Wednesday, February 01, 2012

January

So January slipped away before I knew it.

What have I been doing? Well, I had a birthday. I've been organising, but not going on, two uni applicant days for Son 1. I've been downloading lots of cheap and free books to my Kindle. I've been trying to deal with Son 2's increasing behavioural issues.

And I've been writing.

I completed the 31 days of the River of Stones project. To be fair I did on a few occasions forget to post the stone which was germinating in my mind, but I always caught up the next day and I ended the month with 31 stones written.

I've also started doing Helen M Hunt's Hop On, Hop Off short story course and I'm enjoying it very much. As some of you may know, womag story writing is an area in which I've had no success so far and I'm a great admirer of Helen's stories for that market, so I'm hoping some of her skill will rub off on me. Woman's Weekly has always been the weekly magazine which I feel suits my writing style best and Helen has had significant success in that very competitive market. Although womag stories require the same writing skills as other genres there are definite restrictions on content and I'm trying hard to rein in my darker side!

Helen also runs face to face workshops but if you are looking for something very flexible the Hop On, Hop Off course might just fit the bill.

3 comments:

Debbie Coope said...

Hope you had a good birthday.

Sounds like you're keeping busy with your writing.

Happy hopping.

Anonymous said...

I'd love to write for women's magazines but I've been turned down by a few and give of gave up. Then I started writing my debut novel and it took over the short stories. I always felt that it seemed to be the same authors being published in certain magazines - which doesn't leave much lea way for new ones.

CJ x

Cathy said...

Thanks Debbie :)

CJ, that is exactly where I am with women's magazines. I submit any stories I write which might be suitable but no luck so far. It is a crowded, shrinking market and there is at least one magazine which won't accept stories from writers they haven't published before, but I do believe that with the right story you can still get published. Once you have had one or two acceptances from a mag then your chances of having more accepted probably improve. Certainly not easy to get the breakthrough and not very lucrative, but I want to continue to keep my writing options wide open.