a genre? – is YA fiction. You can
certainly find the designation “YA genre” all over the inter-
net, but Eliot Schrefer, author of the YA novel Endangered,
assures us this genre designation is a misnomer. “I wouldn’t
really call YA a genre,” he says, “at least not in the way that
romance and thriller are genres. It’s an age category, and the
only limit to writing YA is that the book has to be con-
cerned with the experience of being a teenager.” YA can
include a number of genres, such as romance, fantasy, and
mystery, he says.
Schrefer says he’s “long loved survival stories like Gary
Paulsen’s Hatchet.” The storyline, premise, and style of this
YA novel meet his highest standards for a good novel: “It’s
about a kid in the wilderness, trying to survive after a plane
crash. Take away the trappings of family and civilization
from a kid, and their survival techniques – and existential
concerns – are the same as an adult’s. In spare and beautiful
language, Paulsen got to the heart of what it means to be
alive at all.”
Schrefer began his novelistic career by writing two books
for adults, but then he was invited by Scholastic to propose a
book outline for The School for Dangerous Girls – they
approved it, and, he says, “suddenly I was writing for teens.”
He’s glad of his commitment to YA. As an author, he
believes he’s able to do his best writing in this area. “I think
my writing improved once I started writing YA. I was murk-
ier, more arch, and less vulnerable when I was writing for
adults. I don’t think I’ll ever go back.”
*ȽQɊHFɇQɎHɆWɁRɆV
If you’re writing genre fiction, how important is it to “stay in
your lane” and abide by typical genre conventions? How
much room do you have to roam?
 Franklin didn’t actually think about the “thriller” genre
when he wrote Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter. He just wrote
the story he wanted to tell with a “fairly traditional” plot and
structure, “aside from some time-jumps/flashback chapters.”
Any substantive departures he’s made from the standard
genre thriller might be, he says, at the sentence level and “at
the level of psychological detail, making the characters more
vivid, more realistic.”
Like Franklin, Niffenegger didn’t worry about genre con-
ventions when she wrote The Time Traveler’s Wife. Even if
she sees her novel as speculative fiction, she didn’t set out to
match her work with the work of other speculative fiction
writers. “I didn’t worry about that at all. It is important to
have rules, but I didn’t worry about whether my rules
matched anyone else’s.”
In writing her historical novel, Steinke made sure she
Excerpt: Crooked Letter,
avoided one type – a “comprehensive picture of a time
Crooked Letter
period” – and chose a much better one: a story that just
The Rutherford girl had been
“happens to be set in the past.” Rather than a historical
missing for eight days when
novel that becomes little more than “a history lesson,” she
Larry Ott returned home and
says, “I prefer novels that put storytelling, language, and
found a monster waiting in
character in the foreground.”
his house.
To create this second type of historical novel, she had to
It stormed the night
work with her characters at close range. The baroness – a
before over much of the
real person, not a fictitious character – was surrounded by
southeast, flash floods on
famous people like Marcel Duchamp, Man Ray, and Djuna
the news, trees snapped in
Barnes. “One of the conventions I’ve seen in some historical
half and pictures of trailer homes twisted apart. Larry,
fiction,” says Steinke, “is the tendency to situate the story-
forty-one years old and single, lived alone in rural Mis-
telling near a famous historical figure or event. The name of
sissippi in his parents’ house which was now his
the famous person or the mention of the event automati-
house, though he couldn’t bring himself to think of it
cally conjures up images or ideas that the reader already
that way. He acted more like a curator, keeping the
knows well, and the fiction isn’t doing the work.”
rooms clean, answering the mail and paying bills, turn-
As a novelist, Steinke thought it her job “to imagine
ing on the television at the right times and smiling
these characters apart from the well-worn anecdotes sur-
with the laugh tracks, eating his McDonald’s or Ken-
rounding them that had already been repeated several
tucky Fried Chicken to what the networks presented
times in nonfiction.”
him and then sitting on his front porch as the day bled
“I wanted the reader to feel as if they were meeting this
out of the trees across the field and night settled in,
person for the first time,” she says.
each different, each the same.
Through her research, she tried to “imagine how this
It was early September. That morning he’d stood on
person might have spoken, or what they might have done,
the porch holding a cup of coffee, already sweating a
given the evidence.” The more she could use her
little as he gazed out at the glistening front yard, his
imagination, the more she could be faithful to her story.
muddy driveway, the barbed wire fence, the sodden
What partly attracted her to the baroness were the “holes”
green field beyond stabbed with thistle, goldenrod,
in her biographical record, providing a fertile field for the
blue salvia and honeysuckle at the far edges, where
imagination. She began by researching the primary
the woods began. It was a mile to his nearest neighbor
sources, but, says Steinke, “I need to imagine enough of the
and another to the crossroads store, closed for years,
story that it can’t all be fact-checked. In other words, it’s
and the blacktop.
really important for me to honor the fictional part of his-
At the edge of the porch several ferns hung from
torical fiction.”
the eave, his mother’s wind chime lodged in one like a
As to YA conventions, Schrefer believes his YA novels are
flung puppet. He set his coffee on the rail and went to
typical in their pacing. “My YA works do move at a faster
disentangle the chime’s slender pipes from the leaves.
clip than my adult works, and I think that’s true for most YA
From Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter, by Tom Franklin, published by William
novels.” But his work does vary from YA conventions in at Morrow. Copyright © 2010 by Tom Franklin. Reprinted courtesy of
least one way: “There’s also a tendency for YA novels to HarperCollins Publishers.

writermag.com • The Writer | 21


Excerpt: Holy Skirts
Two men standing at the
lamppost glared at her. She
sucked at the cigarette,
leaned back, and blew out a
gorgeous geyser of white.
She sat down on the
bench and studied the city
roses on the bush, red and
turning in the wind like little
wheels. . . .
There had been a string of afternoons Elsa lay in
bed smoking, staring out the window at the crowds on
the street, willing him to appear. Then her longing for
him grew barbed. How could he allow her to worry like
this? How could he leave her with so little cash? She
had begun to worry only when she saw the buds on
the trees. Since then sightings of him teased her wher-
ever she went. Going down the stairs of the train plat-
form, the back of his head; in a café window, his
profile; in the mirror just behind her reflection, his
face. Weeks ago, she’d almost kissed a man because
he wore a gray, creased hat like one Josef liked to
wear, and she followed a tall man with dark hair all
the way to the river, past the chophouses and saloons,
pretending it was him. She knew it was unlikely, but
she couldn’t help the sightings—some physical reflex
jarred by hope.
She stood up and lit another cigarette, held the
smoke for a moment in her mouth and nose. Two
women on the pebbled path turned their heads away
from her, their wide-brimmed hats tilting into plates.
The shorter man suddenly stood in front of her.
“You know, that’s not pretty.” He nodded to the
cigarette.
“Why should it be?” She blew smoke into his face.
He eyed her blue fingernails, then hit her hand so
the cigarette fell into the grass. The smoke curled up
through the green blades.
“Scheisse!” she yelled. Since Josef had left, it
seemed strangers felt they’d been given orders to tor-
ment her, as if her solitariness were writ large on her
forehead, some kind of bull’s eye for men who liked to
throw darts.
From Holy Skirts, by Rene Steinke, published by William Morrow. Copyright
© 2005 by Rene Steinke. Reprinted courtesy of HarperCollins Publishers.
22 | The Writer • May 2018
include romance of some sort, though that’s by no means
absolute.” As a writer, says Schrefer, he’s just not interested
in love and romance. As a human being, he’s interested in
both, but his “writer brain” doesn’t go there. “So I guess
that’s one way I vary from the YA tendency.”
nȤLɌHɊDɊ\ɤJȽQɊH
As with most things, clearly with genre writers, one size
doesn’t fit all. But what about a literary-genre novel? What
makes a genre novel literary in the first place?
For some writers, the term literary suggests work that
exceeds the surface level of the story or novel in some ways.
Franklin’s Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter has been called “a
literary thriller.” For Franklin, the term literary “simply
means that as much, or more, emphasis is put on the writing
as on the plot. That is, the way a novel is written/structured
is as important as what happens.” Though his own novel is,
overall, traditionally plotted and structured, he also uses a
more complex narrative technique (via flashbacks and time
jumps) than one might find in an ordinary genre thriller. He
says this takes us back to the old question of which is more
important: “the tale or the telling of it?” Sometimes, says
Franklin, “how it’s told is crucial to what is told.”
He cites as an example Faulkner’s The Sound and the
Fury. “The first time you read this, it makes no sense. In no
way is this novel ‘commercial.’ It’s a big, shaggy literary bear.”
But beyond complex narrative technique, there is also style,
says Franklin. “Also, obviously, literary fiction focuses more
keenly on the sentence” – as does his novel.
A novel might also be considered literary if it has the-
matic substance. For Schrefer, Endangered certainly seems
to fit the “literary” category. “It’s a survival story about a girl
surviving wartime in the Congo with an orphan ape by her
side, but the novel is as much about how humans treat ani-
mals, and other humans, as it is about the interplays of char-
acter and event,” he says. These thematic ideas make the
story “literary,” says Schrefer, yet he isn’t completely happy
with this term; in fact, he claims an “enduring squeamish-
ness” about the way it’s applied. “I think reputation and per-
ceived worth are often accidents of fate,” he says. Such
accidents, he says, depend on “who reviewed the book early
on, which award committees were interested in certain sorts
of fiction that year, etc.”
Steinke says that others have called Holy Skirts a literary
historical novel, but she says the term literary is subjective.
But for her, a literary novel “includes an inventive use of
language and a complex exploration of character and ideas.”
Story is also important, and she distinguishes it from plot.
“[Stories] could be unfolding in ways that are nearly entirely
internal to the character, in ways that most people usually
don’t consider ‘plot,’” she says. Still, while others also tend to
list these qualities as literary, Steinke often finds these same
qualities in works categorized as genre, science fiction and
suspense among them. In the MFA program she teaches in
at Fairleigh Dickinson University, she works to show her

7ȡ3ȫ )Ȫ2ȥ
students “how good writing transcends genres and labels.”
Niffenegger notes that the literary category is “the presti-
gious one,” and there are several issues to consider. Being a

3Ȫ2ȫ
visual artist, with her training in drawing, photography,

7Ƞ(
painting, and printmaking, she thinks like a visual artist. “In
the visual arts,” says Niffenegger, “the categories are slippery.
An artist might be described in terms of style, medium,
period, or who they hung out with; however, artists often try
to elude categories and labels because they can be limiting
and artificial.” It’s different in publishing, she notes. Several
things are going on with the “literary” label, some of it mar- (ɄLɇW6ȻKɊHȾHɊ
keting – but not limited to this. “In the world of writing and “I often advise my YA writing students to
publishing, categories are often used to sell books, to deter- cut their first five, 10, 50 pages, and start
mine whether a writer is eligible for a prize, to bestow pres- the story wherever the high-octane
tige.” For her, when fiction is called “literary,” this particular material begins.”
category simply means that this book “is very well executed,
and it concerns serious things. Sometimes it means: This
does not fit in any of the obvious genres.” $ɍGɊHɑ1ɁIȾHɆHȿJȽUȒ
She does point out that in history, “categories were less “It’s always about people, no matter
constraining.” Writers back then, says Niffenegger, “might what sort of story you are telling. Create
romp through all the genres. Now, when a genre novel is convincing people, and then see what
excellent, the literary category comes to extract it from its sort of story they want to be in.”
humble genre beginnings.” For instance, she notes that
Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, Henry James’ The Turn
of the Screw, and Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca are all placed 7ɇP)ɊDɆNɄLɆ
in the literature section of a bookstore, whereas they could “Read and read everything. Not just in
be simply categorized as ghost stories or mysteries. Good your genre.”
novels, regardless of genre, are “a surprising and complete
world where we are privy to the thoughts and doings of
people we come to care about and compelling ideas ren- 5ȽQȽ6ɌHɁQɃHȒ
dered in language that opens and blooms in the reader’s “If you’re including a well-known
mind and resonates for some time after the book has con- historical figure, make sure that figure
cluded.” All in all, we shouldn’t distinguish between “liter- feels credibly ‘alive’ by fully imagining
ary” and “genre,” Niffenegger believes. We should simply your own version of that character.”
look for greatness.

