I Want To Be Published - But I'm Just A Kid!

BEFORE YOU SUBMIT - PART II - APPEARANCE

This post moved to my Kids/Youth Getting Published page.

Come on over and leave a comment! Let me know what you as a young writer would like to know about getting published.

I Want To Be Published - But I'm Just A Kid!

BEFORE YOU SUBMIT - PART I - EDITING

This post moved to my Kids/Youth Getting Published page.

Come on over and leave a comment! Let me know what you as a young writer would like to know about getting published.

Heavenly pages - blank or full?

I’m not a huge sports fan, but my husband is. So, while I sit at my laptop reading email or writing, hubby is usually watching some sports event on television. I like to keep an eye on the progress of the Colorado teams: The Broncos, The Rockies, The Avalanche, The Nuggets.

So, when the noon news came out today, it instantly caught my attention when they announced the sudden and unexpected death of Kei McGregor. I don’t know much about him, accept that he was the President of the Rockies organization, he was well known and loved in the sports community in Colorado, at least, he died much too young at age 48, and he left a family behind.

Our town has had its share of losses over these past few weeks as well. A 16 yr old youth who adored his dog went four-wheeling down by the canal one day. When he didn’t return home, family and emergency services went looking for him. They found his body hours later. Apparently, his dog had fallen into the canal and his owner tried to rescue him. They both drowned. Another young man who had been diagnosed with a brain tumor several months ago died a couple of weeks ago at the age of 20. Last week, we lost a man in our community who had served as a pastor and later worked in our school system. He was 62, not much older than I.

All of these losses of life make me take a second look at my own. Why do I deserve more time on this earth when people who seem to accomplish so much more than I have are taken from it? I know it’s all a part of God’s plan, but I suppose it bothers me because it makes me accountable for my time. Every moment wasted is one that could and should be used in some constructive manner.

I remember reading a poem once entitled Eternal Ink by Craig F Pitts. It is a rather long work that depicts a visit to heaven. Once, there the visitor finds an angel writing constantly in a book, but most of the words disappear as soon as they are written. The message of the poem is that only the things we do that have eternal meaning will remain in our heavenly record. The older I get, the more I ask myself, “How many of the pages in my heavenly book are filled with eternal ink – and how many are blank?”

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Introducing I Want To Be Published - But I'm Just A Kid!

It’s been cool and dreary on the porch most of today. We had one spectacular lighting show Tuesday evening, followed by bucketsful of rain mixed with hail. There was a time when the front yard looked like it had snowed. The lighting lasted far into the night.

My granddaughter and I enjoyed the lightning on our way home from her dance class. She asked me what causes lightning. I tried to explain as simply as I could without getting too scientific for an 8 year old. She finally told me, “Grandma, I think God makes lightning because He’s mad. Maybe He had a fight with somebody.”

Thursday, I had the opportunity to go to one of our area middle schools and meet with several students. My main purpose was to give these young people interested in writing an overview of the steps it takes to get their work from their writing pad or computer screen into a magazine.

I had the 7th grade first and was told there would be “quite a few”, so considering the size of the school, I figured around 25 kids. I was told to expect 2-3 8th grade students. Several 6th graders had expressed an interest, so I expected maybe 20 in that group. Well, the first group had 57, the second 14, and the third about 30. I was thrilled to see so many young people interested in writing!

It is hard to tell how much the students learned from my talk. I don’t think a lot of them had heard much of the information I told them. I’m not sure that anyone had ever seen “The Writer’s Market Guide”. I took a copy of that along. I hope that my words inspired these young writers and that some of them will follow through and pursue their dream of publication. Others will go on to accomplish different goals, and that is fine too.

The idea occurred to me that I would like to start a series on my blog geared to young writers. I think many young people have the desire to get published, but don’t know how to go about it or what to expect when they do put their work “out there in the world”. So, help me spread the word about this series to any young people you know who would like to be published.

