Author: Ev Bishop

Don’t Pass On the Genre Pass

/ Ev Bishop / 3 Comments

I recently finished the third draft of my current WIP, and maybe you can identify with the very academic and scholarly feeling of WHOOOHOOO that coursed through my body.

Thinking I was sooo close to The End (I envisioned 4th Draft as being as simple as addressing a few pages of additional notes chapter-by-chapter), you can imagine how annoying it was to find that every time I went to open the novel’s folder, I stalled—ended up reading blogs, posting at forums, playing with my dogs . . . I even found myself doing dishes and catching up on laundry (the true sign of how low I stooped). At first I thought it was just my ever-present, all-too-common love of work avoidance. Then I read Alexandra Sokoloff’s recent Murderati post, “On Genre, Sort of,” followed her link to a post on her personal blog, “Top Ten Things I Know About Editing,” and had a huge Aha! moment.

The lightning-strike comment regarded doing what Alexandra calls a “genre pass.” I’ve never written according to genre before (but I should have. Reading her post made me realize why my first novel, a book I still believe in, got full-reads and good comments from agents, but no offers for representation. It’s women’s fiction, and I should’ve taken comments from literary markets, “It’s too commercial,” and from more mainstream markets, “It’s too literary” and jumped off the fence, picked a group of target readers and edited with them in mind. In fact, I still might do just that—but I digress . . .). The story I’m working on now is a mystery/suspense with supernatural elements. Writing-wise, I feel like I’ve discovered my home. Editing-wise, I now realize that I wasn’t putting off my “last” add-ins, because I have a penchant for household chores. My subconscious writer knew something (as usual) that my usually perceptive inner editor didn’t: The kind of cool/creepy things my brain has been throwing my way lately aren’t for my next book (well, some of them are), they’re to intensify this one.

A small part of me is disappointed (I so wanted to hand over my story with a big “Ta-da—c’est fini!” to my first readers), but the largest part is relieved and excited. I know what I need to do to feel right about calling this book “finished” and sharing it—and that really demands a big WHOOOHOO. Maybe even two.

Author Event

/ Ev Bishop / 7 Comments

I was excited to be asked to take part in a three-author reading event at UNBC (Terrace campus) on Thursday, July 9th. I’ll be reading fiction and non-fiction excerpts, and poets Si Transken and Simon Thompson will be sharing from a variety of their works. It should be a fun, inspiring night. We’d love to see you there!

PDFOnline

Interviewed at The Freelance Survivor

/ Ev Bishop / 13 Comments

I was recently interviewed by Dee-Ann LeBlanc of The Freelance Survivor, a site packed full of useful information. Fun! You can read what I had to say here.

My Writers’ Group

/ Ev Bishop / 9 Comments

My dear friend Jen must’ve been reading my mind. I was planning to post about the writing group I’ve attended (and loved) for years and years: Terrace Writers’ Guild, or TWG. (Okay, so it’s not the cleverest moniker; at least people know what our club is about!)

Jen, however, beat me to it and in a lovely, poetic way that makes you feel like you popped into the meeting for a few minutes. I may still write about it too at some point, but here’s her take on her writing group. And mine. I think the affection and appreciation she feels is pretty clear. How about you all . . . Do you have a face-to-face writing group you attend? Did you ever? What are pros to having one? Are there ever cons?

Happy writing,
Ev

Terrace Writers’ Guild 2009 Fiction Contest

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logoTWGThe 3rd Annual TWG Fiction Contest is open for submissions!

Deadline: Postmarked by Tuesday, October 27, 2009

1st Place: $250.00 from UNBC and paid publication in Northword Magazine.

2nd Place: $150.00 from Marion Olson of Re/Max and author’s name and story title published in Northword Magazine.

3rd Place: $75.00 from saz communications and author’s name and story title published in Northword Magazine.

Rules and guidelines:

1. All submissions must be written by individuals currently living in Northern British Columbia—that’s any community north of Quesnel, including the Queen Charlotte Islands.