7ȽOɄLɆJJɊHȹWVɌRɊLȽV
If you’re attracted to genre fiction, keep in mind that there
are certain conventions for each genre. But the novel you
write is yours, and it might be a mistake to feel constrained
by certain conventions, even though the blogs you read
about this genre tell you otherwise or the genre novels
you’ve read usually follow these conventions. If you want to
write a great genre novel, whether or not it’s extolled as lit-
erary, then work for richness of character and story – and
beyond that, creative narrative technique, depth of idea,
and a gripping prose style, down to the sentence itself. A
great novel, genre or not, grabs us because it has these
things – it’s unique and it’s “new” – which is, after all, what
“novel” means.

Jack Smith is the author of four novels, two books of nonfiction, and
numerous articles and interviews.

writermag.com • The Writer | 23

 LEARNING AS
YOU LAUGH
GRAPHIC NONFICTION BOOKS
CONVEY FACTS IN FULL COLOR.
BY MELISSA HART

24 | The Writer • May 2018

 At first glance, the topic of rhetoric doesn’t inspire a belly laugh.
Still, when professors Elizabeth Losh and Jonathan Alexander
wrote the script for their comic book Understanding Rhetoric,
they found themselves guffawing over bottles of wine in Alexan-
der’s kitchen, reading aloud in the voices of the characters they’d
created and playing around with sight gags that would help uni-
versity students speak and write more effectively.
Undergraduate composition students have responded “I became completely obsessed with her,” Wilgus
with gratitude. “Often, teachers will assign books in explains. “I read decades of Wright family correspon-
writing classes that don’t get read because people feel dence in the public domain – letters to her brothers over
like they’re there to write,” Losh explains. “But students the course of their career. Katharine was hugely impor-
have been extremely positive about the book. It’s nice to tant; women family members kept early aviators’ lives
hear that they actually read it.” running while they were flying around in these ridicu-
Vibrant illustrations explode from the pages of lous machines.”
Understanding Rhetoric. The authors become comic nar- Often, authors of graphic nonfiction books choose a
rators, explaining the principles of compelling commu- narrator to lead people through a story designed to con-
nication succinctly. At times, they draw on narratives of vey information in an entertaining manner. Wilgus
superheroes and campus infestations of wild coyotes to begins with an outline of what has to be documented –
help make their points about persuasive writing and col- facts and breakdowns of scientific principles – and
laborative learning. “Sometimes, seeing a comic book, thinks about how she’ll structure them on each page.
students think they’re being given remedial material,” She submits text to
Losh says. “But everything in our book is comparable to the artist (Molly
a traditional textbook on the subject.” Brooks, in the case
Call them comic books, graphic guides, or graphic of Flying Machines)
nonfiction – the genre speaks to readers of all ages who and they dialogue
appreciate the blend of quirky imagery and text in sto- back and forth
ries designed to convey information on topics that range about characters,
from coral reefs to the history of flight, from explora- text, and how to
tions on Mars to the Serbian refugee crisis. Remedial? convey scenes in
Absolutely not. Difficult to write? Absolutely: Losh panels on the page.”
describes nonfiction comic book writing as “the hardest “Unlike film,
kind of writing you can do.” there’s no industry-
For those wanting to study the craft, the quintessen- standard format for
tial textbook is Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art, comics scripts, so
by Scott McCloud – itself a graphic nonfiction book that some writers
explains how to use narrators and story structure in include more visual
conjunction with imagery in traditional comic book direction than oth-
frames. McCloud went on to write Making Comics: Sto- ers – and some art-
rytelling Secrets of Comics, Manga and Graphic Novels. ists appreciate that
more than others,”
Panels from Flying Machines:
Narrators shape the story Brooks says. How the Wright Brothers Soared.
Alison Wilgus is the author of Flying Machines: How the “Everyone has dif-
Wright Brothers Soared, written for upper middle-grade ferent preferences, and if you know your artist-collabora-
Left: durantelallera/Shutterstock

readers. “You want to convey a lot of information in a
kid-friendly way with a narrative that builds momentum,”
she explains. To do this, she decided to tell Orville and
Wilbur Wright’s story – parallel to the history of flight –
from the point of view of their younger sister, Katharine.
tor ahead of time, it can be helpful to check in and ask
what they’d prefer: barebones page breakdown with dia-
logue? Panel-by-panel ‘camera direction?’ Little thumb-
nail drawings of where you think panels should go? No
one’s going to see the script except the writer, artist, and

writermag.com • The Writer | 25

 editor, so you’re the only ones who need to be able to read
and understand it well enough to turn it into a comic.”
Not all nonfiction comics are humorous, but plenty
of lighthearted moments balance out the scientific
information in Wilgus’ and Brooks’ Flying Machines.
“For me, all the humor comes when I get to write the
dialogue,” Wilgus says. “In Katharine’s case, I kept a list
of funny things she would say in her letters – turns of
phrase like ‘scarce as hens’ teeth.’ All the best lines in the
book are Katharine’s.”
She notes that even though she’s writing nonfiction,
she relies on fiction techniques such as characterization
and narrative arc to shape the narrator’s story. For
example, in the first panels of Flying Machines, Katha-
rine Wright, dressed in period clothing, is trying to
explain early aircraft to a classroom full of contempo-
rary students who just want to talk about jets. “You
weren’t there, and these conversations wouldn’t have
happened,” Wilgus explains, “so you’re functionally fic-
tionalizing the dialogue.”
She also notes it’s tricky to distill a great deal of infor-
mation into pithy speech bubbles, especially when
explaining a complicated concept. Wilgus worked
closely with Brooks to hone the text in each comic
frame. “Every once in a while, she’d send me a blank
template with my script filling half the page, and I’d be
like ‘Yeesh, OK,” and we’d break it into two pages or I’d
take half the text off the page,” Wilgus says.
Losh and Alexander had the same challenges when
writing Understanding Rhetoric. They themselves were
the narrators in the book, drawn as cartoons. “We found
it hard not to be ‘talkie,” Losh says. “In early scripts,
speech bubbles would fill the entire panel. Jonathan and
I would read as our characters, since we wanted the dia-
logue to sound natural, and then he’d cut words and I’d
cut words, and we’d go back and forth again trying to
cut words whenever we could.”
Their scripts included extensive setting and charac-
ter descriptions, panel by panel, so that the artists
would know exactly how each should look. The script
for panels 11 and 12 from the introductory chapter
read like this:
PANEL 11
“Layout of a commercial block with a series of
storefronts featuring permanent store signs, tem-
porarily painted windows announcing sales and
new products, public notices from the city about
permits, warning signs, commercial billboards,
political advertisements, educational posters,
graffiti, etc. JA and LL are walking by as if win-
dow shopping.
26 | The Writer • May 2018
JONATHAN
For instance, just think about the actual
real-life material SPACES in which writing
occurs...
PANEL 12
The block continues on to a school, where jani-
tors are removing the graffiti and advertising. A
defaced “teacher of the month” sign is being
pulled down by the school principal.
LIZ
All of this writing is public, and yet some
of this writing is done without first seeking
the permission of others. Rules about own-
ership, authorship, and customary behav-
ior may prohibit some kinds of public
writing in certain situations.
Since Losh and Alexander could create new charac-
ters rather than relying on those from history, they paid
particular attention to ensuring that students in the
book represented the diverse demographics at their
respective universities.
“The character Luis is Latino, and Cindy is Viet-
namese American,” Losh explains. “We had a nontradi-
tional student character in the book, as well – Carol,
Cindy’s mom. We thought through their backstories
and motivations. Some of Carol’s experiences are based
on those of students I taught when I was first at U.C.
Irvine, where a lot of students were part of the Viet-
namese diaspora.”
The artists, Kevin and Zander Cannon, contributed a
great deal to characterization in the book as well. Losh
and Alexander discussed the backstory of each student
character with them and gave insight into the habits and
idiosyncrasies of contemporary college students who
filled their classrooms.
“The artists often had great suggestions – visual jokes
and ideas about how to explain concepts more clearly,”
Losh says. “You want to open up the possibility for col-
laboration and creativity. An artist isn’t going to want to
do layouts for something that doesn’t let them express
themselves and be creative.”
Research reflects the reality
Don Brown has been a writer and illustrator of a wealth
of graphic nonfiction books for children and teens for
25 years. Most of his books are short on sight gags and
one-liners, more focused on straightforward descrip-
tions of historical events and people.
He works from home in an office full of drawing
 GRAPHIC NONFICTION BOOKS
TO GET YOU STARTED
tables and large computer moni- Â Feynman by Jim Ottaviani  labor intensive, more labor inten-
tors, with art covering the walls. He  Oil and Water by Steve Duin
sive than a conventional book. But
describes the marriage of words it’s an artistic and intellectual puz-
 Diary of a Reluctant Dreamer
and pictures as magical. “It’s a zle that appeals to me.”
by Alberto Ledesma
unique art form, and I can feel
 Everything Is Teeth by Evie Wyld
good about reaching readers who Be tenacious – and network
wouldn’t otherwise necessarily  The March Trilogy Brown describes the genre of
read,” he says. “[Besides] that, it’s by John Lewis and Andrew Aydin graphic nonfiction as relatively
fun for me.” Â Filmish by Edward Ross new – new in the sense that there
He began his career with Ruth  Fun Home by Alison Bechdel are no hard-and fast rules about
Law Thrills a Nation, a book about  Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi what a book should look like. “If
a young woman who tried, in 1916, you can figure out a way to do it
 Science Comics: Bats: Learning to
to be the first person to fly from Fly by Falynn Koch  differently and better than
Chicago to New York City in one another book, you win,” he says.
 Maus by Art Spiegelman
day. “My daughters were little at “You’re not breaking a canon or
the time,” he says. “I wanted to read  American Born Chinese convention that stands in the way
by Gene Luen Yang
to them about real women who of a reader.”
were brave and heroic and accom- Â El Deafo by CeCe Bell He tells potential graphic non-
plished things on their own. I Â District Comics: An Unconventional fiction writers to be tenacious in
wrote a manuscript, and an agent History of Washington, D.C., honing their craft and pitching to
edited by Matt Dembicki
sold it immediately.” agents and editors. “I’m stubborn.
Since then, he’s written graphic  Palestine by Joe Sacco That’s carried me through,” he
nonfiction books about Dolley  My Friend Dahmer by Derf Backderf says. “You’ve just got to keep at it.
Madison, famous “newsie” Kid  Older Than Dirt: A Wild but True Someone has to write a book.
Blink, the Gold Rush, the 1930s History of Earth by Don Brown Someone has to illustrate a book.
Dust Bowl, Hurricane Katrina, and Michael Perfit Why not you?”
and the book America is Under  The Forgotten Man: A New History Losh reminds writers intrigued
Attack: September 11, 2001: The of the Great Depression (Graphic by graphic nonfiction to read a
Day the Towers Fell. He’s currently Edition) by Amity Shlaes great deal in the genre. “Under-
at work on a graphic nonfiction stand the back end,” she says.
book about the Syrian refugee crisis. For that, his “Look at scripts and learn how to give instructions to an
research took him from his home on Long Island to artist. You have to write text like a movie script and offer
three different refugee camps in Greece. instructions on scene and layouts.”
“I wanted to see with my own eyes the life in a refu- Wilgus cites a large and supportive community of
gee camp, to see their living conditions and what types cartoonists eager to welcome new members. She tells
of people they were,” Brown says. “I wanted to confirm beginners to practice creating graphic nonfiction with a
that the things I read were in fact true and accurately subject they know well. “If you can’t draw very well,
reflected the reality on the ground.” that’s fine,” she says. “If it’s well written, you’ll learn how
At the camps, he picked up small details that he to draw better.”
hadn’t found in his extensive reading back home. “One She urges people to exhibit their work at local comic
of the refugees said they get a lot of donations of shows and ‘zine fests. “Make a little photocopied, stapled
T-shirts, which they don’t need,” he explains. “What book of your comics,” she says. “If there’s someone
they need is diapers for older kids because tweens are whose work you really like, you can trade.” She notes
so stressed out that they’re wetting the bed. And they that this is a good way for graphic nonfiction writers to
need shoes for men. The men in the camps are so bored find an artistic collaborator, as well.
that they wear out their shoes pacing the camps. That “[Creating] comics is a difficult job,” she says. “It’s
speaks volumes.” lonely, but if you can find other people to be on the
Each of Brown’s books takes about a year to create in journey with you, you’ll stick with it.”
a process that includes research, writing, creating a
mock-up, soliciting editorial comments, rewriting, and Contributing Editor Melissa Hart is the author of the forthcoming
drawing all the art. “The creation of the art is the slow Better with Books: Diverse Fiction to Open Minds and Ignite Empathy
part. It takes months and months,” he says. “It’s very and Compassion in Children (Sasquatch, 2019). Web: melissahart.com.

