Shining Light into the Pit

Laura E. Steer joins the blog to share an editing challenge for a story she submitted to Relief.

Last year I was enrolled in a Non-Fiction Creative Writing class, but I didn’t have anything interesting to write about that had happened to me. After feeling sorry for myself that I’d never survived a natural disaster or overcome a terminal disease, I wrote the closest thing to fiction that I could get away with—a dream.

It was an epic tragedy. After journeying through miles of tunnel, I emerged into a sort of cavernous purgatory, where I found a young mentee of mine awaiting her sentence. The cave was complete with red lighting, smoke, and a gaping abyss that “beckoned its children to leap into its endlessness,” or, to take the drama out of it, a big hole representing eternal death. I begged the girl to escape with me, she begged me to stay in purgatory with her, and when I finally refused, she hurled herself into the pit. I then fashioned a story around the dream scene—blurbs of interactions between me and the girl, all of which built up to the emotional climax, which was the dream (and was much more exciting than anything I had to write about that had really happened).

I submitted it for publication at Relief, and it was accepted. Under the condition that I edit the dream scene. Heavily. Or remove it.

So I set to work editing. I had built the story around my dream. But the dream had morphed drastically from the abstract series of mental images produces by neurons firing back and forth in my brain that it had originally been. Somewhere along the way, I had written myself right into that endless pit and, at the bottom, found myself swimming in a vat of thick, sticky metaphor and imagery.

But the goal isn’t to fill in the Metaphor Pit with mounds of dry, subject-verb sentences. The goal is to shine a light into the pit and show its shape, to climb into it thoughtfully and chisel stories that are unique and stirring, worthy of being submitted to the public for scrutiny and applause.

I edited the dream scene down from 458 words to 87. It was scrutinized and applauded.

***

Laura E. Steer is a recent graduate of Malone University, where she majored in English (no, not to teach!) and minored in both Bible and Communication Arts. Though her ultimate goal is to pursue careers in editing and freelance writing, she has, in the meantime,accepted the position of Drama Director at her church. She also volunteers there as a middle-school youth leader, and plays keyboard and sings backup vocals for a Christian rock band. Beyond writing and music, Laura also enjoys consuming and creating visual art, namely photography. Her future plans include artistry, travel, and a possible move to Chicago. Laura's story "Phantom Child" can be found in Relief Issue 3.2.

Photo Haiku Wednesday 2.17.10

I love me some Cowboy Poetry and in my opinion there isn't enough of it! My cowboy and I went to see the SuperBull Series in Grand Rapids last weekend where this cowboy was talking to God a bit before trying for his 8 second ride. Photo courtesy of Michelle Pendergrass.

Directions:

1. Write a haiku inspired by the photo and post it in the comments.

For extra chances to win:

2. Follow @reliefjournal on Twitter

3. Follow @Quo Vadis on Twitter

4. Twitter @reliefjournal with your haiku and #PHW (Photo Haiku Wednesday)

* * *

The good people over at Quo Vadis have generously donated some prizes!!

The weekly winner will receive a Quo Vadis Habana Journal and a bottle of J. Herbin ink!!

Every week Relief will choose a random winner! So play along and tell your friends. See the information below for extra chances to win.

* * *

Winner will be announced via Twitter Thursday afternoons.

We can only ship to U.S. addresses right now.

You may only win once every three months, but you may play along every week for Twitter Super Bonus Points.

* * *

Would you like to have your photo featured on Photo Haiku Wednesday?

Email your photos to Michelle: photohaiku@reliefjournal.com

You'll get a photo credit link here on the main blog and you'll also be entered in the drawing for the Quo Vadis Habana journal and bottle of J. Herbin ink the week your photo appears on the blog!

Stories like Fine Beer and Cheese: The Importance of Texture (Part 1)

The following is part 1 of 3 from Robert Garbacz.

[Author’s Note: This is part one of a three-part series discussing the importance of a rich texture in fiction.  Here, I discuss the way Greg Mitchell used contrasting genres and perspectives to earn “Flowers for Shelly” a place in the second Diner. Next week, I will take a more literary turn with Michael Snyder’s “Normal People” from Relief 3.1. I will conclude on a practical note, with hints for how to create a sense of texture and a promise of the rewards of taking risks.]