2. No entry fee is required, and all story rights remain with the author. All genres are welcome, but sorry, no poetry or stories intended for children.

3. Submissions must be between 1500 and 3000 words. Stories that do not meet this guideline will be eliminated from competition.

4. All works must be original and free of plagiarism (which includes third-party poetry, song lyrics, characters, etc., without written permission). The contest’s audience is the general public, so excessive violence or sex, determined by the judges, will result in
disqualification. Entries may not have been previously published.

5. Entries should be typed in 12-font, double spaced in black ink on white paper, and must have a cover page with the title of the work, the author’s name, contact information, and an approximate word count. Every subsequent page must carry the title and a page number, but the author’s name must be deleted in order for fair judging. Any submissions not meeting these guidelines will be disqualified.

6. Manuscripts will be destroyed after judging. A #10 (business size) self-addressed, stamped envelope must be included with the entry in order to receive judging results. Entrants may choose to not send an SASE, in which case winners may be viewed by visiting this website after December 31st, 2009.

Please mail submissions to:

TWG FICTION CONTEST
PO BOX 1046
TERRACE BC
V8G 4V1

Winners will be notified by December 15th, 2009

No email submissions will be accepted. For more information, e-mail here.

On behalf of Terrace Writers’ Guild and all the writers up here in Northern BC that benefit from the inspiration and motivation this contest provides, I’d like to express a tonne of appreciation to our generous sponsors: Northword Magazine, UNBC, Marion Olson, and saz communications.

INK WELL, edited by Ev Bishop, launched today

/ Ev Bishop / 4 Comments

INK WELLThe young writers’ club that I head up at Centennial Christian School here in Terrace, Writers’ Ink, launched its Spring 2009 issue of our magazine, INK WELL. We’ve come along way since the days of cutting and pasting and photocopying! Check us out and make sure you click to preview – you can flip through each page, very cool! I’m especially excited, because I did the design work – a bit of new branching out for me.

And if you’re into desktop or print-on-demand publishing for any purpose – to put your own creative work “out there,” or for business, non-profit, or special interest work you’re involved with – look into MagCloud. I’m very impressed with the quality of their end product, their prices, and the overall site set up.

SiWC 2009 or bust!

/ Ev Bishop / 14 Comments

So I just did something very exciting—booked a four-night stay at the gorgeous Sheraton Guildford in Surrey, BC. It seems unbelievable, but it’s already time—really time!—to start planning my favourite annual indulgence: The Surrey International Writers’ Conference.

I normally try to rein in my freakish enthusiasm and exuberance while blogging, so I don’t scare readers away, but allow me one, YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!

I know some writers are sceptical of the advantages of conferences. They think they’re nothing but a money grab. They feel you don’t learn anything that you couldn’t from a book or a bit of research. They’re sure everyone’s just there for their egos—I’m a writer, look at me. They’re convinced you’d be better off spending the time writing, not talking about writing.

I confess I don’t understand conference bashers.

1. Yes, attending a conference is a financial commitment. That it costs you something is part of its value. Say what? Just that: Putting money into your craft, saying in essence, “I’m serious about my writing, and it’s worth not just my time, but also my material resources to pursue,” is like giving yourself a big ol’ permission slip to take your goals more seriously. It’s also a big cue to family and friends—Oh, she’s serious about this little writing thing.

Professional development (Yes, a little FYI, conferences are P-D, not just wonderfully social times where everyone sips wine, talks about their favourite things—books and storytelling, of course—and comes away absolutely inspired) betters the quality of your work and boosts your word counts. Being with other people who are excited about the same things you are is motivating.

2. Books on craft are great, and yep, you learn a lot reading them, but—and gasp, I can’t quite believe I’m saying this—there are some things being alone with a book can’t do. Reading alone in your study doesn’t give you the experience of being with 1000 other souls who love what you love—ideas, words, stories. It doesn’t give you the chance to laugh along with one of your favourite authors. It doesn’t provide the opportunity to stick up your hand in the middle of the information to say, “Gah—I don’t get it!” or “Yay—I love how you put that!”