writermag.com • The Writer | 27

 AM E
DAY
8 PRO TIPS FOR SUCCESS
IN THE TABLETOP
GAME-WRITING INDUSTRY.
By Ryan G. Van Cleave
W
hy are more and more writers interested in
working for the tabletop game industry?
Here are three of the top reasons.

One: The market is huge. The tabletop game market – com-

prised of collectible games, miniatures, board games, card and
dice games, and roleplaying games – had nearly $900 million in
North American retail sales in 2014 alone.
Two: The market welcomes beginners. “‘Indie’ is a term
that is as meaningless in tabletop gaming as it is in movies,” says
Ken Hite, the writer for 80+ tabletop games, including Dracula
Dossier, Night’s Black Agents, and the forthcoming fifth edition of
Vampire: The Masquerade. “Almost no games are first made by a
company that’s large enough to call them ‘corporate games.’”
Simply check out how many tabletop games are being offered
up on Kickstarter right now from “companies” that are really just a
couple of people. That’s not even taking into account how many
downloadable tabletop games can be distributed entirely online at
sites like Drivethrurpg.com.
Three: Games are fun.

So if you want to get involved in a booming story-making

industry that’s both fun and welcoming to beginners, here are a
few tips to help out.

writermag.com • The Writer | 29

 TIP 1:
Play Dungeons
and Dragons.

BREAK OUT THOSE POLYHEDRAL DICE

and learn from the granddaddy of them all!
Dungeons and Dragons (D&D) isn’t just
a classic tabletop game, it’s arguably THE
classic one, says Hite. “It all began in
1974 with the publication of three com-
pletely illegible and unplayable booklets
cumulatively entitled Dungeons and Drag- Lose a turn!
ons.” Today, D&D is on the fifth edition,
which Hite says is “very playable, with
sleek, fast, well-play tested rules.” Playing
D&D now is a great way to experience a
game that’s rooted in character and con-
flict versus burdensome rules and glitchy
game mechanics.
TIP 2:
Plus, a 2014 New York Times article Focus on
celebrating the game’s 40th anniversary
identified a number of writers who
the fun.
acknowledge the role that D&D played in
the development of their own storytelling
abilities: George R.R. Martin. Matt Groen-
ing. Junot Diaz. SURE, WORLDBUILDING IS FUN, BUT
Playing D&D helped make them who spending too much time and space on ele-
they are. Now get out there and kill some ments that players won’t interact with?
kobolds in the pursuit of your own better That’s a common error, says Rick Dakan,
storymaking ability. It’s time to be a who teaches “Writing for Tabletop Games”
twenty-sided troubadour! and “Advanced Game Writing” courses at
Ringling College. “Figure out what’s inter-
esting and unique about your game, then
consider how players make choices. If the
interesting part doesn’t line up closely with
actual gameplay, the game won’t be fun or
interesting,” he says.
The most beautiful artwork, complex
rulebook, and cool miniatures won’t matter
if the game ultimately isn’t fun.
 Creating Game Conflict 101
A tabletop game writing activity by Rick Dakan

Game settings should be designed to incite conflict between players. The following activity helps you imagine
what a setting primed for conflict might look like.

1. Pick a real-world place and time, like New York in 1970, Baghdad in 1600, or even your hometown
during the year you were born.
2. Identify at least three separate sources of conflict that aren’t directly related to each other. It might
be rival political factions, a struggle between two influential residents, a natural disaster, or a host
of other things.
3. Now come up with a short summary of potential plot hooks for each of the conflict sources you’ve
selected.
4. Challenge yourself to create a single final plot that incorporates all three hooks.

The outcome? A game setting that’s ripe for conflict – something players will thank you for.

TIP 3: TIP 4:
Study great Don’t reinvent
game writing. Roll again! the wheel.

BESIDES D&D, PLENTY OF OTHER WHY TRY TO RE-CREATE D&D OR

hugely successful games are worthy of seri- another tabletop gaming phenomenon
ous study. Dakan suggests that “the story- when you don’t have to?
telling in Pandemic Legacy is very clever As Hite explains, “Once you dive
and something that could only be accom- deeper into the gaming world, you find
plished in a board game. Robin D. Laws’ how much open content there is or, in
DramaSystem game is not only well written many cases, licensing that is so ridicu-
but provides a perfect model for how to lously easy to get that it might as well be
gamify dramatic scenes from books, televi- considered open content.”
sion, and movies.” Like D&D. Like Fate. Like RuneQuest.
Don’t just play these for fun. Pay atten- Hite’s point? “Not only can you make a
tion to WHY they work, and ask other play- game that is your own game, but it’s built
ers what worked for them and why. Take for a game system that plenty of people
notes. Identify the elements of story suc- already play and love.” Talk about a ready-
cess in play. made consumer market waiting for what
A few other games with quality story- you have to offer.
writing? Netrunner, City of Remnants, and Thanks to open-source opportunities,
Dead of Winter. Hite says, “it has NEVER been easier to
make a game that people want to play. It
was always easy to make a game that
nobody wants to play.”

writermag.com • The Writer | 31

 TIP 5:
Explore different
gaming styles.

SOME GAMES – OFTEN AMERICAN –

are characteristically about aggression
and winning, and they often require a
high degree of luck to win. Put simply,
these games have heavy themes and dra-
matic gameplay.
Some examples of highly thematic
games? Risk. Axis & Allies. Arkham Horror.
Other games – often European ones –
typically have indirect conflict, where
instead of fighting other players directly,
you might compete for a pool of resources
or points. In these games, the leader often
finds it harder to stay ahead, which makes
runway victories less likely. These games
tend to be characterized by great artwork
and complex game mechanics.
Examples of these? Settlers of Catan.
Ticket to Ride. Carcassonne.
TIP 6:
Keep an idea
notebook.
WHETHER THIS IS A GOOGLE NOTES
file, a physical diary, or a Word doc, jot
down your ideas as you have them. Hite
says he has a dozen ideas for games in his
head at any one time, so to help keep your
own straight, get them recorded before
new ones crowd in.
An added bonus of this practice is that
if you’re ever in a situation where owner-
ship of ideas is in question, you’ll have
solid evidence to support your intellectual
property.

32 | The Writer • May 2018

 re C ard
Sco
TIP 7:
Playtest. Playtest.
And playtest again.
START WITH FRIENDS AND FAMILY.
Their feedback won’t be as brutal, but
they’ll likely have a few suggestions. If your
game passes muster with these softies,
take it to other gamers beyond your imme-
diate circle and watch as they struggle.
Take notes. Don’t jump in and help – let
them figure it out (or not!). It’s valuable to
see if your rules, mechanics, and plot hold
up without your on-the-spot clarifications.
The last stage is to get complete
strangers to try it out without you around,
and then report back on their successes
and struggles. A good local game store can
likely help set this up.
BONUS TIP:
Befriend your local
game store.
PHYSICAL GAME STORES NOT ONLY
have well-curated selections that you can
inspect, touch, and often test out in per-
son, but they also have game experts with
strong opinions. Use their expertise. It’s
worth spending a few extra bucks at these
stories than shopping at Amazon. I can’t
tell you how many games I’ve learned
about and loved (or not!) at The Dark Side,
my own local comic and game store in
Sarasota, Florida. These places – and the
people there – are pure gold.
Whether your goal is to create the next
decade’s D&D, Magic: The Gathering, or
Apples to Apples, or you just want to
explore the cool world of tabletop games,
the practice of playing, thinking about, and
making your own game can be an invalu-
able learning experience for any writer.
Great games require terrific stories and
compelling thematic elements, just like any
other type of storytelling. You can never
have too much practice at creating intrigue,
action, and audience engagement.
Plus, it’s worth repeating: Games are
fun!
Ryan G. Van Cleave is the author of 20 books,
and he runs the creative writing program at the
Ringling College of Art and Design in Sarasota,
Florida. Web: ryangvancleave.com.
writermag.com • The Writer | 33
34 | The Writer • May 2018
PLOT
STORY
RULES,
Spacewo/Shutterstock; ComicVector703/Shutterstock

