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SPONSOR OF THE WEEK
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Tom Howard/Margaret Reid Poetry Contest - Last
Call!
13th year. $4,000 in prizes will be awarded, including
$1,500 for a poem in any style and $1,500 for a poem that rhymes or has a traditional style. Both published and unpublished work accepted. All entries that win cash prizes will be published on WinningWriters.com and announced in the Winning Writers Newsletter, with over 50,000 subscribers. Entry fee is $10 per poem. Each poem may have up to 250 lines. Deadline: September 30. See
guidelines, past winners, and enter at www.winningwriters.com/tompoetry
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EDITOR'S THOUGHTS
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TO WEBSITE OR NOT TO WEBSITE?
Received a very sweet email this week from an author who begged to know if an author really needed a website. Short and sweet, the answer is YES. These days, when someone hears your name, and might be interested in whatever it is you offer, they Google you. Yes, Google has become a verb as well as a noun, and it's because we've become so accustomed to grabbing a keyboard on some device and learning more. Instant intelligence, I call it.
f the public cannot find you, they instantly wonder if you are worth their time. Sounds harsh, I know, but it is the truth. The only thing that can overcome that mentality is a strong word of mouth campaign, and we all know how hard that is to create.
So how do you establish a website when you don't understand squat about it?
1) Hire a webmaster. You may pay several hundred to a couple thousand, but webmasters deserve to be paid for all that knowledge. They grab the domain name for you, set you up with a site to include hosting, and update it for you on command. Or have them create it and leave it up to you to update and omit the monthly updating charge. Some webmasters specify websites for authors. Take a look at these babies.
They have some gorgeous sites:
3) Go to Blogger.com or Wordpress.com and teach yourself how to do a basic blog/website. You may have Blogspot or Wordpress in the domain name, but when you're starting out, that's not a detriment. People are becoming accustomed to seeing such URLs. No domain name, no hosting, no monthly or annual fee. You just have a learning curve.
4) Compromise and get someone to design item 3) above so the set up charge is much less.
5) Commit to a great Facebook fan page and make sure the graphics are superb, the updates regular. Cost = nothing.
6) Commit to a great Tumblr page. Cost = nothing.
I've fallen into the habit of hearing a name of an author, or receiving a pitch from a writer, and instantly flipping into their website to decide whether I'm interested. It's like a quick phone interview, or an instant resume.
To have no online presence tells a reader several things whether you intend to or not:
1) You're testing the waters with this writer business.
2) You don't want to invest THAT much time into your presentation.
3) You don't want to connect to readers.
4) You're new to either the computer or writing.
5) You are older.Face it . . . younger people want that online presence.
The answer is yes you need an online presence. The question is just what kind?
P.S. TOTAL FundsforWriters is the extended version of this newsletter, with 70 markets, contests, grants, etc. and still at the ten-year-old cost of $15 for 26 issues. A great way to find opportunities to make money, without the hours of searching. Some subscribers have been around since TOTAL's origin a decade ago...they swear by it that much. NOTE: TOTAL will be going up in price November
1. Now might be the time to get in at the prize that's been around for a decade! Click here to consider TOTAL.
-Hope Clark
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Upcoming Book Signings and Classes!
Oct 7 - Bouchercon, Raleigh, NC, James Scott Bell class (as attendee), 1-5 PM
Oct 9 - Lexington, SC Book Club - ON EDISTO BEACH!
Oct 10 - Release of Edisto Jinx, Edisto Beach, SC, Edisto Bookstore, 4-6 PM
Oct 17 - Greenwood, SC - Fiction Class AM / Book Club PM (details TBD)
Oct 29-Nov 1 - Killer Nashville Con, Nashville, TN Nov 7 - Local Authors Presentation - Cayce-West Columbia Library, SC, 2-5 PM
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WORDS OF SUCCESS
The man who has willpower is the one who keeps his mind centered upon what he is after.
~ Abraham Lincoln
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MURDER ON EDISTO
A big city detective
A Lowcountry crime
When her husband is murdered by the Russian mob, Boston detective Callie Jean Morgan suffers a mental break and relinquishes her badge to return home to South Carolina. She has no idea how to proceed with her life, but her son deserves to move on with his, so she relocates them to the family vacation home.
But the day they arrive on Edisto Beach, Callie finds her childhood mentor and elderly neighbor murdered. Her fragile sanity is threatened when the murderer taunts her, and the home that was to be her sanctuary is repeatedly violated. Callie loses her fight to walk away from law enforcement as she becomes the only person able to pursue the culprit who's turned the coastal paradise into a paranoid patch of sand where nobody's safe. But what will it cost her?
Purchase any of Hope's books and receive a one-year subscription to TOTAL FFW free. Send receipt to hope@fundsforwriters.com |
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SUCCESS STORY
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Dear Hope,
Thank you for your wonderful newsletters. I've always thought of submitting something to a writing contest that you are so kind to list for all of us. I read about a contest with Work Stew in your newsletter. So finally I sent in a 600 word story, about my biggest mistake at work. Well, I won! Thank you so much for all you do supporting writers with so much great stuff.
