Early Admission to Odyssey

2008-02-28T06:42:00.000-08:00

Of my three workshop applications (Clarion, Clarion West, and Odyssey), the first one just came back: I was accepted for early admission to Odyssey.

HELL YEAH!!!

For those of you who would like to see the story that got me in, email me at thundress@hotmail.com and I'll send it to you. Or, for those who are really daring, sign up for my next sci-fi novel at kingnovel@gmail.com and mention The Golden Directive and I'll send them both your way.

Also, ditto for anyone who would like to read one of the two Honorable Mentions I've received in the Writers of the Future Contest. If this is the case, mention Parasite or Fury of the Sphinx. I like them both, but personally I think Parasite was better.

But back to the point: The Odyssey acceptance means I will definitely be going to one of the Big Three writing workshops this summer. MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! I'm going to hold out in confirming with Odyssey as long as I can, to see if 1) I get accepted to the other two and 2) if any of the three will offer scholarships. Damn I need a scholarship.

The really cool thing about this is that, within a 24-hour period, I learned I was a Writers of the Future Honorable Mention and I got the green light from Odyssey. This is definitely my year, folks. :)

-Sara King

http://www.kingfiction.com/

Save Science Fiction

2007-02-01T06:50:00.000-08:00

Want to help save Science Fiction? Read this:

New authors of genre fiction (sci-fi, fantasy, horror, mystery, etc.) need marketplaces to establish themselves as professional writers before submitting to the bigwigs of the publishing business (editors and agents in NYC). Without publishing credits to your name, it's almost impossible to get attention for your novel from the right type of people.

So how do you get those publishing credits? The biggest, easiest way is to submit to genre magazines like Asimov's, Analog, Apex, and Fantasy & Science Fiction.

The problem is these marketplaces are dying off.

Television and the Web have dealt a crippling blow to speculative fiction magazines. Readers that, 20 years ago, would have subscribed to a dozen spec-fic magazines each year are now spending their time mindlessly surfing TV and internet sources. Reading is falling by the wayside.

How can you, as a writer, help?

Check out genre fiction magazines on the web and subscribe. Subscribing does two things for you as a writer. First, it helps keep those genre marketplaces open and active. Every subscriber helps the magazine raise both the quality of its fiction and the amount it can pay per word (the two come hand-in-hand), which is a continuous cycle. Eventually, they might be able to establish themselves as professionally-paying magazines (5 cents a word or more, according to the SF&F Association). Secondly, it allows you the writer to see just what that particular magazine is looking for in its fiction. Each magazine has a niche it likes to fill in the genre marketplace, and if you know what that niche is, your chances of being accepted increase many, many times over blind submission.

And, if you know what the magazine publishes and use that knowledge to get published in it, you've just raised your chances of getting accepted by an editor or agent, since now you've got some credits under your belt.

So, in short, subscribe to speculative fiction magazines. Enjoy them, pass them around, and get your friends to do the same. Maybe together we can turn the cycle around.

Some good places to start:
http://www.ralan.com/ (lists genre writing markets)
http://www.duotrope.com/index.aspx (lists spec-fic magazines)
http://www.locusmag.com/Links/Portal.html (lists a TON of writing links and magazine websites)

Thanks for helping to support genre fiction!

-Sara King
http://www.kingfiction.com

Alaskan on the Edge

Early Admission to Odyssey

Save Science Fiction