DROOLS
 The three crucial storytelling elements
every novel needs to succeed.
BY PHILIP MARTIN
A
writer is basically a story-
teller, said Isaac Bashevis
Singer, winner of the Nobel
Prize for Literature.
On my bookshelves, I
have many books of advice
that focus on formulaic elements of
fiction – plot, conflict, character devel-
opment, and such. But story is much
harder to pin down. As Flannery
O’Connor famously said, “I find that
most people know what a story is until
they sit down to write one.”
As an editor and indie-press pub-
lisher, I encounter many submissions
that have decent plots, likable charac-
ters, required conflict, and all that. But
the manuscripts have a fatal problem:
The storytelling is poor. These works
are headed for the rejection bin.
Beginning writers often believe that
the plot is the clever thing that a writer
does, and so they craft intricate plots –
plots that do not pay off until late in
the story, if at all. The truth is that plot
is like a skeleton; it’s good to have but
has little intrinsic appeal. Story is a
stronger attention-getting device.
Recently, scientists have studied the
power of story to attract our attention,
trigger empathy for characters, and
shape values. It might best to say that
story is essential and elemental, while
plot is constructed and can be some-
what artificial. Both are good and
enjoyable when done well. But story is
closer to the heart – closer to why we
value stories and storytellers.
As Ray Bradbury said, plot is nothing
but footprints left in the snow after your
characters have run by on their way to
somewhere else important to them.
So what makes a good story? A
good story delivers three key elements:
1. Something curiously odd at the
start.
2. Selective and delightful details to
draw out the tale through the
middle.
3. An ending that makes it clear
why this story was worth telling.
Let’s look at a few techniques for
each part.
Intriguing eccentricity
Odd or quirky, it turns out, is naturally
interesting. We are intrigued by some-
thing peculiar. We want to know more
about it.
A story is by definition eccentric; it
is about something different from the
norm. If you want to get published,
something odd should appear in the
first pages of a manuscript to catch the
attention of an agent or editor. It could
be an odd image, a peculiar voice, a
curious incident. Remember, there is
an immense stack of fairly equivalent
works available to any editor. Unless
your story offers a quirky hook, it will
quickly be tossed aside.
If you are going to be eccentric,
why wait to reveal it? A fisherman
doesn’t save his bait ‘til he sees a fish.
He baits the hook before he drops a
line in the water.
writermag.com • The Writer | 35
 Gregor Samsa wakes up and finds he is a giant
insect in Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis. What
could be odder? It loads the story onto a catapult and
hits the launch button on page one.
Dorothy from Kansas is spinning aloft in her house
and on her way to Oz by page three.
In the first line of Charlotte’s Web, Pa walks past the
window carrying an ax, on his way to the hoghouse to
kill a runty piglet.
Some beginning writers think it best to create a
slowly developing sense of what their story is about,
hoping that this will intrigue the reader. However, this
often fails because the reader is just mystified…and
not engaged enough to read on.
The trick is to avoid the predictable incident, the
easy plot point, the comfortable character. To develop
quirky ideas, there are many techniques for brain-
storming, journaling, collecting odd scraps of conver-
sations, always pushing harder to ask “What if…?”
again and again.
Quirks, of course, are just the beginning. Once you
have the reader interested, it’s up to you to embellish
and develop the story.
A story will sink or swim based on the appeal
of these three elements: intriguing eccentricity
to draw us in, delightful details to make us
enjoy the middle course of the story, and a
satisfying conclusion to wrap it up well.
Delightful details
Why do people read fiction? In many ways, readers
want to experience in a story what they experience in
eating delicious food. Joy in eating comes from a crav-
ing not for nutrition but for delightful tastes. Eating is
not about the outline of a recipe; it’s about the pleasure
of tasting what appears on the plate.
The same is true of literary creativity. The details
you put on each page of your manuscript are the spices
that make the words tingle on the tongue of the mind.
The good story is full of distinctive, flavorful details.
The problem is that beginning authors often over-
look the need to create delightfully rich, savory details
in favor of addressing the needs of the plot. In other
words, they organize the menu and serve the food but
forget to spice it properly.
36 | The Writer • May 2018
One good way to develop details is to use more
senses. In the first Narnia book, C.S. Lewis describes
the youngest child, Lucy, entering that magical land
through a wooden wardrobe. The several paragraphs
are full of sensory imagery:
Looking into the inside, she saw several coats
hanging up – mostly long fur coats. There was
nothing Lucy liked so much as the smell and
feel of fur. She immediately stepped into the
wardrobe and got in among the coats and
rubbed her face against them...It was almost
quite dark in there and she kept her arms
stretched out in front of her so as not to bump
her face into the back of the wardrobe. She took
a step further in – then two or three steps –
always expecting to feel woodwork against the
tips of her finger. But she could not feel it.
“This must be a simply enormous wardrobe!”
thought Lucy, going still further in and pushing
the soft folds of the coats aside to make room
for her. Then she noticed that there was some-
thing crunching underneath her feet. “I wonder
is that more moth-balls?” she thought, stooping
down to feel it with her hands. But instead of
feeling the hard, smooth wood of the floor of
the wardrobe, she felt something soft and pow-
dery and extremely cold…
And then she saw that there was a light ahead
of her…. A moment later she found that she was
standing in the middle of a wood at night-time
with snow under her feet and snowflakes falling
through the air.
Another way to develop rich details is to build a
strong sense of place. Too many beginning writers set
their story in a place that can only be called generic,
with few concrete details, and those provided tend to
be stereotypical.
Consider David Guterson’s novel Snow Falling on
Cedars, which takes place on San Piedro Island in
Puget Sound in the 1950s, involving the mysterious
death of an island fisherman and the trial of a Japa-
nese-American man for the crime. The story’s plot
revolves around characters and their actions. But sig-
nificantly, it happens in a place that sets the stage, con-
fines the people, and shapes their interaction.
Here’s how Guterson introduces us to San Piedro:
San Piedro was an island of five thousand
damp souls…Amity Harbor, the island’s only
town, provided deep moorage for a fleet of
purse seiners and one-man gill-netting boats.
 It was an eccentric, rainy, wind-beaten sea vil-
lage, downtrodded and mildewed, the boards
of its buildings bleached and weathered, their
drainpipes rusted a dull orange…Rain, the
spirit of the place, patiently beat down every-
thing man-made. On winter evenings it roared
in sheets against the pavements and made
Amity Harbor invisible.
Writing rich in specificity is a major element that
literary agents or acquisitions editors look for. If I were
an editor at a publishing house reading a passage like
that first glimpse by Guterson of the island of San
Piedro, would I want to read more? Yes – and I’d be
eager to get a chance to publish it.
The satisfying surprise at the end
Does your ending satisfy the reader with surprises? As
writer Carol Bly noted: “An essential difference
between experienced and beginning writers is the
amount of surprise they give us.”
If you want to achieve both satisfaction and surprise
at the end, a good place to start is to identify the main
characters’ desires. In Katherine Paterson’s novel
Bridge to Terabithia, young Jess begins the novel want-
ing to be the fastest runner in the fifth grade. “He had
to be the fastest ... the very best.”
But soon he is thwarted, beaten in a foot race – by a
girl who becomes his friend. As the story moves for-
ward, we learn more about what Jess cares most about.
His true desire is to have a close friend, to be liked and
understood. We share in his desires and challenges, as
the story builds to its surprising emotional conclusion.
A good story will reveal something about important
human needs: love, understanding, friendship, follow-
ing a path of rightness in the world.
Do you know what the core theme of your story is?
This is a logical source for the surprise at the end. The
theme of Bridge to Terabithia is friendship, and what
can be lost and what endures. The surprise at the end
speaks to that theme.
C.S. Lewis wrote, “[Stories are a] series of events:
but it must be understood that this series – the plot, as
we call it – is only really a net whereby to catch some-
thing else.”
That “something else,” said Lewis, is the “real
theme.” Plot’s purpose, he suggested, is to catch the
theme, like a bird in the net, if only for a few moments
in the story. “The bird has escaped us. But at least it
was entangled in the net. We saw it close and enjoyed
the plumage.”
Beginning writers may feel embarrassed to have the
theme too visible, even briefly. You may be afraid that
someone will accuse you of being too moralistic. But
the whole purpose of novel writing, to some extent, is
to look at something important. Pull the theme for-
ward, especially as you shape your ending.
Of course, theme is not a fortune cookie or an
Aesop’s Fable moral. We need to be artful. We need to
create complex characters and develop interesting
challenges for them. But in the end, your story should
speak to something important to you, your characters,
and your readers.
The heart of the story
The three aspects of story I’ve discussed here are not
the only ones needed for good fiction. A story needs
other things too, including a functional plot. But in my
experience, a story will sink or swim based on the
appeal of these three elements: intriguing eccentricity
to draw us in, delightful details to make us enjoy the
middle course of the story, and a satisfying conclusion
to wrap it up well.
Consider Shakespeare’s plays. It’s not the plot, it’s his
storytelling skill that has made these works so beloved
over the ages. He is master of the play of words, the
frolic of fancy, the comic interludes, and many other
techniques that beguile the heavy gait of plot. As poet
Howard Nemerov noted, the clever bard “tells the
same stories over and over in so many guises that it
takes a long time before you notice.”
If you do it correctly, you will attract, delight, and
amaze your readers. A good story will shed new light
on the human condition. As John Steinbeck, another
winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, wrote:
We are lonesome animals. We spend all of our
life trying to be less lonesome. One of our
ancient methods is to tell a story begging the lis-
tener to say – and to feel – “Yes, that is the way
it is, or at least that is the way I feel it.” You’re
not as alone as you thought.
So I recommend that you focus your novel-writing
process on story, not on plot. If you do it well, story
will be always at the core of your strongest writing.
Or, as I’ve said elsewhere: story rules, plot drools.
Philip Martin is director of Great Lakes Literary (GreatLakesLit.com)
and runs an indie publishing house, Crickhollow Books
(CrickhollowBooks.com). He is a past acquisitions editor for The
Writer Books, when he worked with many prominent authors,
agents, and editors. His most recent book of literary advice is an
expanded edition of How To Write Your Best Story; this article is
drawn from it. He is also the author of A Guide to Fantasy Literature
and The Purpose of Fantasy. He lives in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
writermag.com • The Writer | 37
LITERARY SPOTLIGHT INSIDE LITERARY MAGAZINES
BY MELISSA HART

The Forge Literary Magazine

This inclusive journal offers a wealth of opportunity
for both writers and editors.

J
ohn Haggerty, founding editor of
the 2-year-old literary magazine
The Forge, worries about people
who are forced to abandon their
writing because of careers and
family. To encourage and showcase
their talents, he and his fellow editors
launched the 2018 Forge Fellowship
for writers over 50 years old. Winners
receive $500 and the opportunity to
read and edit for the magazine over a
year. Forge editors offer a separate fel-
lowship to a writer of color.
“We decided upon the two initial
Fellowship categories because we
want to be more active agents in
encouraging and facilitating diversity
in the literary community,” they note
on their website.
Volunteer editors from the interna-
tional writers’ forum “Fiction Forge”
contribute their vision to this digital
publication. A rotating selection of edi-
tors chooses one piece of fiction or
nonfiction for publication every week.
The website also includes “wish lists”
from current editors.

