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Chingonas, Strong Women, Wisdom, Writing

Five Steps to Finding the Right Publisher

Mona Alvarado Frazier
AROHO Foundation
http://aroho.org/home.php

My cell phone screen saver has the dramatic backdrop of the mountains and mesas surrounding Ghost Ranch, just to cheer me up. I still have the AROHO retreat on the mind and the spirit of the women I met in my heart.

These women are “chingonas” “strong women,” in my book. They’re not strong because they were born that way, or Superwomen, but rather they became strong through failure, weakness, trials, and experiences that would defeat many. They learned from these challenges, gathered knowledge along the way, and shared that wisdom with others. That’s what makes them “chingonas.”

What I learned through these women helps me touch my AROHO experience and I hope assists you in some small way.

Each day we chose to attend 15 minute “Mind Stretches.” These were discussions on topics exploring craft, creative process, issues personal to women and publishing. Several of my past posts had to do with the craft of writing, such as Writing on the Edge but today’s post is about publishing.

“You think finding the right partner is a problem? Try finding the right publisher.” Kate Gale

This quote gives you a little insight into the witty personality and honesty of Kate Gale, PhD.  She is Managing Editor of Red Hen Press, Editor of the Los Angeles Review , Past President of PEN and President of the American Composers Forum, LA. She serves on the boards of A Room of Her Own Foundation and Poetry Society of America. She is author of five books of poetry and six librettos including Rio de Sangre, with composer Don Davis.

Kate Gale-Writer, Poet, Publisher
Kate Gale-Writer, Poet, Publisher

Kate’s bio shows us that the woman knows what she’s talking about when it involves writers, poets, and publishing. Her insights into the world of writers is priceless:

“…the most difficult part in getting one’s work out into the world is that you are a cave dweller if you are a writer. You have to come out of your cave, understand the world of editing, publishing, publicity, social media, and you have to talk to people. And you don’t know how. So you go back into the cave angry. And emerge later. Telling people how you aren’t appreciated. That doesn’t make them love you more. You start to seem misanthropic. Writers can be fun. Funny and fun. There is a lot you can learn from writers. About patience mostly.”

Now go grab a pen and notebook, it’s time for some interactive work to help you find the right publisher.

Answers these five questions:

  1. Who are you? Come on you can list more than three items. What are you passionate about? Keep writing until you get to the heart of you.
  2. What does  your story (novel, memoir, poem) want to say? What is your message? Keep writing until you find some universal themes.
  3. Who are the writers in your tribe (genre of writing)?
  • List 5-10 writers you love to read in your genre of writing (most of them have to had published in the last five years). Let’s say the writers/books you write about and love are in the historical fiction genre. Now:
  • What regional, national associations in this genre do you belong to?
  • Have you attended conferences, workshops, seminars in this genre?
  • Do you attend readings in this genre?

4.  Once you find your tribe (in #3), you need to find out how to open and get inside that door. The people you meet should be part of the tribe.

5.  Form connections with authors, editors, agents, publishers you meet in these settings.

  • Meet them one on one. Step out of your comfort zone.
  • Let them know how much their reading, presentation, or book meant to you.
  • Once inside the door, make yourself useful. Volunteer, hold an office, contribute in some way. Be a literary citizen.

Did you fill up at least one side of your paper? If you did, you’re on your way to finding the right publisher for your work. It’s a difficult road to walk as a writer, but with guidance it may be a whole lot easier. Happy travels and happier writing.

Writing

Writing for Change: Activism and Writing

Mona Alvarado Frazier

“You write in order to change the world … if you alter, even by a millimeter, the way people look at reality, then you can change it.”-James Baldwin

“What do you want to change with your pen?” Florencia Ramirez asked when she opened her presentation, “Activism and Writing.”  This thought provoking statement had many audience members perk up.

“How many of you have an issue you carry in your heart where you would like to see change?” Most of us could quickly mention several topics:

  • Violence against women and children
  • Education
  • Race, gender, sexual equality
  • Environmental issues

Florencia writes about water scarcity issues on her blog Eat Less Water. She uses this phrase to explain the concept of conserving the natural resource through farming practices and grocery-buying habits. Water experts predict that by 2025, two-thirds of the world will be experiencing water scarcity.

It’s not an easy task to rivet an audience with information on water scarcity especially since research statistics can be boring and dry. We don’t want to be reminded of school when we read about any of these topics.

water scarcity
water scarcity

We want others to care about the issue and we want to get them to act (change).

So how did Florencia manage to speak and write about this issue  of water scarcity and get several people talking about taking shorter showers, using buckets to capture water, and committing to plant only low water plants? Florencia is doing this by translating her passion for the topic and through that passion she has the reader experience that enthusiasm so it becomes their very own.

Three Elements to Use:

  1. Accessibility: Nest your information in story, use interesting language, poetic devices, give the issue a ‘face.’
  2. Optimism: Focus on the positive when you write your story, make it a hopeful one.
  3. Creative non-fiction: use narrative and storytelling to make your point. Your writing then becomes the change agent for something bigger.

An example of all three elements are found in these two short excerpts from the book that Florencia says changed her life:

Rachel Carson’s “Silent Spring.” The outcry that followed its publication forced the banning of DDT and spurred revolutionary changes in the laws affecting our air, land, and water. The author nested the technical language of chemical fallout and science with eloquent storytelling and poetic language. She writes:

“These sprays, dusts and aerosols still the song of birds and the leaping of fish in the streams, coats the leaves with a deadly film, and to linger on the soil-all this through the intended target of a few weeds or insects.”

“A Who’s Who of pesticides is therefore of concern to us all. If we are going to live so intimately with these chemicals eating and drinking them, taking them into the very marrow of our bones – we had better know something about their nature and their power.”

An excerpt from Florencia’s manuscript in progress, Eat Less Water:

“In black stenciled letters on the sky blue wall I painted the words, “I love you to the moon and back” in my baby daughter’s room. It was a quote from my favorite children’s book. It never failed that when I read this line aloud to my daughter my voice cracked with emotion and tears pushed their way free. Many years later, I read in a very different book, that women and children of South Africa walk the distance of the moon and back seventeen times each day for water. I thought about the words that had been in my daughters first room. I contemplated the little girls carrying heavy pots of water on their heads to the moon and back. Again the tears pushed their way free…”

Start with a story, give the issue a ‘face,’ and write with optimism. We need to hear your activism.

“Optimism brings with it hope, a future with a purpose and therefore, a will to fight for a better world.” Saul Alinsky