One of the greatest little pleasures of living in Austin is to visit Whole Foods, sampling the cheeses, wines and beer that are available for free.  There is something almost magical about the blend of flavors in a good cheese or ale; a sea of competing tastes, textures and sensations that changes as it trickles across the tongue.  A good beer might start with a soft, fruity taste and then kick in later with a bitter aftertaste.  A good cheese will often be uneven, with a delicious, organic texture as it slides across the tongue.

I hate processed “American cheese” and “light beer.”  Sure, they’re smooth, easy to eat, and they’re focused on their goal.  But they lack the complexity and texture of the good stuff.  In comparison, they’re crap.

The same thing is true of short stories.  Reading through a slush pile, nothing will make me sit up and take note about a story than a sense that it has a really good, complicated texture; that it goes in multiple directions at once, instead of trotting straight at its target.  And while nothing will guarantee acceptance, a story with the rich, variegated texture of a Trappist ale or Irish cheese will make me perk up, and at the least make me want the story to be good enough for acceptance.

But enough about foods, before I get hungry.  Let’s look at our first story, and the way it uses contrasting thoughts and “flavors”  to make something better than the sum of its parts.  (Minor spoilers, it should be noted, are a given.)

“Flowers for Shelly,” from the second Diner, started with the solid, earthy basis of a good character drama.  The narrator is obviously in love with his wife, and wants nothing more than to stay in bed with her all day.  His responsible wife wants him to get up and go to work.  The scene is cute, a bit saccharine, but already somewhat textured thanks to the narrator’s self-deprecating wit.  The wit is understated, but at least engaging:

“Work sucks.  It’s 9:30 a.m. and I want to go home, lie in bed, and wait for Shelly to return with less pressures.  And, preferably, less clothes.”

So far, it’s more textured than processed cheese, but not much.  Maybe Kraft mild cheddar, with a slight kick of humor and marital tension.

Then the narrator’s friend and co-worker gets slaughtered by zombie-police and the story takes on a different tone:

“Suddenly, I feel a cold sensation around my ankle and see a bloody hand reaching out from underneath the car.  Pulling.  Yanking.  Moans rise up like phantoms from the depths of hell and I look into the still teary eyes of Kevin as he lures me in.  At first, I think he’s somehow survived, but then it hits me.  He’s dead, too.”

All of a sudden, this story is beginning to feel more like the sort of solid, hand-crafted cheese that is worth shipping over oceans.  What are the dead doing coming to life?  How will our hero survive?  And what the hell does this have to do with his decision to give flowers to his wife Shelly?  It’s interesting, uneven, and because I have such dissonant tones I don’t know what’s going to happen next.  I like it.

Nor is the combination of two genres all that Greg Mitchell does in his story.  In addition to the gruesome descriptions of zombie mayhem, we have the narrator’s often incoherent thoughts, his gun-nut friends’ insane euphoria at the fact that they’re actually shooting zombies, a thoroughgoing sense of humor, and a mad quest to give pretty flowers to the beautiful Shelly.  I’m not much into zombie stories, but Mitchell’s ability to pile on a hundred different flavors and cram them into a small space made this a fun romp through death and mayhem that I won’t soon forget.

The moral: even with straight-forward, zombie killing genre fiction, odd combinations and unexpected, off-kilter happenings are key.

***

Robert Garbacz, when in his natural habitat, can frequently be seen arguing theology, politics, and art over ale with often excessive volume, haranguing his friends repeatedly with obscure but fascinating facts about Medieval literature, or staring cloyingly into the eyes of his beloved wife Hannah. Unfortunately, his natural habitat is Oxford in the period from 1930-1950. This is a bit awkward for someone born in Tulsa in 1983, but he is studying towards his Doctoral at the University of Texas in Austin and feels this is a firm step in the proper direction. His short story, "The Salvation of Sancho," appeared in the previous Diner anthology, inducting him into this peculiar world of horror, bloodshed, and merciless ravagement of grammatical missteps.

Damascus, February 1990

Lisa Ohlen Harris provides us with a short passage that didn't make it into her forthcoming book Through the Veil. The post first appeared on her website LisaOhlenHarris.com.

We bumped suitcases up a set of stone stairs, and into the narrow pathway of the Old City. Along with the eleven other Americans in my research group, I followed our team leader, Steve, through a maze of stone and dust, of small doorways and little children. I could not imagine finding my way in or out of these corridors every day for three months, but Steve assured us, "Everyone will know where the foreigners are living. If you get lost, just stop and ask." Two boys playing soccer with a grubby ball stopped their game to stare at our strange procession of suitcases and foreigners. I thought I heard one of them whisper the name of our Syrian host, Abu Mousa.