Hearing authors talk about their personal experiences, reassure you that it’s an achievable dream (they’re living proof, after all), and answer every-question-you-can-imagine is invaluable. As is getting to learn face-to-face from agents and editors who accept books (maybe even one like yours!) for their livings.

3. As for the complaints about “egos” . . . I don’t see it. I’ve met people I don’t click with, sure. I may have (it’s terrible) even cringed or grimaced inwardly a time or two on behalf of a cornered agent or author, yep. But people are people wherever you go. The great, the bad, the meh—they’re everywhere. And for what it’s worth, I think writing conferences having a higher per ratio capacity of hilarious, generous, kind, and witty people than most public groupings. The feeling of community and camaraderie is almost the whole reason I go. I work alone day after day all year (Yay for the Internet, but that’s an aside). Even the most reclusive of us benefit from and need human company sometimes.

4. Four days of conferencing and sushilizing does not, in anyway, take away from my productivity. I write almost every day—and that’s in addition to my business writing, editing, and workshops. Surrey energizes me for a whole year. If I have a day where I feel kind of unmotivated, I look at the calendar and recall the goals I’ve set for the next conference . . . Speaking of which, I’m on track, but not ahead of where I wanted to be by this month, so I should go.

Happy writing, everyone—and if you’re heading out to Surrey this October 22, 23, and 24 for SiWC, let me know.

I’m also interested in any comments about why you love writing workshops or conferences—or really mix things up and tell me why I’m out to lunch and they suck! 😀

~ Ev

Ye Olde Idea Shoppe

/ Ev Bishop / 12 Comments

Stephen King has said he’s frequently asked where he gets his ideas. He gives slightly varying answers, but one of *my favourites, he attributes to a friend of his: “I buy them at the supermarket.” Now it’s obvious he was being a bit facetious—on some level asking a writer where he/she gets ideas is like asking the moon why it hangs in the sky or where the ocean gets its water. There probably is a perfectly reasonable scientific explanation to the query, but I’ll be darned if I’d ever know how to articulate it. And even the best responses would be destroyed with one further question: why? Why do you get ideas for stories? Why indeed. But I digress. Back to ideas, where they come from, and the ones at grocery stores—oh yes, the grocery store. S.K. and his quoted buddy were speaking partially in jest, but they would agree that the statement is factual.

Story ideas abound in grocery stores. They arrive in the produce section (who hasn’t lifted a big yellow clump of bananas and thought about the huge, hairy spider that might have arrived with the shipment?). They lurk about the deli. Why does man keep standing there like that? Is he going to try to shoplift bulk olives? Does he have a thing for the girl at the counter? Is she his long lost child? They sit in well-ordered rows in the canned foods sections. Do you know what’s in that can of refried beans—the third one back in the middle of the row? Well, do you?

When short on cash, or just not in the mood for a big shop, have no fear. Ideas are everywhere:

In conversation, like when a friend recently expressed his suspicion that the reason there are so many more vaccinations now than when we were kids isn’t disease-prevention at all. It’s a safe guard for world governments worried about over-population. If at anytime they want to cull the population, they just have to press a button and release whatever it is that reacts with whatever injection. Story idea!

In overheard snippets of dialogue. “I can’t believe she’d do that. It’s sickening.” What can’t the speaker believe she’d do? And who’s she? And who, come to think of it, is the speaker? And what’s sickening? How sickening?

In dreams (See, that’s what I’d like to know—forget ideas—where do dreams come from? Come to think of it, a story about where dreams come from would be pretty fascinating!)

In physical work, especially it seems to me, in gardening and yard work.

In doing absolutely nothing (which is why, even when I’m really busy, I strive to have do-nothing time . . . It’s good for your brain).