Every Friday, I will enter a blog post geared to the young writer. I’m going to start by posting the guidelines for Starsongs, a publication of Written World Communications for which I am the editor.

STARSONGS GUIDELINES

“Giving Voice to the Future”

Starsongs Magazine is a publication of Written World Communications

You are the future, and Starsongs wants to hear your ideas about it. Whether you like to write about the world in general or your little piece of it, we would like to see your story.

We are looking for short stories, poetry, artwork, and photography that reflect the way the writer or photographer views their life experiences with relationships to family, friends, role models, situations that young people face today and how they solve their dilemma.

We are interested in work by writers, artists, and photographers age 12-19. We are open to fiction or non-fiction and “as told to” stories.

We are not interested in work that deals with encouragement of drug use, explicit sexual situations, graphic violence, slasher stories, or torture situations.

Short stories should be submitted as an attachment with the following format. Double spaced, times new roman or courier new, 12-14 point font, 1" margins top, bottom, and both sides. Any Microsoft word program from 2007 and earlier is acceptable.

Starsongs will be a small publication with limited space. Therefore, short stories are limited to 1500-2000 words. Poetry is restricted to 16-24 lines per poem and can be sent as an attachment or in the body of the email in the way you would like to see it formatted on the page.
Photography should be submitted as an attachment in jpeg format.

Submissions should be addressed to Patti Shene at starsongs.mag@gmail.com

Next Week: Before you submit - Part I

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Review of The Promise of Morning by Ann Shorey

This thought-provoking tale is the second book in Ann Shorey’s AT HOME IN BELDON GROVE series. It takes place on the Illinois frontier in the 1840’s.

Ellie Craig has already suffered much loss with the deaths of her three infant children. Her grief along with fear of more loss distances her from her family. Raised by her aunt and uncle, Ellie has always carried the stigma of orphan. When a family secret is revealed to her, she begins a quest for the truth.

Meanwhile, husband Matthew questions his position as pastor of Beldon ‘s church when the son of the town’s founder, who also claims to be a minister, uses gossip to taint Matthew’s name. He journeys a long distance from home to see his Elder and ask to return to the position of circuit rider.

Miss Shorey delights her readers with vivid characters who face difficult choices and persevere against hearrtbreaking situations. It raises the question of how we struggle against man’s acceptance versus God’s will.

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The Equality of Easter

I wrote this article for our church newsletter, but that it appropriate for my blog as well since it addresses the message of the Easter season.

How do you know if you are equal to other Christians? Do you look at your fellow parishioners’ clothing and judge whether it is more elegant than yours? Do you measure another’s ability to sing, play an instrument, or teach Sunday school and determine your worth in comparison?

We have all envied someone else’s talent, ability, financial status, or accomplishments at one time or another. Conversely, each of us is guilty of arrogant pride as we claim superiority over others whose social skills, moral conduct, or level of achievement does not measure up to our expectations. We judge ourselves to be either inferior or superior to our fellow Christians, but seldom equal.

One of the reasons Jesus was condemned to death was because He claimed equality with the Father. “For this reason the Jews tried all the harder to kill him….he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.” (John 5:18 NIV). It is through this very equality with the Father, His power to take away the sins of the world, that the Son made us equal with each other.

No amount of material riches, political power, or number of influential friends can elevate any of us to a higher level in the eyes of God. When Jesus gave Himself in sacrifice on the cross, he died for all our sins. He didn’t divide us into categories that determined the degree of our transgressions.

Easter brings all of God’s children to a state of equality. None of us are worthy of the great gift of salvation that Jesus guaranteed when He claimed victory over death at the resurrection. Yet, we are equally granted the gift of eternal life when we accept His sacrifice.

This Easter, remember the equality you share with your brothers and sisters in Christ, as you await fulfillment of the promise written in Hebrews. “…Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many people; and he will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him.” (Hebrews 9:28 NIV).

Happy Easter and God bless you!

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