Devyani Borade is the creator, and real-life version, of Debora. Her fiction, nonfiction and art have been accepted/published by over 170magazines across the world. Visit her website Verbolatry at http://devyaniborade.blogspot.com to contact her, and enjoy more of Debora's adventures.
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COMPETITIONS
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TENNESSEE WILLIAMS LITERARY FESTIVAL ONE-ACT PLAY COMPETITION
$25 ENTRY FEE.
Winner receives $1,500, professional Staged Reading at the next Festival, VIP All-Access Festival pass for two years ($1,000 value), publication in Bayou Magazine. The top nine finalists will receive a panel pass ($75 value) to the Festival. Their names will be published on the site. Plays should run no more than one hour in length (one act). Deadline November 1, 2015.
THE FICTION DESK NEWCOMER PRIZE 2015
ENTRY FEE £8.
Deadline November 6, 2015. First prize £500, second prize £250. The competition is for stories from 1,000-7,000 words. Writers should not have been previously published by The Fiction Desk, and should not have published a novel or collection of short stories in printed form.
NATIONAL TEN-MINUTE PLAY CONTEST
NO ENTRY FEE.
We consider all submissions for the Heideman Award — a $1,000 cash prize given out each January — as well as for production in the Apprentice/Intern Tens and the Humana Festival of New American Plays. Deadline November 1, 2015. Characters in submitted plays should be in the age range 18-28. Each script must be no more than ten pages long. Submissions are limited to the first 500 scripts we receive each year.
WELLS COLLEGE ANNUAL POETRY CHAPBOOK CONTEST
$20 ENTRY FEE.
Deadline November 30, 2015. The author of the chosen manuscript will receive 20 copies of the letterpress printed, hand-sewn chapbook. The author will also be invited to read from her or his new chapbook at Wells College in the fall of 2016. The poet will receive a $500 honorarium and room and board for the reading. We print editions of 100 signed and numbered copies. Submit 18-30 manuscript pages (with no more than one poem per page).
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GRANTS
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MASSACHUSETTS CULTURAL COUNCIL
The Massachusetts Cultural Council (MCC) is pleased to announce the 2016 Artist Fellowships Program. The Artist Fellowships are competitive, anonymously-judged grants for Massachusetts individual artists, with awards based solely on the artistic quality and creative ability of the original work submitted. Deadline for poetry October 5, 2015. Deadline for fiction/creative nonfiction is January 25, 2016. Pending approval by MCC's Board in early September, the fellowship award will
increase this year, from $10,000 to $12,000. The finalist award remains $1,000.
KENTUCKY TEACHING ARTS TOGETHER ROSTER
Teaching Art Together (TAT) is another important grant program the arts council offers. We maintain an adjudicated directory of teaching artists, professionals in their respective disciplines who have the know-how to enter a classroom and share their art form with students. Teaching Art Together is a grant program that allows schools to pay for a one- to four-week residency with one of our teaching artists. It allows Kentucky teachers to broaden the scope of their courses. It also
benefits students, who may have never met a person for whom art is their full-time profession. Artists cease to be figures from the pages of a history book when they are standing in a classroom demonstrating a skill they have spent the better part of their lives perfecting. There's no price tag you can put on that experience. The application deadline for a Teaching Art Together Grant for the spring 2016 semester is October 1, 2015. Contact the Kentucky Arts Commission about getting your name
on the roster.
MID-ATLANTIC ARTS FOUNDATION
Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation's Creative Fellowship program provides support for individual artist residencies at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts (VCCA) in Amherst, Virginia. Residencies provide artists with a private studio, room and board, and the company of other artists from around the nation for an intensive period of self-guided exploration and development. Creative Fellowships at VCCA support two-week or one-month residencies for composers, literary and visual
artists from Delaware, Maryland, New York, and West Virginia. A modest travel subsidy is also awarded to the selected artists. Deadline September 15, 2015.
VERMONT ARTISTS IN SCHOOLS
Artists in Schools grants fund artist residencies in a school. The residencies, which are funded for up to ten days, are intended to serve as a model for the integration of the arts into the curriculum and community of a school. The artists completing the residency must be selected from the Vermont Arts Council Teaching Artist Roster and are expected to collaborate with classroom teachers to ensure that the residency meets student learning objectives and that there is a sustainable
impact in the school community.
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FREELANCE MARKETS
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PARABOLA
Parabola is a quarterly journal devoted to the exploration of the quest for meaning as it is expressed in the world’s myths, symbols, and religious traditions, with particular emphasis on the relationship between this store of wisdom and our modern life. Each issue of Parabola is organized around a theme. Articles run 1,000-3,000 words. Article payment generally ranges from $150 to $400. The payment for epicycles and book reviews is $75.