Steve smiled in triumph as we rounded the turn leading to Abu Mousa's doorway. One by one we passed through the front door and into a wide atrium garden, where Um Mousa had prepared a welcome feast—chicken over rice, with vegetables and pine nuts. We were jet-lagged and hungry, and the chicken was so good. We sat together and ate. A lot.

I remember it was cold in Syria in February in a hundreds-of-years-old stone house with no heat. I remember sneaking up to the rooftop to meet Todd after a day of ethnographic research. I remember weeping three months later when it was time to leave Damascus, the city I had learned in such a short time to love.

Twenty years ago. For every detail I remember there are dozens I’ve forgotten. And for every chapter inThrough the Veil there are memories that didn’t make it into the book. In these last months before the book releases (summer 2010) I’m going to post “deleted scenes” from Through the Veil. By sharing these memories I hope to serve up an appetizer for the forthcoming book as well as commemorating the twenty-year anniversary of our time living in Damascus.

***

Lisa Ohlen Harris is Relief's Creative Nonfiction editor. Her Middle East memoir, Through the Veil, will be published by Canon Press in 2010. Lisa's essays have appeared in journals like River Teeth, Arts & Letters, and The Laurel Review, and have received special mention in Pushcart Prize XXXIII: Best of the Small Presses (2009) and in Best American Spiritual Writing (2008 and 2010). Lisa enjoys mentoring and editing the work of emerging writers through her critique service.

All That Glitters

Deanna Hershiser recalls the "joy" of being humbled. Even melancholy writers like me can have a positive morning. At such times everything shines like my golden ideas.

But I’ve learned to feel suspicious of their glow. I guess we all have to do that. Bask for the moment, sure, but later test new paragraphs, stanzas, or stories for actual quality. Why is it, the more fantastic they seem when they arrive, the clunkier they can rattle out of my brain? I don’t often comprehend this until I receive negative feedback or continued rejection, or both.

An essay I once started had all the markings of a hit. My daughter and I ran through the neighborhood for the first time at her request. Who could fail to tug heartstrings, I thought, describing their child’s interest in exercise? I read a rough draft sometime later to my critique group, and one lady asked what I was trying to say.

An innocent question, and a good one. But I felt derailed. I talked back (something our rules said not to do), defensive. Maybe it was the way she framed her question. Maybe I had eaten too much chocolate after lunch. Anyway, I returned to my essay, and what once had been golden felt like lead. I slogged through editing the piece and sent it out to face the inevitable—it was never published.

My next attempt grew from scraps jotted in my journal about running with my little dog. I tried writing it different ways, wary of sharing it anywhere. If no one appreciated my mother-daughter bonding tale, who would like this motley adventure?

In my humbled state I found some encouragement. While I considered doggy jogging mundane, I saw I was writing a more genuine anecdote. I liked running. So did my dog. My daughter hadn’t wanted to do it again after her first try. She had been the one to suggest I run with our pooch to start with, and so I mentioned my gratefulness to her in the essay. Finally, I arrived at an opening image for the story, based on what I had learned about myself. If only my dog and I could voice our imaginings, we would rather be an Amazon-type athlete racing her Malamute in the Iditarod, than a 30-something woman out circling the sewage treatment plant with her raccoon-sized dog.

This lowly image sold my essay. I had discovered how to smile at my own shabby efforts and see beauty in ordinary moments. Readers related to this story and contacted me to share some of theirs. It was an honor to have struck a nerve.

Since then I try to remember, when writing, running, or falling down, there’s no shame in not shining all the time.

***

These days Deanna Hershiser jogs on her treadmill when not out fishing with her dad. She has had work published in Runner's World, Relief, and Long Story Short. She blogs here.

Photo Haiku Wednesday 2.10.2010

Would you like to have your photo featured on Photo Haiku Wednesday? Email your photos to Michelle: photohaiku@reliefjournal.com

You'll get a photo credit link here on the main blog and you'll also be entered in the drawing for the Quo Vadis Habana journal and bottle of J. Herbin ink the week your photo appears on the blog!

Photo courtesy of Michelle Pendergrass.