Tone, editorial content

Haggerty appreciates submissions that
show a writer’s willingness to go to dif-
ficult and painful places. “That’s really
where the art is,” he observes. “Nonfic-
tion, especially, hinges on telling some
sort of deep truth that you’ve discov-
ered in your own life. That takes a lot piece, to bring something new into As an example, he points to “Rain” by
of courage. When we see that, it really the world even though someone Tricia Amiel (10/23/17), which begins:
stands out.” might say that it’s ridiculous and
He sees that same sort of bravery in makes no sense,” he explains. “It’s a “So I’m sitting there, in the
skillful fiction writing. “Since it’s willingness to go to a difficult place, deepest funk, flipping through
invented, you have to have the cour- to do something that people haven’t the channels with the remote.
age to really inhabit that fictional seen before.” Some made-up blonde shows
38 | The Writer • May 2018
 up, talking about Russian
women being sold as sex slaves.
‘Shocking story at eleven.’ I flip
again, and another blonde
appears, something unbeliev-
able this time – some brother
getting the shit beat out of him
‘cause he’s in the wrong neigh-
borhood. These people on the
TV don’t live nowhere ‘round
here, I know that. Else they
wouldn’t have the heart to be so
damned surprised all the time.”
“The story doesn’t tie everything up
in a nice bow,” Haggerty says. “But
there’s something there that happens,
and it feels like a profound shift and a
reason to read that story.”
Contributors
Forge editors published author Nahid
Rachlin’s piece “Three Sharp-Edged
Memories” (1/23/17), about a Persian
woman revisiting three traumatic rec-
ollections of her childhood in Iran.
Haggerty selected this particular piece.
“It’s strong and visceral writing,” he
explains. “It would have pushed me to
the edge to write it.”
He also points to Natalia Theodor-
idou’s “The Emptiness Machine”
(4/3/17) as the type of fiction he likes
to highlight. The story begins, “You’d
have thought it was a mad scientist
who gave me the Emptiness Machine,
but that’s not true. It was a poet.” He
notes that the piece could almost be
classified as speculative fiction, on the
edge of experimental.
Generally, Haggerty and other edi-
tors at The Forge don’t publish genre
writing – submit plot-driven ghost sto-
ries and zombie stories elsewhere. “But
if a piece includes good characteriza-
tion and a strong theme, we’d definitely
be willing to print that,” he says.
Advice for potential contributors
Haggerty hopes that writers will pay
particular attention to crafting power-
“Our taste is wide-ranging
and eclectic.”
ONLINE.
Genre: Fiction and nonfiction.
Reading period: Year-round.
Length: Up to 3,000 words.
Submission format: Anonymously
online via magazine website.
Payment: $.05/word.
“If it hadn’t been for this conference,
Contact: Current editors, via website. I’d probably still be sitting on a rerun
of The Dating Game somewhere.”
editor@forgelitmag.com. Fannie Flagg, NYT bestselling author
forgelitmag.com.
Santa Barbara
Writers Conference
ful first paragraphs and thought-pro-
voking conclusions. “A lot of times, we
get stories going along really well, and June 17-22, 2018
the characters are good, and the piece
feels like it might be emotionally reso-
Join us for 6 days
nate,” he explains, “and then it seems
beachside, at the
like the writers just trail off. They’ve
Santa Barbara Hyatt
written themselves into a corner and
don’t know what to do.”
If a story concludes ambiguously, as • Workshops
Amiel’s “Rain” does, he wants to see • Agents
that the writer deliberately intended to
leave readers with a sense of unease
• Speakers
and lack of resolution. • Panels
Forge editors appreciate shorter
pieces, particularly flash and micro- • Improve your craft
prose. However, they will consider • Find your tribe
submissions up to 3,000 words. All • Make lifelong connections
pieces must be submitted anonymously
via Submittable.
Readers hoping to have work pub-
lished in The Forge can read prose
selections for free on the magazine’s
© Peanuts Worldwide LLC
website. Additionally, an online
department called “The Smithy”
includes interviews with writers talk- Our
ing about their newly published pieces 46th
and announcements regarding the Year!
winners of the Forge Fellowship. Register online:
Contributing editor Melissa Hart is the
www.sbwriters.com
author of Avenging the Owl (Sky Pony, 2016) and
info@sbwriters.com
two adult memoirs. Web: melissahart.com (805)568-1516
writermag.com • The Writer | 39
CONFERENCE INSIDER
BY MELISSA HART
Kauai Writers Conference
Want a little Hawaiian vacation with your writing education?
This is the conference for you.
I
n November, when most of us settle in for a long,
chilly winter, participants at the Kauai Writers Con-
ference gather at the Marriott Resort to learn and
network, kayak and surf, and stroll across white
sands under palm trees. “We have such a rich and diverse
faculty that writers are torn,” explains conference director
David Katz. “Should they go see a best-selling author or go
to the beach?”
There’s so much to see and do, in fact, that people end up
taking advantage of the conference hotel’s reduced rates for
three days before and three days after the conference – the
better to merge business with pleasure.
The first day of the conference begins with a traditional
Hawaiian blessing and concludes with a luau featuring sing-
ers, dancers, and traditional slack key guitar. “The luau
brings people into the understanding of Hawaiian culture,”
40 | The Writer • May 2018
Katz explains. “We don’t want to be just a conference that
happens in Hawaii. We want to be genuinely Hawaiian.”
What you’ll learn
Master classes on Nov. 5-8 include a four-day focus on
memoir or poetry and four half-days of instruction in
screenwriting, voice in fiction, character psychology, inde-
pendent publishing, and how to find and work with an
agent. “Go to a master class, if possible,” Katz advises.
“They’re all run by people who were specifically chosen
not just as well-known authors but as outstanding teachers
John Sartin / Shutterstock.com
of writing.”
The writing conference, Nov. 9-11, offers a blend of craft
workshops, inspirational presentations, and opportunities to
pitch work to agents and editors. Participants can sign up for
manuscript critiques and consultations as well. These

CONFERENCE:
Kauai Writers Conference
DATES: Nov. 9-11, 2018
COST: From $695
LOCATION: Kauai, Hawaii
CONTACT:
Conference director David Katz,
davidk@kauaiwritersconference.com
kauaiwritersconference.com
sessions take place in gazebos and
nooks overlooking the hotel pool and
the ocean.
To ensure that participants get to
meet with the agents and authors who
will be of most value to them and to
their particular writing project, the
conference offers free phone consulta-
tions prior to registration. (Interested
writers can visit the conference website
for details about these consultations.)
“We’ll ask you about what you’re
writing and whether you’ve published a
book before and get a feel for who you
should meet at the conference,” Katz
explains. “Maybe you should be sure to
connect with Christina Baker Kline or
be sure to have lunch with Jane Smiley.”
Featured presenters
This year, the conference welcomes
best-selling authors Smiley, Garth
• low up-front prices
• paperback & hardcover
• 20-day production
• 25 minimum order
Request a FREE Kit
800- 650-7888, ext. W5
morrispublishing.com/W5
Stein, Alice Hoffman, Sara Gruen,
Kristin Hannah, Scott Turow, Baker
Kline, and others. Ellen Bass will speak
about the power of metaphor in poetry
and prose, while Kaui Hart Hemmings
will teach writers how to create a sense
of place. Jeff Arch will give a talk titled
“How a Schoolteacher wrote ‘Sleepless
in Seattle,’” while Stephanie Cabot and
Emma Sweeney will discuss “The
Agent/Author/Publisher Triangle.”
Independent publishing experts Jon
Fine, April Eberhardt, and Brooke
Warner will be on hand to talk about
exciting alternatives to traditional pub-
lishing. “The reality is that the majority
of people who attend any writers’ con-
ference are probably not going to get a
big advance from Random House,”
Katz explains. “We want to serve a
broad community of writers. Indepen-
dent publishing is not a second choice.
Years ago, there was a real stigma
against self-publishing. Now, because
of e-books, those days are gone.”
Advice for first-time attendees
Katz urges newcomers to spend time
on the conference website, clicking
through the various links and reading
participants’ bios to see what they’ve
written and what they teach. “If you
spend an hour or two going through
our website, you’ll gain a good under-
standing of the opportunities that are
available at the conference,” he says.
Don’t be afraid to grab those oppor-
tunities, he adds, from master classes
to informal discussions in the lush gar-
dens to impromptu walks on the
beach. “All of our attending authors are
just people,” he explains. “They weren’t
born famous authors. They’re here to
share their stories with people who
would like to follow in their footsteps.”
Katz counts as his favorite part of the
Kauai Writers Conference the spontane-
ous interactions and meetings between
faculty and participants. “There’s this
informal openness because we’re meet-
ing at this beautiful place right on the
beach,” he explains. “Everyone just kind
of lets their hair down.”
Contributing editor Melissa Hart is the
author of the middle-grade novel Avenging the
Owl (Sky Pony, 2016) and two memoirs for
adults. Web: melissahart.com.
Creative Writing
Classes in NYC
& Online
GOTHAMWRITERS. COM
writermag.com • The Writer | 41
 MARKETS
COMPILED BY TONI FITZGERALD

Deadline: Check website for exact date.

Entry fee: Check website for fees. Prizes:

By the rules Grand prize winner receives $5,000; the

winner and finalists are considered for rep-
resentation. Contact: American Zoetrope.
Some rules are made to be broken, but in the world of writing con- Email from website. zoetrope.com/contests
tests, that’s not the case. Here are common elements to double check
before you submit your work. You don’t want to be disqualified for a P ANHINGA-ROBERT DANA PRIZE
clerical error.  FOR POETRY Open to all poets regardless
1. Blind submissions are called such for a reason. If the contest you of experience or past publications. Submit a
enter is one of them, make sure your name and other vital details 48- to 100-page collection of poems via reg-
don’t appear anywhere in the submission file. This includes: cover ular mail or online submission manager.
page, title line, and header/footer. Online submission managers Deadline: May 31. Entry fee: $25 for hard
have their own ways of identifying you – trust that they will work. copy entries, $28 for electronic submissions.
Prizes: $2,000, publication by Anhinga
2. Be sure your submission is within the specified word count. Press, and a reading tour of select Florida
Judges may be willing to let 10 or 20 extra words slide, but if colleges and universities. Contact: Anhinga
you’re more than that, definitely make cuts.  Prize for Poetry, P.O. Box 3665, Tallahassee,
FL 32315. info@anhinga.org anhinga-
3. Stick with the theme of the contest you are entering, if there is
robertdanaprizeforpoetry.submittable.com/
one. If you are on the fence over whether your story can be inter-
submit/78852/2017-anhinga-robert-dana-
preted in just the right way to fit the theme, rethink the submis-
sion. Others will write a story with the details in mind, so your poetry-prize
stretch of a tale could get knocked out immediately.
F AURA ESTRADA SHORT STORY
The following contests are a sampling of what the industry has to CONTEST Seeks previously unpublished
offer. You’ll find even more listings at writermag.com, including our short stories up to 5,000 words. Submit
own short fiction contests. using online submission manager. Deadline:
Check website for deadline. Entry fee: $20
per submission. Prizes: Winner receives
$1,500 and publication in Boston Review.
Information in this section is provided to F N P AMERICAN LITERARY REVIEW Runners up may also be published. Contact:
The Writer by the individual markets and AMERICAN LITERARY AWARDS Offers Short Story Contest, Boston Review, P.O.
events; for more information, contact
three prizes for short fiction, creative non- Box 425786, Cambridge, MA 02142. Email
those entities directly.
Subscribers to The Writer have online access to
fiction, and poetry. Submit via online sub- via online form. bostonreview.net/contests 
information on publishers, publications, mission manager only. Opens June 1.
conferences, contests and agents. Go to Deadline: Oct. 1. Entry fee: $15 for one F N P AUTUMN HOUSE PRESS
writermag.com and click on Writing Resources. work of fiction under 8,000 words, one work POETRY, FICTION AND NONFICTION
of nonfiction under 6,500 words, or up to CONTESTS Open to full-length collections
F = Fiction N = Nonfiction P = Poetry
three poems. Prizes: The winner in each of poetry of 50-80 pages and fiction and
C = Children’s Y = Young adult O = Other
category will receive $1,000 and publication nonfiction submissions of 200-300 pages.
F THE WRITER SHORT STORY CON- online. Contact: American Literary Review. Deadline: June 30. Entry fee: $30. Prizes:
TEST Regularly hosted by The Writer mag- americanliteraryreview@gmail.com ameri- Winners in each category receive book pub-
azine. Max 2,000 words. Submit via online canliteraryreview.com/contest lication, $1,000 advance, and a $1,500 travel
portal only. Deadline: Check website. Entry grant to promote his or her book. Contact:
fee: $25 for first entry, $15 for every addi- O AMERICAN ZOETROPE SCREEN- Autumn House Press, 5530 Penn Ave., Pitts-
tional entry on the same transaction. Prizes: PLAY CONTEST Aims to find new cre- burgh, PA 15206. 412-362-BOOK.
First place receives $1,000 and publication ative and compelling film narratives and info@autumnhouse.org
in The Writer magazine. Second place introduce the next generation of screenwrit- autumnhouse.org/contest-submissions
receives $500 and publication on The Writer ers to the leading production companies.
website. Third place receives $250 and pub- The winner and 10 finalists will be consid- F N P BEACON STREET PRIZE Submit
lication on The Writer website. Contact: The ered for representation by various agencies fiction (max 8,000 words), nonfiction (max
Writer. writermag.com/contests and for film option by big-name studios. 8,000 words) or up to three poems. Submit