JUST LABS
Let Just Labs join you in the celebration, the training, the humor, the health, the tributes, the essays and photos and fun and learning… there is more to life with a Lab than just filling the food bowl. And we show you – in every issue. For full Writer's Guidelines, which include rates, send a request to Jill LaCross, Managing Editor, at jillianlacross@villagepress.com. Prefers 1,000 to 1,800 words. Pays up to $400.
YOUNG RIDER
Young Rider is a bi-monthly magazine written for children and teens who own horses or who take lessons at riding schools. Pays $150 for features of 800 to 1,000 words.
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JOBS
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JUNIOR TECH REPORTER
Location New York, NY
We want someone looking to write in a fast-paced journalism setting who has an interest in a range of subjects — primarily technology, but able to converse about science, pop culture, design, and more. Bonus points if you’re a major nerd about one (or more) of those areas, and can contribute additional expertise and enthusiastic ideas to those realms. Employer Vox Media.
STAFF WRITER, SCIENCE OF EVERYTHING
Location Washington DC
Vox.com is a user’s guide to the news, helping readers make sense of everything from the GOP debates to NASA's mission to Pluto to the science of seasonal allergies. We want to create the single best resource for news consumers anywhere. Employer Vox Media. Must have a proven ability to ask interesting and unexpected science-related questions about the world around us and report them out. These are stories that aren't just driven by the latest journal research.
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AGENTS / PUBLISHERS
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PRIMETIME
PrimeTime is a new imprint of Acute By Design, but aimed at the opposite end of readers’ age spectrum. While AbyD publishes books for children, PrimeTime will be publishing books for people ages 50 and up. Our first season, spring of 2016, will see us publish four print books and an as-yet-unspecfied number of e-books. We are willing to work with previously unpublished writers and do not require that you submit through an agent. We will consider queries or complete manuscripts.
We are most interested in books in the 20,000-60,000-word range. For this first season, we are not considering any novels or short story anthologies—NONFICTION ONLY at this time, please. Today’s Boomers and Seniors (the 50-and-up demographic who will make up our audience) encompass a wide range of activity levels and interests. The majority are active and reasonably healthy. Some are retired and some not. Please do not envision our readers as being planted in rocking chairs. Only a
small portion of our readers will fit that image. We are NOT a vanity, co-op, self-pub, or hybrid publisher. We are a royalty-paying traditional publisher.
ACRES USA PUBLISHING
If you are a skilled farmer, experienced consultant, researcher, or student of the world with a story to tell about ecological food or farming, Acres U.S.A. might be the perfect publishing partner for you. Our editors are open to reviewing manuscripts and material from both first-time and published authors. We also seek books previously published which fit into our published niche.
GOODMAN BECK PUBLISHING
With a clear focus on mental health, personal growth, aging well, positive psychology, accessible spirituality, and overall self-help, Goodman Beck's unwavering goal has been to improve each reader's life — one book at a time — simultaneously making the world a better place.
LANGMARC PUBLISHING
Langmarc is pleased with decades of excellence in providing literary entertainment for people of all ages from all walks of life. But most importantly, Langmarc is proud of the “G” label that we can place on all of our novels — novels that families can read together and schools can be proud to have on their shelves.
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SPONSORS
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Last chance to sign up for this highly-recommended online retreat.
There are six spots left and scholarships available if you need one.
"Retreat for the Writer's Soul" is a 21-day online retreat you can access from anywhere. It guides and inspires through daily discussions, meditations,and exercises to help you heal and let go of what doesn't nurture you,embrace your writer-self, find your voice, and be the writer you were meant to be. Starts September 6. Don't miss it! Learn more and sign up >>
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Mediabistro is a bastion of creative professional development for people at any level of learning. We offer classes across all disciplines, from Novel Writing to Marketing, to Public Relations and Social Media.
For a limited time, we are offering new students 10% off any course! Visit our online course catalog to find the course that is right for you and register today.
 
NOTE: 30 percent off for FundsforWriters readers for a short time. Click here.
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Fine print
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Please forward the newsletter in its entirety. To reprint any editorials, contact hope@fundsforwriters.com for permission. Please do not assume that acknowledgements listed in your publication is considered a valid right to publish.
C. Hope Clark
E-mail: hope@fundsforwriters.com
140-A Amicks Ferry Road #4 Chapin, SC 29036
Copyright 2000-2015, C. Hope Clark
ISSN: 1533-1326
**Note that FundsforWriters.com places paid advertising in this newsletter, ALL ads being related to writers and the business of writing, screened by FundsforWriters to make sure the information is suitable for writers and their endeavors to improve their careers. But the mailing list is not sold to third parties. You will not receive this newsletter without your permission. It's physically impossible since recipients must opt-in, giving us permission to send the newsletter. If at any
time you no longer wish to receive the newsletter, click the UNSUBSCRIBE link at the bottom of each newsletter. We want you to enjoy this newsletter at your pleasure, not be forced to read anything you do not wish to receive. The website is not advertised using unsolicited messages by Aweber, affiliates or other third parties. Direct any complaints, suggestions, and accolades to Hope Clark at hope@fundsforwriters.com. We are an anti-spam site.
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