Would you like to have your photo featured on Photo Haiku Wednesday? Get ready! Starting next week, you'll be able to submit your photos to Michelle.

Directions:

1. Enjoy

2. Write a haiku inspired by what you see

3. Post the haiku in the comments for chance to enter

For extra chances to win:

4. Follow @reliefjournal on Twitter

5. Follow @Quo Vadis on Twitter

6. Twitter @reliefjournal with your haiku and #PHW (Photo Haiku Wednesday)

* * *

The good people over at Quo Vadis have generously donated some prizes!!

The weekly winner will receive a Quo Vadis Habana Journal and a bottle of J. Herbin ink!!

Every week Relief will choose a random winner! So play along and tell your friends. See the information below for extra chances to win.

* * *

Winner will be announced via Twitter Thursday afternoons.

We can only ship to U.S. addresses right now.

You may only win once every three months, but you may play along every week for Twitter Super Bonus Points.

The Psalms as Poetry

Heather Cadenhead unravels Psalm 77 and looks closely for the all of the great poetic bits within it.  She also examines her own personal poetry for the same "beautiful truth" she has found in the psalmists verses.

The first time I heard someone refer to the Psalms as a book of poetry, I was considerably moved.  As a creative writer living under the grace of my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, the idea of God speaking to me through a book of poems was an altogether beautiful notion.  I imagine that it's the same sort of feeling that Johan Huibers, a Dutch contractor, got when he was able to recreate Noah's ark using the exact measurements given in the Old Testament.  There is a sense of wonder in meshing God's perfect truth with the things we most love to make with our hands, whether that is something functional like an ark or aesthetic like a poem.

As of late, I've loved the poetry in Psalm 77 because it seamlessly weaves together three elements of poetry that I believe to be crucial to any completed work of verse.

• It uses metaphor skillfully: "The waters saw You, O God; / The waters saw You, they were afraid; / The depths also trembled" (Psalm 77:16, NKJV).  Water, as an inhuman thing, cannot feel the human emotion of fear; however, water is at the mercy of God's hand.  Knowledge of God's mercy over us creates a fear of the Lord, making the line "The waters saw You, they were afraid" an appropriate and beautiful metaphor.
• It uses beautiful imagery and shows a strong command of language: "Your way was in the sea, / Your path in the great waters, / And Your footsteps were not known" (Psalm 77:19, NKJV).  The sea imagery here is not only lovely, but succinct: the Psalmist's verse isn't wordy and he doesn't use unnecessary adjectives or adverbs. In fact, the only adjective in this verse is the word "great" to describe "waters."  The phrase "great waters" serves as a synonym for "sea" here. So, the adjective isn't meant to be flowery.  It's a necessary description.
• It conveys truth in a chilling way: "Your path was in the great waters, / And Your footsteps were not known" (Psalm 77:19b, NKJV).  I discussed this verse in the last point, while talking about imagery, but it also conveys a bone-rattling truth: God can perform the greatest of miracles without even being seen.  If He chooses, He may roam the sea without leaving a single footprint. It's an entirely chilling and beautiful truth conveyed skillfully in the Psalmist's verse.

As a Christian writer, my goal should be to write beautiful truth. By beautiful, I don't mean to imply that our poems should read like textual versions of Thomas Kinkade paintings.  Far from it.  I mean that we should write poems that sound good; we ought to choose strong words (not necessarily concrete words over abstract words, but concrete words to convey abstract ideas).  A well-written poem is, to me, a beautiful poem. It isn't related to the content. Psalm 77, in fact, has a few bleak moments: "Has His mercy ceased forever? / Has His promise failed forevermore?" (Psalm 77:8, NKJV).  It has moments that stop you dead in your tracks: "I remembered God, and was troubled; / I complained, and my spirit was overwhelmed" (Psalm 77:3, NKJV).

By truth, I mean that our poems as Christians should convey what is true, what is real.  In Psalm 77, I find two truths: one is the truth of man's frailty ("My hand was stretched out in the night without ceasing; / My soul refused to be comforted" [Psalm 77:2b, NKJV]); the other is the truth of God's sovereign grace ("Your way, O God, is in the sanctuary; / Who is so great a God as our God?" [Psalm 77:13, NKJV]).