42 | The Writer • May 2018

by online submission manager. Deadline:
May 1. Entry fee: $10. Prizes: $1,000 in
each category and publication in Redivider.
Contact: Redivider.  Review, P.O. Box 425786, Cambridge, MA
contests@redividerjournal.org  02142. review@bostonreview.net  first 50 pages of an unpublished mystery or
redividerjournal.org/submit/contests/
beacon-street-prize
F N P BELLEVUE LITERARY REVIEW
PRIZES Honors outstanding writing in the
themes of health, healing, illness, the mind,
and the body. Fiction and nonfiction up to
5,000 words, and up to three poems. Dead-
line: Check website for deadline. Entry fee:
$20 per submission, max four submissions.
Prizes: First prize in each genre is $1,000
and publication. Honorable mentions
receive $250 and publication. Submit by
online submission manager only. Contact:
Bellevue Literary Review. 212-263-3973.
info@BLReview.org blr.med.nyu.edu
P BENJAMIN SALTMAN POETRY
AWARD Recognizes a previously unpub-
lished collection of poetry. A 48-page mini-
mum, 96-page maximum. Submit through
online submission manager. Deadline: Oct.
31. Entry fee: $25 per submission. Prize:
$3,000 and publication by Red Hen Press.
Contact: Attn: Benjamin Saltman Award,
Red Hen Press, P.O. Box 40820, Pasadena,
CA 91114. 626-356-4760.
editorial@redhen.org
redhen.org/awards-2/bsa
F P BLACK RIVER CHAPBOOK COM-
PETITION Semiannual contest for unpub-
lished chapbooks of poems or fiction 16-36
pages long. Submit via online submission
manager. Deadline: May 31 for spring, Oct.
31 for fall. Entry fee: $15. Prizes: Publica-
tion, $500 and 10 copies of the chapbook.
Contact: Black Lawrence Press.  dozen separate themes. Work must be at
editors@blacklawrencepress.com  least 40,000 words in length. Books may be
blacklawrence.com
P BOSTON REVIEW ANNUAL
POETRY CONTEST Submit up to five
unpublished poems, no more than 10 pages
total, by regular mail or online submission
manager. Simultaneous submissions not
accepted. Entry fee includes three-issue sub-
scription. Deadline: June 1. Entry fee: $20.
Prize: $1,500 and publication in Boston
Review. Contact: Poetry Contest, Boston
bostonreview.net/contests
F P THE BRIDPORT PRIZE Enter your
previously unpublished poem, short story,
or flash fiction. Poems up to 42 lines, short
stories under 5,000 words and flash fiction
under 250 words. Open to anyone age 16
and older. See website for proper formatting.
Deadline: Check website for deadline.
Entry fee: £8 for flash fiction, £9 for each
poem, £10 per short story. Prizes: Short sto-
ries and poetry: £5,000/£1,000/£500 and 10
£100 prizes; flash fiction: £1,000/£500/£250
and three £100 prizes. Contact: The Brid-
port Prize, P.O. Box 6910, Dorset DT6 9BQ,
UK. Kate Wilson, Bridport Prize adminis-
trator: kate@bridportprize.org.uk  Deadline: May 1. Entry fee: None. Prizes:
bridportprize.org.uk
P BRITTINGHAM AND FELIX POLLAK
POETRY PRIZES Awarded annually to the
two best book-length manuscripts of origi-
nal poetry submitted in an open competi-
tion. Submissions are considered for both
prizes. Submit manuscripts between 50 and
90 pages. Deadline: Sept. 15. Entry fee: $28
per entry. Prizes: $1,000 and publication to
each winner. Contact: Brittingham and Pol-
lak Poetry Prizes, c/o Ronald Wallace, UW
Press Poetry Series Editor, Dept. of English,
600 N. Park St., University of Wisconsin,
Madison, WI 53706. rwallace@wisc.edu
uwpress.wisc.edu/poetryguide.html  three poems for $10. Prizes: All winners will
F N CHANTICLEER BOOK REVIEWS
AWARDS Genre writing competitions for
fiction and nonfiction featuring more than a
published, unpublished, indie, or traditional.
Deadline: Varies depending on award. Entry
fee: $75. Prizes: First-place winners receive a
prize package and marketing package; grand
prize genre winners receive $200; one overall
grand prize winner receives $1,000. Grand
prize winners announced at Chanticleer
Awards Gala. Contact: Chanticleer Book
Reviews. info@chantireviews.com
chantireviews.com
F THE CLAYMORE AWARD Submit the
thriller manuscript of any subgenre. Affili-
ated with the Killer Nashville conference.
Deadline: April 1. Entry fee: $40. Receive a
written critique for an additional $20.
Prizes: Over $3,000 in prizes, plus possible
book advance, agent representation, and
movie deal. Contact: Killer Nashville
Award, P.O. Box 680759, Franklin, TN
37068. 615-599-4032. killernashville.com
F P CRUCIBLE POETRY AND FICTION
Free contest awards unpublished poems and
stories with publication in the literary journal
of Barton College. No simultaneous submis-
sions. Online submissions only. Submit up to
five poems or one story (8,000 words max).
$150 in each category (poetry and fiction)
and publication in Crucible. Second prize,
$100 in each category. Sam Ragan Poetry
Prize of $150. All submissions to the maga-
zine are automatically considered for the con-
test. Contact: Crucible. 800-345-4973.
crucible@barton.edu barton.edu/crucible
P DANCING POETRY CONTEST
Hosted by Artists Embassy International.
Forty lines maximum each poem. No limit
on number of entries. The grand prize-win-
ning poems will be “danced” at the Dancing
Poetry Festival in San Francisco. Deadline:
April 15. Entry fee: One poem for $5 or
receive a ticket to the Dancing Poetry Festi-
val. Three grand-prize winners: $100 each.
Six first-prize winners: $50 each. Twelve sec-
ond-prize winners: $25 each. Thirty third-
prize winners: $10 each. Contact: AEI
Contest Chair Judy Cheung. 704 Brigham
Ave., Santa Rosa, CA 95404. 
dancingpoetry.com/dpfpoetrycontestrules.html
F THE DAVID NATHAN MEYERSON
PRIZE FOR FICTION Open to writers who
have not yet published a book of fiction, either
a novel or collection of short stories. Submis-
sions must be under 8,000 words. Deadline:
writermag.com • The Writer | 43
MARKETS
May 1. Entry fee: $25. Prize: $1,000 and pub-
lication in Southwest Review. Contact: The
Meyerson Fiction Prize, Southwest Review,
P.O. Box 750374, Dallas, TX 75275.
swr@smu.edu smu.edu/southwestreview  shorts. Prizes: $1,000 and publication in the
F DRUE HEINZ LITERATURE PRIZE
Open to writers who have published a book-
length collection of fiction or at least three
short stories or novellas in commercial maga-
zines or literary journals. Eligible submissions
include a manuscript of short stories; two or
more novellas (a novella may comprise a
maximum of 130 double-spaced typed pages);
or a combination of one or more novellas and
short stories. All must be between 150 and
300 pages. Deadline: June 30. Entry fee:
None. Prize: $15,000 and publication by the
University of Pittsburgh Press. Contact: Drue
Heinz Literature Prize, University of Pitts-
burgh Press, 7500 Thomas Blvd., Pittsburgh,
PA 15260. info@upress.pitt.edu upress.pitt.edu
F E.M. KOEPPEL SHORT FICTION
AWARD Submit unpublished fiction in any
style or with any theme. Maximum length of
3,000 words. Send manuscript via regular
mail only. Deadline: April 30. Entry fee: $15
for a single story, $10 for each additional.
Prizes: $1,100 for first place and additional
$100 to the editors’ choices. All winners are
eligible to be published on writecorner.com
and for inclusion in the permanent website
anthology. Additional P.L. Titus Scholarship
of $500 is awarded to the winner if they are
currently attending college. Contact: Koep-
pel Contest, P.O. Box 140310, Gainesville, FL
32614. contact@writecorner.com  contests held every month with various
writecorner.com/award_guidelines.asp
F N P FANSTORY.COM CONTESTS
Website features multiple contests in all
genres running throughout the year. An
independent volunteer community reads
and discusses all entries. Contest entries
receive feedback from readers and other
authors. Deadline: Varies. Entry fee: Varies.
Prizes: Vary. Contact: Email from website.
fanstory.com
F P FINELINE COMPETITION FOR
PROSE POEMS, SHORT SHORTS
44 | The Writer • May 2018
AND ANYTHING IN BETWEEN Submit
1-3 unpublished prose poems and shorts up
to 500 words. Deadline: June 15. Entry fee:
$10 per each set of three prose poems/short-
Mid-American Review for first place. Ten
finalists also receive notation and possible
publication. Contact: Mid-American
Review, Department of English, Bowling
Green State University, Bowling Green, OH
43403. mar@bgsu.edu casit.bgsu.edu/
midamericanreview/fineline-competition
F N GERTRUDE PRESS FICTION &
CREATIVE NONFICTION CHAPBOOK
CONTESTS Submit 8,500-10,000 words of
short fiction, multiple essays, or a self-con-
tained manuscript excerpt. Any subject mat-
ter is welcome, and writers from all
backgrounds are encouraged to submit.
Enter online or by postal mail. Deadline:
Check website for deadline. Entry fee: $17
online. Prizes: $200, chapbook publication
and 25 free copies of the chapbook. Con-
tact: Gertrude Press. gertrudepress.org
F GIVAL PRESS NOVEL AWARD Given
to a previously unpublished literary novel
between 30,000 and 100,000 words. Dead-
line: May 30. Entry fee: $50 per novel.
Prize: $3,000, publication and 20 copies of
publication. Contact: Robert L. Giron, Edi-
tor. Gival Press Novel Award, Gival Press,
LLC, P.O. Box 3812, Arlington, VA 22203.
703-351-0079. givalpress.com
F GLIMMER TRAIN CONTESTS Fiction
themes. Word counts 300-12,000 and cate-
gories include family matters, open fiction,
and short story award for new writers.
Deadline: Varies. Entry fee: Up to $20.
Prizes: Range from $700 to $2,500. Contact:
Glimmer Train Press, P.O. Box 80430, Port-
land, Oregon 97280. 503-221-0836.  the Impress team and a shortlist from which
editors@glimmertrain.org glimmertrain.com
P GUY OWEN AWARD Southern Poetry
Review seeks unpublished poetry. Submit
three to five poems. 10 pages maximum.
Deadline: May 31. Entry fee: $20; includes
one year subscription to journal. Prize:
$1,000 and publication. Contact: Southern
Poetry Review, Guy Owen Prize, Dept. of
Languages, Literature and Philosophy, Arm-
strong Atlantic State University, 11935 Aber-
corn St., Savannah, GA 31419.
southernpoetryreview.com
N HARD TIMES WRITING CONTEST
“Write about a difficult experience in your
life, how you overcame this obstacle, and
how you were changed by it.” Hosted by the
Writers’ Workshop of Asheville. Winning
stories chosen based on originality and style.
Unpublished stories only. Should not exceed
5,000 words. Deadline: May 31. Entry fee:
$25; $20 for members. Prizes: First place:
Choice of two-night stay at the Mountain
Muse B&B, three free workshops, or 50
pages (or 10 poems) line-edited and revised
by editorial staff. Second place: Choice of
one-night stay at B&B, two free workshops,
or 35 pages (or eight poems) line-edited.
Third place: Choice of one free workshop or
25 pages (or five poems) line-edited. Up to
10 honorable mentions. Contact: The Writ-
ers’ Workshop, 387 Beaucatcher Rd., Ashe-
ville, NC 28805. writersw@gmail.com
twwoa.org/contests.html
P HAROLD G. HENDERSON AWARDS
FOR BEST UNPUBLISHED HAIKU
Submit up to five unpublished haiku. Contest
held by the Haiku Society of America. Dead-
line: July 31. Entry fee: $5 per five haiku for
members, $7 per five haiku for nonmembers.
Prizes: $150/$100/$50. Winning haiku will
be published in Frogpond and on the HSA
website. Contact: Henderson Haiku Contest.
hendersonhaikuaward@gmail.com
hsa-haiku.org
F N THE IMPRESS PRIZE FOR NEW
WRITERS Looking to discover and publish
new writing talent. Entries are assessed by
a panel chooses the winner. The panel is
comprised of representatives from the pub-
lishing industry and the writing community.
Deadline: Check website for deadline.
Entry fee: £15. Prizes: Winner gets a pub-
lishing contract and book published in
paperback and ebook forms. Runners up
also considered for publishing potential.
