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An Evening of Cautionary Tales
A journalist, a columnist, and three book authors shared hard-won lessons on Tuesday, February 12, at our Cautionary Tales evening. The morals of the writers' personal stories "could serve as an inverse gold standard of what 'not to do' for writers," said NWU member Randy Meyers. And Miriam Stein was glad she'd braved the cold and impending storm to attend: "The tips the speakers shared sensitized me to the many issues I should pay attention to in dealing with the publishing world."
Music journalist Peter Gerler shared "take your time" stories: it once took him two and a half years to get one story published, but her persisted because he knew it was good. On the other hand, he once rushed a story submission to meet a prestigious journal's deadline. He regretted the rush: after it was rejected, an editor friend told him it was very good. Lesson: don't send your work in too soon. Make sure it's the best you can do before sending it out.
Cynthia Winfield told a timing story, as well: she'd intended to submit her new book, Gender Identity: The Ultimate Teen Guide, for a Lambda Book Award. But she didn't keep track of the deadline, and missed it. Lesson: keep careful track of important deadlines. She told a second timing story: she once submitted a story but waited so long to follow through that it had been thrown out when she finally did so. She'd kept no backup. Lesson she's never since forgotten: always keep a copy.
Artemis March, author and self-publisher of Dying Into Grace, learned the hard way how important it is, when you hire someone (e.g., editing, indexing, graphic design, website, book cover, marketing), to set not only a billing rate but to clarify precisely what work that rate covers, to vary the rate depending on the skill set required, and to get frequent status reports so that the final bill is no surprise.
Lee Ann Hoff, author of People in Crisis, soon to appear in its 6th edition, shared a story that illustrated the graceful way to switch editors or publishers without, in the process, burning your bridges. It's a tricky balance: on the one hand: "don't go for sweet-talk" from legal departments when you ask for reversion of rights, which you need in order to seek another publisher, but on the other hand: "don't badmouth your former editor."
Judah Leblang, essayist, public radio commentator and Bay Windows columnist, described writing an article for a community newspaper paper on a lesbian couple's commitment ceremony (before gay marriages were legalized in MA) which the editor first refused to run with wedding announcements unless the couple paid for it as a $100 announcement. They paid, but the article was pulled the night before it was scheduled to appear: the paper's corporate owner, Boston Herald publisher Purcell, had vetoed it. Leblang got friends and organizations to complain (the next year the paper changed its policy). Lesson learned: You don't know if something will appear in print until it appears in print.
Leblang then told how he'd once sold a public radio piece to his hometown radio station in Cleveland, a personal piece about a health scare he'd never told his mother about. He knew that his mother's radio couldn't receive that show but didn't count on her friends hearing it and telling his mother, which they did. Lesson: Don't assume that people you write about won't read what you wrote.
"I'll forever remember not to assume that my family's bad radio reception will prevent them from learning secrets that I share on the airwaves," said Randy Meyers, who said the evening's "intimate atmosphere made it seem like friends sharing stories over coffee."
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