***

Heather Cadenhead’s poems "Embalming" and "Bone Collection" were published in Relief Issue 3.2.  Her work has been featured in Illuminations, Arbor Vitae, The Ampersand Review, Boston Literary Magazine, and other publications.  She recently won the Editor’s Prize for an upcoming issue of New Plains Review.  Heather lives in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, with her husband, Tyson, and their dog, Arthur.  She is the senior editor of The Basilica Review.

Photo Haiku Wednesday 2.3.2010

It's Photo Haiku Wednesday!  The good people over at Quo Vadis have generously donated some prizes!! The weekly winner will receive a Quo Vadis Habana Journal and a bottle of J. Herbin ink!!

Every week Relief will choose a random winner! So play along and tell your friends. See the information below for extra chances to win.

Photo courtesy of Michelle Pendergrass.

Would you like to have your photo featured on Photo Haiku Wednesday? Get ready! Starting next week, you'll be able to submit your photos to Michelle.

Directions:

1. Enjoy

2. Write a haiku inspired by what you see

3. Post the haiku in the comments for chance to enter

For extra chances to win:

4. Follow @reliefjournal on Twitter

5. Follow Quo Vadis on Twitter

6. Twitter @reliefjournal with your haiku and #PHW (Photo Haiku Wednesday)

* * *

Winner will be announce via Twitter Thursday afternoons.

We can only ship to U.S. addresses right now.

You may only win once every three months, but you may play along every single week for Twitter Super Bonus Points!

Photo Haiku Wednesday 1.27.2010

Photo Haiku Wednesday is back and there's good news! The good people over at Quo Vadis have generously donated some prizes!! The weekly winner will receive a Quo Vadis Habana Journal and a bottle of J. Herbin ink!!

Every week Relief will choose a random winner! So play along and tell your friends. See the information below for extra chances to win.

Photo courtesy of Michelle Pendergrass.

Directions:

1. Enjoy

2. Write a haiku inspired by what you see

3. Post the haiku in the comments for chance to enter

For extra chances to win:

4. Follow @reliefjournal on Twitter

5. Follow Quo Vadis on Twitter

6. Twitter @reliefjournal with your haiku and #PHW (Photo Haiku Wednesday)

* * *

Winner will be announce via Twitter Thursday afternoons.

We can only ship to U.S. addresses right now.

You may only win once every three months, but you may play along every single week for Twitter Super Bonus Points!

On Writing Groups and Muddling Through

Last summer, my husband’s friend posted on Facebook: “Are there any serious writers in Seattle who are interested in a writers group?”  My husband replied that I was, and then he asked me what I thought.

He was right.  I was interested.  I was still working a couple of part-time jobs, and I was considering pursuing my M.F.A.  The thing about these writing programs though is that they require a writing portfolio and I hadn’t done any significant poetry writing since 2007.  Writing is a lot like exercise: once you stop, it’s really hard to get started again, and it’s easier to do if you have a buddy.

Writing Groups of All Shapes and Sizes

As a writing major and an English teacher, I have a long history with writing groups.  I learned how to give and receive critique from my high school English teachers who both modeled effective critique and created workshop space for us to interact with each other’s work.  It wasn’t until I began teaching that I realized how rare those creative writing classes are in high school, and I have yet to work at a school that offers that same opportunity.  By the time I graduated from college, I had come to depend on feedback from my community on my writing, and I found it harder and harder to come by.  My teacher friends didn’t often offer the same depth of critique—perhaps because it was simply relief to be reading something beyond the average eighth grade poem—so when I came upon my first writing group in Portland, I felt relieved to know that my writing was once again in good hands, with people that would neither praise it excessively or tear it down needlessly.  I found this particular group through my church: it was small, met biweekly, and while we each had different poetic styles, we were able to provide solid feedback to each other.  Either that, or we just said, “Dude, I’m not sure what to tell you.  This is beyond me.”  Being in a small group gave us space to focus ample time to each piece on those rainy winter evenings.

That group broke up about six months after I joined it as people moved and life happened.  About a year later, I was asked to become part of the leadership team for a larger writing group, and I found that to be much less effective.  We only met monthly, so I frequently found myself either throwing something together before rushing out the door (a great leadership model to be sure) or not bringing anything because I knew there was no way we would get to everyone.  While I received some good feedback on the few pieces I did bring, I was exhausted, leading in too many areas of my life that year.  I was not sad to step down.