Even in random personal moments. I bought a full-length formal gown (of all things) two weeks ago. Wearing a dress like that makes you (or makes me, anyway) just feel different. And that made me think of a story idea—what if you walked into a vintage store, tried on an outfit, and suddenly—poof—you were you no longer—or you were, but only in the flesh suit and life of the person who’d owned the apparel you now sported? (Hey, I didn’t say every idea was a good idea.)

Chances are if you’re a writer, you don’t need to find ideas. You need to somehow stop tripping on them as they lift the floorboards late at night. You need to carefully replace the stone you moved only to find another one scuttling beside a centipede. You need to do something, anything, to stifle them, so you don’t lose focus on the ones you’ve already collected and are trying to coax onto the bright white page. You understand full well how ideas just appear, well, everywhere, from nowhere.

My question for people who ask, “Where do you get your ideas?” is this: Don’t you get random weird ideas all the time?

I know that not everyone writes, but it never actually occurred to me that perhaps not everyone is inundated with the what-ifs, questions, and strange observations that spark story ideas. I think I thought that ideas came to everyone, just that some people are compelled to do something with them . . .

* If you happen to know where on earth I read this bit—I want to say it’s in On Writing—could you give me page number? I’d like to give the actual name of the person King attributes it to, and I’d like to confirm how it’s worded. Thanks!

The Waiting Game

/ Ev Bishop / 5 Comments

Is there anything more onerous to a writer than the waiting game? Most people tackle a project and then, well, they’re done. Not fiction writers, oh no. They “finish” their work (which could take months, a year, or even years) and send it away, only to have the really time consuming part of the job start: the waiting.

Lurking dangers surround all that waiting. Self-doubt has lots of time to imagine unkind things being said to your story’s face (and to do its own unkind muttering in your head). The desire for regular coffee money might trick you into some cave of a job where you’re paid by the hour. Writer’s block (if you subscribe to that kind of notion) is more prone to leap upon you and starting chewing on your throat—especially if what you want to write next might depend (foolishly!) on whether the circulating work sells (my advice: write like it sells, or don’t and start something entirely new—just write!).

It’s not all bad though. If you let it, waiting to hear back can be kind of like counting down to a vacation. Each passing day is one closer to at least some sort of a response, the wait gets sweeter, the anticipation builds. I’ve learned to use the hope that just won’t die (I’m bandaging my throat here as you read!) as motivation to write the next thing. While your words sit on someone’s desk, there is the endless opportunity that said words might find a home—someone might like that story, poem, article, or what-have-you. Nothing is more inspiring than the idea that someone might relate to your offerings and even (gleep!) want more of them. Exciting stuff.

I try to take full advantage of this wait/hope phenomenon by keeping 6 – 8 things “out there” all the time. That way, rejection doesn’t hurt as much (hope sprints over to another project to rest on) and my inner-creep can’t do as much of a job on my self-esteem.

Hmmmm . . . Is there a point to this post? Yes (lectures self), get your stuff out there and keep it out there until it finds a home. And in the meantime, the waiting time, get busy on the next idea.

Happy writing,
☺ Ev

Sci-fi Creatives Evening

/ Ev Bishop / 2 Comments

Righteous Anger by Lynda Williams

Righteous Anger by Lynda Williams

Yesterday I attended a Sci-fi Creatives evening (advertised in my last post), featuring Lynda Williams, author of the Okal Rel saga. Judging from the laugher, head nodding, and everyone-participating-conversation, a good time was had by all. Lynda is a hilarious, candid speaker, and I think any writer would benefit and be inspired by her enthusiasm for her own and other people’s creative works.

The highlight for me was a casual bit of advice given toward the end of the night. It wasn’t anything I hadn’t heard before—in fact, it’s something I always strive to live my writing life by, yet it was much needed encouragement: Write the stories you want to write, that you care about, are passionate about. And while Lynda didn’t add this, she just as easily could have; it was in every bit of her attitude: Have fun!

So yes, if you ever have a chance to take in a Creative SF Evening with Lynda Williams, do so. And if you fall into her Okal Rel universe before I do, let me know how you find it—the books sound amazing.