Contact: Impress Books Limited, Innova-
tion Centre, Rennes Drive, University of
Exeter, Devon, EX4 4RN, UK.
rachel@impress-books.co.uk
impress-books.co.uk/impress-prize
F IOWA SHORT FICTION Submit a previ-
ously unpublished collection of short stories
of at least 150 pages. Manuscripts that have
been published in periodicals are eligible.
Authors cannot have a published book of
fiction. Submit by regular mail only. Dead-
line: Sept. 30. Entry fee: None. Prize: Publi-
cation by the University of Iowa Press.
Contact: Iowa Short Fiction Award, Iowa
Writers’ Workshop, 507 N. Clinton St., 102
Dey House, Iowa City, IA 52242.
uipress@uiowa.edu uiowapress.org/authors/
iowa-short-fiction.htm
P JANET B. MCCABE POETRY PRIZE
Submit up to two poems per entry, no lon-
ger than 40 lines each, via online submission
form. Deadline: May 15. Entry fee: $20,
includes a free copy of Ruminate. Prizes:
$1,500 and publication for first place, $200
and publication for second place. Contact:
Ruminate magazine. Email via form on web-
site. ruminatemagazine.com
F Y LEAPFROG PRESS FICTION CON-
TEST Submit unpublished adult, middle
grade, or YA fiction, novella or novel-length,
including short story collections. Minimum
length is 22,000 words. All submitted unpub-
lished stories will be considered for publica-
tion. Email entries only. Deadline: June 15.
Entry fee: $33. Prizes: First prize: publica-
tion offer with an advance, in addition to the
finalist awards ($150 and one or two judge
critiques, permanent listing on contest page).
Contact: Leapfrog Press Fiction Contest.
fictioncontest@leapfrogpress.com
leapfrogpress.com/contest.htm
P LITERAL LATTÉ POETRY AWARDS
Send unpublished poems up to 2,000 words.
All styles welcome and all entries considered
for publication. Deadline: July 15. Entry
fee: $10 per set of six poems or $15 for a set
of 10. Prizes: $1,000/$300/$200. Contact:
Literal Latté Awards, 200 E. 10th St., Suite
240, New York, NY 10003. 212-260-5532.
Email via online form. literal-latte.com
F LITERAL LATTÉ SHORT SHORT
CONTEST Send unpublished shorts, up to
2,000 words. All styles welcome. Deadline:
June 30. Entry fee: $10 per set of three
shorts or $15 for a set of six. Prize: $500.
Contact: Literal Latté, 200 E. 10th St., Suite
240, New York, NY 10003. 212-260-5532.
Email via online form. literal-latte.com
F LORIAN HEMINGWAY SHORT
STORY COMPETITION Submit original
unpublished fiction, no longer than 3,500
words. Only open to writers whose fiction
has not appeared in a nationally distributed
publication with a circulation of 5,000 or
more. Deadline: May 1 for regular entry;
May 15 for late entry. Entry fee: $15 per
story until May 1; $20 per story between
May 1 and 15. Prizes: $1,500 and publication
in Cutthroat: A Journal of the Arts; second
and third place receive $500 each. Contact:
The Lorian Hemingway Short Story Compe-
tition, P.O. Box 2011, Key West, FL 33045.
shortstorykeywest@hushmail.com
shortstorycompetition.com
F L. RON HUBBARD WRITERS OF THE
FUTURE CONTEST Awards short fiction
up to 17,000 words written by emerging sci-
fi, fantasy, and dark fantasy writers. Dead-
line: Quarterly. Entry fee: None Prizes:
$1,000 first prize awarded each quarter; one
of these winners also receives the $5,000
annual “Gold Award” grand prize. Each quar-
ter, second place receives $750 and third place
receives $500. Contact: L. Ron Hubbard’s
Writers of the Future Contest, 7051 Holly-
wood Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90028. Joni
Labaqui: contests@authorservicesinc.com
www.writersofthefuture.com
F MARGUERITE MCGLINN PRIZE FOR
FICTION Submit previously unpublished
works of fiction up to 8,000 words through
online submission manager only. All entrants
receive a complimentary issue of Philadel-
phia Stories contest issue. Deadline: June 15.
Entry fee: $15. Prizes: $2,000, an invitation
to an awards dinner at Rosemont College,
and publication in Philadelphia Stories; sec-
ond place $500; third place $250; both pub-
lished online. Contact: Philadelphia Stories.
contest@philadelphiastories.org
philadelphiastories.org/marguerite-mcglinn-
prize-fiction-0
F N P NEW LETTERS LITERARY
AWARDS Includes the New Letters Prize
for Poetry and Fiction and the Conger Beas-
ley Jr. Award for Nonfiction. All entries will
be considered for publication in New Letters.
Fiction and essays are not to exceed 8,000
words. A single poetry entry may contain up
to six poems. Deadline: May 18. Entry fee:
$24 for first entry, $15 for every entry after.
Includes one-year subscription to New Let-
ters. Prizes: $1,500 for first place in fiction
and poetry; $2,500 for nonfiction. Contact:
New Letters Awards for Writers, UMKC,
University House, 5101 Rockhill Rd., Kansas
City, MO 64110. 816-235-1168.
newletters@umkc.edu newletters.org/
writers-wanted/writing-contests
P OMNIDAWN FIRST/SECOND BOOK
CONTEST Open to writers who have never
published a full-length book of poetry or
who have published only one full-length
book of poetry. Max 120 pages. Judge: Sri-
kanth Reddy. Deadline: June 30. Entry fee:
$27. Entrants who add $3 shipping will
receive an Omnidawn book of their choice.
Prize: $3,000, publication, and 100 copies of
the book. Contact: Omnidawn Publishing,
1632 Elm Ave., Richmond, CA 94805.
submissions@omnidawn.com
omnidawn.com/contest
F THE PETER HINCHCLIFFE FICTION
AWARD Open to Canadian citizens or resi-
dents who have not yet published a first
novel or short story collection. All submis-
sions will be considered for paid ($250)
publication in the magazine. Submit via
online form. Deadline: May 28. Entry fee:
$40; includes a one-year Canadian subscrip-
tion to The New Quarterly. Prize: $1,000.
Contact: The New Quarterly. 519-884-8111
ext. 28290. Email from website.
tnq.ca/contests
writermag.com • The Writer | 45
MARKETS
F N P PLOUGHSHARES EMERGING
WRITER’S CONTEST Open to writers
who have not published a book or chapbook
of fiction, nonfiction, or poetry. Submit
three to five pages of poems or up to 6,000
words of prose. Deadline: Check website for
deadlines. Entry fee: $24. Prizes: $2,000 in
each category and publication. Contact:
Ploughshares. 617-824-3757.
pshares@pshares.org pshares.org
P POETRY SOCIETY OF NEW HAMP-
SHIRE NATIONAL CONTEST Open to
all poets. Winning poems will be published
in the quarterly magazine, the Poets Touch-
stone. Limit 40 lines. Subject and form are
open. Poems must not be previously pub-
lished, have won a prize, nor be currently
entered in another contest. Deadline: May
15. Entry fee: $3 for the first poem and $2
each for others. Entries limited to five
poems per poet per contest. Prizes: First
place, $100. Second place, $50. Third and
fourth places, $25 each. Contact: National
Contest Coordinator, Robert Crawford, 280
Candia Rd., Chester, NH 03036.
poetrysocietyofnewhampshire.org/contest.html
F RED HEN PRESS FICTION AWARD
Awards an original story with a minimum of
150 pages. Submissions accepted via online
submission manager. Deadline: Aug. 31.
Entry fee: $20. Prize: $1,000 and publica-
tion. Contact: Attn: Red Hen Press Fiction
Award, Red Hen Press, P.O. Box 40820, Pas-
adena, CA 91114. 626-356-4760.
redhen.org/awards-2
N RICHARD J. MARGOLIS AWARD
Awards a nonfiction journalist or essayist
whose work “combines warmth, humor, wis-
dom, and concern with social justice.” Sub-
mit at least two articles, published or
unpublished, maximum 30 pages. Deadline:
July 1. Entry fee: None. Prizes: $5,000 sti-
pend and month-long residency at the Blue
Mountain Center, a writers’ and artists’ col-
ony in the Adirondacks. Contact: Richard J.
Margolis Award of Blue Mountain Center,
c/o Margolis & Bloom, 667 Boylston St., 5th
floor, Boston, MA 02116.
award@margolis.com award.margolis.com
46 | The Writer • May 2018
P RIVER STYX INTERNATIONAL
POETRY CONTEST Send up to three
poems, no more than 14 pages total. Submit
online or via regular mail. Deadline: April
30. Entry fee: $20 (includes a one-year sub-
scription to River Styx). Prize: $1,500. Con-
tact: River Styx International Poetry Contest,
3139A South Grand Blvd., Suite 203, St.
Louis, MO 63118. bigriver@riverstyx.org
riverstyx.org/submit/poetry-contest
F P ROBERT WATSON LITERARY
PRIZES Entries must be previously unpub-
lished and fiction entries should be no lon-
ger than 25 typed, double-spaced pages.
Poetry entries can include any number of
poems up to 10 pages. Submit online or by
regular mail. Deadline: Sept. 15. Entry fee:
$14. Prizes: $1,000 and publication in The
Greensboro Review. Contact: The Robert
Watson Literary Prizes, The Greensboro
Review, MFA Writing Program, 3302
MHRA Building, UNC Greensboro, Greens-
boro, NC 27402. tgronline.net/contest
F SATURDAY EVENING POST GREAT
AMERICAN FICTION CONTEST In its
nearly two centuries of existence, the Satur-
day Evening Post has published short fiction
by a who’s who of American authors – ulti-
mately helping to define what it means to be
an American. Submit any genre of fiction
between 1,500 and 5,000 words. All stories
must be previously unpublished. Electronic
submissions only. Deadline: July 1. Entry
fee: $10. Prizes: Winning story will be pub-
lished in the January/February 2019 edition
of The Saturday Evening Post, and the author
will receive $500. Five runners-up will each
receive $100 and will also have their stories
published online. Contact: Editorial, The
Saturday Evening Post, 1100 Waterway Blvd.,
Indianapolis, IN 46202. 317-634-1100.
editors@saturdayeveningpost.com
saturdayeveningpost.com/fiction-contest
P SLAPERING HOL PRESS CHAP-
BOOK COMPETITION Seeks poetry col-
lections by authors who have not previously
published a poetry book or chapbook. Sub-
mit 16 to 20 pages by mail or online. Dead-
line: June 15. Entry fee: $15. Prizes: $1,000,
publication, 10 copies of the chapbook, and
a reading at The Hudson Valley Writers’
Center. Contact: The Editors, SHP Chap-
book Competition, The Hudson Valley
Writers’ Center, 300 Riverside Drive, Sleepy
Hollow, NY 10591. ask@writerscenter.org
writerscenter.org
F N P SNAKE NATION REVIEW YOUTH
EDITION Submit works of poetry (60-line
limit), nonfiction (5,000-word limit), or fic-
tion (5,000-word limit). Any topic will be
considered. Previously published work is not
admissible. Deadline: Check website for
deadline. Entry fee: None. Prizes: Check
website for prizes. Contact: Snake Nation
Press, 110 West Force St., Valdosta, GA
31601. snakeyouthentries@gmail.com
snakenationpress.org/submission-guidelines
P STAN AND TOM WICK POETRY
PRIZE Offered annually to a poet who has
not previously published a full-length collec-
tion of poems. Submission must consist of 50
to 70 pages of poetry, with no more than one
poem per page. Winner will be chosen by
Ellen Bass. Submit by regular mail or through
online submission. Deadline: May 1. Entry
fee: $25. Prizes: $2,500 and publication by
Kent State University Press. Contact: Stan
and Tom Wick Poetry Prize, Wick Poetry
Center, Kent State University, P.O. Box 5190,
Kent, OH 44240. wickpoetry@kent.edu
www.kent.edu/wick/stan-and-tom-wick-
poetry-prize 
F N P TERRAIN.ORG ANNUAL CON-
TEST FOR FICTION, NONFICTION
AND POETRY Submit original fiction or
nonfiction of up to 5,000 words or submit
three to five poems or one long poem of at
least five pages. Submit online only. Dead-
line: Sept. 3. Entry fee: $15 per entry.
Prizes: $500 plus online publication in each
genre. Runners-up may also receive online
publication and a small monetary prize.
Contact: Terrain.org. info@terrain.org
terrain.org/submit/contest-guidelines
F N P TIFERET WRITING CONTEST
Seeks writing that expresses a religious or
spiritual experience or promotes tolerance.