Despite the overwhelming sense of relief after leaving the leadership team, I effectively stopped writing poetry a few months afterwards.  It seems I am not as self-motivated as I would like to think I am.  So when this opportunity opened to join a new group in Seattle, I jumped on it despite knowing no one in the group.  I have found it’s often best if the people in the group form their relationships around the writing; it’s easier to stay on topic that way, and it’s easier to be honest—both in your writing and in your feedback.

Since those initial summer conversations, we have met a handful of times.  We are still figuring out our rhythm: how often to meet, how to prevent procrastination, what size is best.  Perhaps most significantly, we are working through how to give feedback on significantly different kinds of writing.  Out of the four women, each of us is working within a different genre, and I find myself a little disoriented jumping from one genre to the next, in and out of my expertise.   Yet there comes a point when good writing is good writing, and it’s something you recognize in prose or poetry.

Muddling Through (Or Um, What Now?)

However, it is hard to be an active member of a writing group when I am not producing much new poetry.  I’m out of practice; I’m not seeing or hearing things like I used to.  Last week, I had about two hours to write a poem for the upcoming meeting.  Nothing happened.  I read some poetry.  Nothing.  I found some of my old work.  Nothing.  I finally decided to take the old work to the new group since they hadn’t read it before in hopes that it would spark new ideas and ultimately new poems.  So far, nothing.  The issue is not so much getting back into writing.  Those of you who read my personal blog know that I participated in National Blog Posting Month in November where the challenge was to post every day for thirty days.  This commitment catapulted me back into writing regularly; it’s the best thing I’ve done for myself in some time, but the poetry remains stagnant.

Right now, I am waiting.  While I am still planning on pursuing my M.F.A. after my husband completes his graduate program, I am not sure where I’m at as a writer right now.  And I believe that’s okay.  There’s something to be said for the discipline of writing, for surrounding yourself with good art and thoughtful people, for giving yourself deadlines so you actually produce work instead of just telling strangers over appetizers and small talk that you’re a writer.  Yet it’s not instant, there’s no formula, and you must learn to listen well—even when the silence uncovers more questions (like which genre to pursue and when).  In the end, the process will yield the art, and right now I am trusting the journey.

***

Kristin Mulhern Noblin is a veteran English teacher who enjoys good coffee, watching football, and using her red KitchenAid mixer.  She lives in Seattle, Washington, with her husband and looks forward to the day they will have a dog.  When not wrangling middle school students, she is busy standing for truth, beauty, freedom, and love.

Photo Haiku Wednesday

Photo Haiku Wednesday is back and there's good news! The good people over at Quo Vadis have generously donated some prizes!! The  weekly winner will receive a Quo Vadis Habana Journal and a bottle of J. Herbin ink!!

Every week Relief will choose a random winner! So play along and tell your friends. See the information below for extra chances to win.

Photo courtesy of Michelle Pendergrass.

Directions:

1. Enjoy

2. Write a haiku inspired by what you see

3. Post the haiku in the comments for chance to enter

For extra chances to win:

4. Follow @reliefjournal on Twitter

5. Follow Quo Vadis on Twitter

6. Twitter @reliefjournal with your  haiku and #PHW (Photo Haiku Wednesday)

* * *

Winner will be announce via Twitter Thursday afternoons.

We can only ship to U.S. addresses right now.

You may only win once every three months, but you may play along every single week for Twitter Super Bonus Points!

I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For

I'd be a terrible poser if I acted like U2 was one of my favorite bands. (Sorry Heather) However, as I sat down to write this post, that song did come to mind and I did pull it up and listen to it.

Because right now, it's truth as far as The Midnight Diner goes.  So I'm going to lay it all out there and hope that you will rise to the occasion and make it so.

Submissions were extended to January 15 and maybe I should have addressed the issues then, but I didn't think about it.  Live and learn, right?  So the 15th came and went and I looked at the state of submissions and noticed a huge discrepancy in categories.  Some categories are overflowing but most are gaunt and starving.

We have plenty of horror, paranormal, and hard-boiled stories. They are abundant.  Everything else? Not so much.  Like almost nothing. A drought.

We need you to submit in these categories:

Jesus vs. Cthulhu

Monster

Shatner on a Plane

Archetypical Exploration

The One That Happens in a Diner

Weird Western

Conspiracy/Intrigue

Adventure

Aliens/UFO

Weird War

I am committed to producing a quality publication and right now, I feel that the scales are stacked and there isn't much variety.  Take a look at the list and get going!

As for the new deadline, I wanted to give you until the end of March, but then I looked at my April calendar and I'll be traveling three-quarters of the month and I know I will not be able to read the last minute submissions, not to mention start trying to produce this issue, so to save my sanity, I'm going to go out on a limb here and set the new submission deadline for May 15, 2010.

I realize that means we've kept submissions open for two months shy of a year and I understand we've not made decisions on stories submitted over the past six months, but I'd rather publish a quality, diversified issue  than try to make it work with mostly three categories.  In the end, this is better for you, author, because you want your story in a publication that cares.

* * *

Michelle Pendergrass is Editor-in-Chief of The Midnight Diner and hopes you consider submitting a story in one of the desolate categories above.

Hitting the Mixes

Deanna Hershiser ponders failure and success in writing.

I've been looking back and thinking I would describe a few of my writing hits and misses. But then I thought, what do those terms mean?

Hit

--n.: 1. a blow; stroke. 2. a getting to what is aimed at.

As in baseball, so with the pen. I wanted to get hits, to see my name in print, to hear that people were reading me. After each of those gifts arrived, I hoped I would receive more -- wider recognition, contest wins, and let's not forget lump sums.

In daydream scenarios, I imagined the greater good my words might accomplish, the lasting effect of my ministry on the world.

Many times, though, I received good news from an editor or contest when some aspect of my life was in a low state, or when the news was more like a blow. For example, the first check I received for an article, back in 1996, brought with it amazing feelings -- most of them good. But I couldn't help tracing over again the sorrowful subject of my story. Was God pleased that I got paid for this? Or had I taken advantage of a sad situation to boost my ego?

While a therapist might have labeled my guilt feelings neurotic, I'm not sorry for the inner wrestling I did. Further thought and prayer helped me write more on the subject and find richer insight.

Miss

--n.1. a failure to hit, attain, etc. 2. (obsolete) loss; lack.

I almost quit writing after my first rejection. Thanks to encouraging friends and growing up some more, I tried new things. One evening I found myself at a writers' conference banquet, knowing I had won a prize for a short story but waiting to hear whether I had received first, second, or third.

Though happy to be in my seat at all, I really wanted first prize. Who would ever care about the other two? To come all this way and not get first, I knew, would feel like a loss.

Then a fresh thought hit me. I might be able to handle loss right now better than someone else sitting in the full dining room. Forget how good anybody's writing is for a minute, my mind said. Someone else might truly need first prize. Strange to say, I relaxed. And yep, someone else won. I still have the certificate for my second prize in a file somewhere, all but forgotten. Yet, again, I'm glad I went through those weird thoughts and emotions in my writing process.

I may post more in coming weeks about my successes, failures, and the mixture of lessons that have ministered through them to me. Feel free to share any of your own in the comments section.

***

In 2010 Deanna Hershiser plans to take breaks from toil over essays and memoirs to fish with her father on the McKenzie River near Eugene, Oregon.  Her latest publications have included fiction in joyful! and nonfiction in Camroc Press Review. She blogs here

I Lost

On the last day of NaNoWriMo 2009, Ian David Philpot looks on the positive side of things...even though he lost.

Today is November 30--the last day of this month--and I have officially lost NaNoWriMo. Two weeks ago, I wrote about how I had been faring in the program that pushes writers to get out 50,000 words in the month of November. Unfortunately, I have only written a couple thousand words since then. Resting just below 20,000 words, I am an official loser.

I have no problem admitting my inability. Between helping out with Relief to working 20-35 hours a week and fighting through the toughest semester yet, I wasn't able to meet my goal. And I'm fine with that, because National Novel Writing Month was a success. I wrote more for that story than I have ever written for any one piece before. I've also got a great start to a novel.

I also have a better understanding of how to direct my energies in my future. My dreams of being a professional writer have officially met with the struggles of time and the two clearly do not mix well. Reconciling them may take a lifetime, but if that's what it takes, I will do it.