Submit fiction or nonfiction up to 20 pages
or submit up to six poems. Online submis-
sions only. Deadline: June 1. Entry fee: $15.
Prizes: $500 and publication in Tiferet for
best entry in each genre. Contact: Tiferet
Journal. editors@tiferetjournal.com
tiferetjournal.com/2017-writing-contest
P TOM HOWARD/MARGARET REID
POETRY CONTEST Open for poems in
any style or theme. The Margaret Reid Prize
awards poems with rhyme or traditional
style. The Tom Howard Prize is given to the
best poem of any style. Submit through
online form. Deadline: Sept. 30. Entry fee:
$12 per poem. Prizes: $1,500 for each of the
two categories. Ten honorable mentions will
receive $100 each. Top 12 entries published
on the Winning Writers website. Contact:
Winning Writers. 351 Pleasant St., PMB 222,
Northampton, MA 01060. 413-320-1847.

XFMMDPOOFDUFE
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Adam Cohen, president:
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P VIOLET REED HAAS PRIZE FOR
POETRY Submit a manuscript between 75
and 100 pages. Previously published work
is eligible. Deadline: Aug. 31. Entry fee:
$25. Prizes: $1,000 and publication. Con-
tact: Snake Nation Press, 110 W. Force St.,
Valdosta, GA 31601.
snake.nation.press@gmail.com
snakenationpress.org
F WEST VIRGINIA FICTION AWARD
AND COMPETITION Open to West Vir-
ginia residents and students attending school
in the state. Awards unpublished fiction of
up to 5,000 words that fosters an apprecia-

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went from promising to a published and critically

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tion of Appalachian culture and values. The

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submission may not have received any other
award, recognition, or special honor. Dead-
line: May 1. Entry fee: None. Prizes: $500

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first prize and possible publication, $100
each for second and third place. Contact:
West Virginia Fiction Competition, Depart-

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ment of English, Shepherd University, P.O.

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fiction-competition
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writermag.com • The Writer | 47
HOW I WRITE
BY ALLISON FUTTERMAN

Malinda McCollum

S
hort story writer Malinda
McCollum’s work has been
recognized with a Pushcart
Prize, the Plimpton Prize, and
the prestigious Stegner Fellowship. Her
first book, The Surprising Place, winner
of the Juniper Prize for Fiction, is a
collection of linked stories set primar-
ily in Des Moines, Iowa. Deeply affect-
ing, her stories about Midwesterners
and their struggles are engrossing and
full of humanity.
Though the stories in The Surprising
Place take place pre-2000, before tech-
nology became a ubiquitous part
everyday life, her current writing proj-
ect involves present-day stories that
roam up and down the East Coast.
Why short stories?
In Tobias Wolff ’s Paris Review interview,
he says he values short stories for their
“exactitude, clarity, and velocity.” I think
the qualities of “exactitude” and “clarity”
draw many writers to the genre – short
stories allow for a precision that may be
tougher to achieve in novels. But for me,
it’s the term “velocity” that truly captures
the short story’s appeal. A great short
story is urgent, insistent, and propulsive.
It’s like a whirlwind or a whoosh!
On teaching writing
When I was younger, I thought writing
ability was innate – you either have it
or you don’t. Luckily, my foolishness
was tempered by studying with bril-
liant teachers like James Alan McPher-
son. Jim had a way of enlarging the
stories that were up for discussion.
He’d take a draft others might dismiss
as shallow or stupid and – without
relying on empty flattery or intellectual
sleight-of-hand – locate something dis-
tinctive and essential about the piece.
Jim operated on the assumption that
everyone has valuable stories to tell
and that workshops can help writers
discover and evolve those singular sto-
ries. To this day, I try to follow Jim’s
example in the classes I teach.
Midwestern settings
I was born in Des Moines, Iowa, and
lived there until I was 17 and went to
college in California. Since then, I’ve
resided all over the country, but I still
go back to Iowa every summer. It’s a
deeply familiar place to me. It’s also a
mysterious and sometimes maddening
place to me, especially in recent years,
with the state’s political shift toward
bombast and bigotry. In my stories, I
wanted to go beyond the archetypal
image of Midwesterners as clear-eyed
and level-headed – or as provincial and
repressed – and explore characters
with more complexity.
The physical landscape of the Mid-
west fascinates me too, as does the
region’s collection of natural disasters:
floods, tornadoes, and the 17-year
cicadas that pop up throughout my
book. I remember the cicadas emerg-
ing one summer when I was a kid, and
being amazed and horrified by their
non-stop singing and by their crispy
corpses on the sidewalks and in the
trees. Those cicadas transformed an
ordinary landscape into something
unsettling and surreal, and I aimed to
do something similar with the stories
in The Surprising Place.
Creating a linked story collection
I didn’t plan to write a collection of
linked stories set in Des Moines.
Instead, it was a gradual process, as I
found myself revisiting earlier settings
and characters, sometimes years later.
I also started to notice certain images
resurfacing in multiple stories, which
got me thinking about how different
characters’ paths might intersect. My
hope is this indirect approach to
structuring the book has kept the col-
lection from feeling overdetermined
or contrived.
Allison Futterman is a freelance writer based
in Charlotte, North Carolina.

48 | The Writer • May 2018

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extra
You can't find this in print.
EXCERPT: “THE FIFTH WALL”
Sam’s Tackle Box
was wall-to-wall
merchandise,
packed so tight it
fooled most cus-
tomers into
thinking that
everything for sale was already on dis-
play. But Elana Hall wasn’t fooled.
Though the store stunk of bait and
brine, she could still catch the sour
odor of methamphetamine, which Sam
himself cooked regularly in a well-
vented room above the sales floor.
Elana came to the Tackle Box with
her daughter Jeanette every week,
though neither had much affection for
fish. Still, the kid went wild in the
place, and broke away from her mother
as soon as they passed through the
door. Elana, troubled and aching,
paused next to an arrangement of
musky lures and watched her go.
Weren’t children’s senses supposed to
be more acute than adults? Shouldn’t
Sam’s reek and clutter be too much for
her girl? A dim memory surfaced from
her own past, a trip to New York City,
to Chinatown, the smell of fish so
overwhelming that she begged her dad
to return to Des Moines straight away.
The fact that her daughter could han-
dle Sam’s – the fact that she sometimes
seemed to love it – suggested Jeanette
was already leaving childhood behind.
Physical senses dulling, their loss soon
to be offset by increased insight and
guile. A pain pulsed behind Elana’s
eyes. It frightened her, this coming Jea-
nette. This clever spy replacing her
dreamy little tot, who understood and
wanted not much at all.
“Friends!” Sam’s third wife called
from behind the register. Her name
was Janice and she wore studded
wristbands, a leotard, and a long, low
ponytail, as if any minute she might
either punch somebody or pull out a
sticky mat and pop into Downward-
Facing Dog.
Elana allowed a thin smile of antici-
pation. Janice pushed a button beneath
the counter, and they both listened to a
faint bell ring overhead. There was the
solid sound of boots hitting the floor.
A door closing. The ee-aw of the stairs.
Then Sam himself, from behind a
green curtain on the side wall, still
handsome and imposing at sixty. And
Elana as happy to see him as a kid at
the Ceilidh, when he’d grab her to join
a Gordon dance with his now-dead
first wife and her dad.
She moved toward him quickly. But
out from an aisle ran her daughter,
crashing into his legs. Sam lifted Jea-
nette, and she opened up to flaunt her
horrible new braces.
“Mom said they make me look
beautiful!” she squealed.
“Your mom’s a real sweet lady,”
Sam said smoothly. “Your mom’s
something else, that’s for sure.” He set
the girl down. “In fact, I’d like to talk
to your mom in private. I have an idea
for your birthday present that I need
to float.”
“We got some Fuzz-E-Grubs in,” Jan-
ice called enticingly. “I haven’t put them
out yet, but I’ll let you take a look.”
Her daughter rushed to the coun-
ter, and Elana followed Sam through
an aisle of rigs and out a rear screen
door to the Mirage. Thirty years ago
he’d created it by fencing off half his
parking lot and planting oak trees and
grass. The last six months had seen the
addition of motion-sensitive lights
and barbed wire. The lights were
designed to function only at night, but
through the years, the oaks had grown
aggressively, and the Mirage was over-
hung with a dense awning of leaves
that nearly blocked the sun. As Elana
and Sam entered, individual floods
clicked on and spotlighted their move-
ments – her sitting in a ratty mesh
lounger, him hauling himself into the
bass boat he’d parked on blocks.
This was in June, during a summer
when the seventeen-year cicadas
emerged from underground. The trees
were filled with buzz, males drumming
their abdomens while females laid eggs
and died. But in spite of the noise, the
headache Elana had been fronting all
day stepped back. Around Sam, things
settled into place. He took over what-
ever story you were telling so you
could sit down and shut up.
Reprinted with permission of the author.