My new goal is to have my current novel finished and peer reviewed before summer of next year. That way I can start preparing for NaNoWriMo 2010 much sooner. My next novel is going to be about a celebrity who leaves a long trail of clues in his movies about how he is a member of a mysterious society that carries the secret of the still existing lineage from Pope Joan. The title: The DiCaprio Code (copyright Ian David Philpot 2009). Oh, and you better believe I'm going to be using Write a Book in 30 Days next year. I clearly can not do it on my own. :)

***

Ian David Philpot, a Relief intern, is studying English at Northern Illinois University and spent one year in Columbia College Chicago's Fiction Writing program. He writes fiction and poetry and music. Ian prefers black to white, vanilla to chocolate, and only eats yellow cake.

NaNoWriMo Virgin

Ian David Philpot brings you up to speed on his first time participating in NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month -- NaNoWriMo.org).

Twenty days ago, I was happy.  I had just chosen my topic for  NaNoWriMo, and I felt that I could find a way to stretch it into 50,000 words (the minimum number of words needed to "win").  I knew that it was going to be tough, and I tried to mentally prepare for the adventure.

I read through the forums and planned on going to my area's Kick-off/Write-in event on the first day.  I was very pumped.

When I arrived at the Kick-off/Write-in, I found I was the first person there.  Over the course of about an hour and a half, I met six other writers--all women between 18 and 40.  As each person joined, everyone introduced themselves and we shared what kind of novels each person was writing.  That's when a clear distinction was made: I was not only the solitary male but also the only person writing for a general readership.

I know this is a generalization of the women I met, but they were pretty much all writing young adult novels about girls for girls.  Don't get me wrong, there is absolutely nothing wrong with that, I just found it very difficult to relate with them.  (Especially the one about a girl who talks to mermaids.)

It was a good feeling on that first day to have fellow writers around, but I struggled to build solidarity because of my subject matter.  My first few days reflected a good word count because I almost felt like I had a group that I belonged to.  As I kept thinking about how alone I was in the writing process, my ability to keep my word count up and I quickly fell behind the 1,667 word/day average that would bring me to 50,000 by November 30.

As of today, November 19, I'm only at 14,512 when I should be closing in on 30,000.  I'm going to keep writing and hope that I make it there on time.

If you'd like to see what I'm writing about and keep up on my progress, click here.

***

Ian David Philpot, a Relief intern, is studying English at Northern Illinois University and spent one year in Columbia College Chicago's Fiction Writing program. He writes fiction and poetry, and can also list off eighteen elements from the periodic table and occasionally does not eat meat.

Ian David Philpot, Relief's intern and Blog Master, is studying English at Northern Illinois University and spent one year in Columbia College Chicago's Fiction Writing program. He writes fiction, poetry, and music as often as he can.  Ian loves Italian ice and gelato.

Photo Haiku Wednesday 11.18.09

Photo courtesy of Michelle Pendergrass.

Directions:
1. Enjoy.
2. Write a haiku inspired by what you see.
3. Post the haiku in the comments for bonus points.
4. Put the haiku on your twitter with #PHW (Photo Haiku Wednesday) in your tweet for SUPER bonus points.

Al bonus points are awarded via @ReliefJournal on Twitter.

Relief News Tuesday 11.3.2009

Now Accepting Submissions for 4.1!

Submissions for Relief Issue 4.1 are open!  Click here to get over to the Online Submission System and submit your pieces.  If you are unsure about the formatting or requirements, be sure to check out the Submit Your Work tab at the top.

Disregard the Following

This week, Coach came across some "Love Inspired Guidelines."  Click here to check them out.  (And don't stop before you reach the part about waltzing.)

*NOTE: Any submission that strictly follows those "Love Inspired Guidelines" will be promptly rejected.  Relief encourages writers to embrace their form and to write what is true without worrying about unnecessary censorship.

On a final note...made up of 50,000 words

It wouldn't be right to acknowledge those of you (including Relief's intern) who are participating in NaNoWriMo this year.  We know it's hard writing 50,000 words in 30 days, which is why WriteABookIn30Days.com exists.  WABI30D was created by our very own Coach, and his course gives you motivation and encouragement as you push your word count skyward.  There's even a FREE Mini-Course available, and anything that's FREE is worth checking out.

Fall/Winter Writing

Our fall/winter reading period will open tomorrow, November 3, 2009. Log in and submit your essays, short stories, and poems! Also, if you're looking for motivation to write a novel, make sure you check out WriteABookIn30Days.com!  It's a great motivational system to get you to increase your word count and get that great idea you've been thinking about out and on the page.  (It also makes a great companion for NaNoWriMo.org!)