Submit, submit!

Last year, there was an inspiring piece on The Review Review called "Yes, Your Submission Phobia is Holding You Back". Having published short fiction at an embarrassingly low rate since 2010 (1 a year - go me!), one sentence in particular stuck out: "You think rejection is proof that you have no talent or that the work is no good. Actually, the only thing a rejection proves is that you sent out your work." 

2013 has been the first year ever - ever - when I've had stories plural published (here, in the LS13 anthology, and here, in the Willesden Herald anthology). And it's still only June! I'm hoping to have at least two more published before the end of the year. The only way I can improve my embarrassing strike rate of 1 story per year, I realised, was to get my work off my hard drive and out into the world. 

So, I developed a system. Being something of a systems nerd (there's no cure, apparently), I worked out a way of tracking submissions using a spreadsheet*. Doing this helps the whole process so much less painful. I am sharing this spreadsheet with you, everybody on the whole of the internet, because I'm nice like that. 

In day to day internet browsing, I keep an eye out for submission opportunities. If I see a competition I want to enter, or a lit mag with its submission window open, I add it to my spreadsheet in the lower columns, making a note of the closing date and word limit. If I think one of the stories I have ready is worth trying in one of these competitions, I put the magazine's name next to that story title. (see spreadsheet for illustration). The whole thing is colour-coded. Blue for acceptances, Red for submissions, Black for places to try, Green for rejections, and Purple for stories I have withdrawn myself. This last one is key, and a kind thing to do for other writers. If a story gets accepted for publication somewhere, I make sure to contact the other places and withdraw it. This allows editorial teams to reduce the size of their slush pile, and get back to other writers more quickly. It's only fair. 

The bookmarking and updating of the spreadsheet is something I do as I'm going along, but the submitting is something I set aside time for. Many of the magazines have slightly differing formatting requirements, and that in itself takes time. I set aside a couple of hours every month to get the stories I'm sending out into the right format, and then I send stories out - at the moment, I'm doing at least 2 a month. It's good to set a target for yourself, because then you're in the position of actually having to look out for appropriate submission opportunities. And please, for the love of God, make sure you're sending your work to the kind of places that are likely to publish it. Don't waste your time sending pulpy science fiction to Granta. You're only setting yourself up for disappointment. Know what kind of work you make, and what kind of magazines like it. Your submissions process will only ever end in tears otherwise. 

One last thing. I always save my finished stories in two different versions - one that's been through a UK English spellcheck, and one that's been through a US English spellcheck. This makes it easier and quicker for sending versions out internationally. 

Thanks for reading, and happy submitting! 

Currently reading

Breakfast of Champions Kurt Vonnegut

Best of Young Brazilian Novelists Granta 

Busy bee

Recently I've been hard at work revising my novel, and collating my short story collection. Both have been very involved tasks leaving me with little time to update this blog!

However I'm pleased to say that there's quite a lot of exciting stuff going on in Leeds over the next few weeks, not least The Big Bookend Festival and The Hannah festival. I'm not involved in core organisation for either of these events, but am glad to be peripherally involved either by organising warm-up events, or giving readings. Have a look below to see whether there's anything that interests you!

4th June 2013 - Avast! Join us as we plash a creaking boat through a miscellany of stories, songs and poems of the sea. Featuring performances by Matthew Bellwood, SJ Bradley, Becky Cherriman, and Ian Pepper, with music from We Died at Sea and The Ocean Loiners. At Santiago's, Leeds, from 7:45, entry £3. Avast! facebook events page

7th June 2013 - Big Bookend Anthology launch. At the Customer Services lounge in Trinity Leeds, from 7pm onwards.

14th June 2013 - Poetry in the North / Fictions of Every Kind / Hannah festival - A shared event curated jointly by Fictions of Every Kind & Poetry in the North, as part of the Hannah festival. With readings from SJ Bradley, Kathryn Glass, Jenny Oliver, and Catherine Stones. Clock Cafe, Otley Road, from 7:30 (not sure of entry price)

2nd July 2013 - Fictions of Every Kind: Ramble featuring guest speakers Anna Chilvers and Max Dunbar, and music from Look Yonder! Wharf Chambers, 7:30, £3 (please note Wharf Chambers is a members' club and you must be a member, or guest of a member, in order to attend an event here. Please visit www.wharfchambers.org for more info). More information on the Fictions of Every Kind facebook events page 

Currently reading

Junot Diaz Drown
E M Forster Howard's End

The Printing Press Of My Dreams

If you've been following this blog a while, you may already know that I'm a sucker for an antiquated printing method called Letterpress. I didn't mean to fall in love with Letterpress - it just happened. We met one day while I was at a book fair. Letterpress showed me all these cards made with salvaged type nobody else wanted; it whispered in my ear that it would take up hours of my life, infect my thinking, and make me want to drive to other parts of the country to look at bits of metal in boxes.

"I don't mind," I said. "It is already too late."

Between then and now I've printed cards, chapbooks, posters, and a tiny anthology of work by writers I admire (now sold out). I used to print these at The Print Project, but for various reasons decided I'd be better off with a press of my own (pictured above).

In the future Yuertes (as he is affectionately known) will likely be used to print gig fliers, leaflets, and short story postcards. For now, he is just settling into my kitchen. Doesn't he look at home?

Here are some of the things Yeurtes and I have made this afternoon.

(answer: fabulous).

What You Can Do To Help

Long ago, I used this very blog to air my complaints about one of my least favourite living writers, a one Mr. J Franzen. I dislike Franzen for several reasons, all of which I will not bother you with now. We'll gloss over those, and go directly to my #1 gripe with J-Franz, which is: the way he writes about women.

Male writers, I know it is not easy to imagine what it is to be a woman. Many male writer-friends have told me they avoid writing women, or leave them out of their work altogether. It's often for the most honourable reasons. Perhaps you're afraid to get women 'wrong'. Or you're sensitive to the fear of undermining female perspectives, because you might steal women's stories and mistell them through the prism of male experience. Worst of all, women like me might read your stories, become enraged by your lack of understanding, and write a whole series of blog posts about what a massive misogynist you are.

So how does a writer like Franzen - somebody who is frequently hailed as being the greatest writer of his generation - get women so wrong? For me, as a reader, the answer is really simple. In trying to use his female characters to explore the problems of sexism, Franzen ties them up in knots. His female characters often are used as mirrors to extrapolate the dilemmas facing his male characters. They don't jump off the page; they don't have needs, wishes, desires. Their needs only exist as a means of irritating or servicing (delete as applicable) the needs of the men in the book. They have no volition, save when it serves the men for them to do so. They have no complexity, no depth, no sympathy. In short: Franzen writes about women as though he has never met any.

Men, here is what I suggest: if you want to get women right, there's a lot you can do. The more you do, the more your feel for women will improve. You can do as little as much as you feel able, but I recommend doing as much as you can. It'll all serve your work in the end.

A good place to start is by reading women writers, and lots of them. You might find that women writers see the world differently, that they write differently. It might surprise you how different the female perspective is. There are plenty of amazing female writers to read - my personal favourites are writers like Margaret Drabble, Muriel Spark, Amy Tan, and Claire Massey. Don't just leave it at one book. Read many, and widely. Women write a wide range of fiction as do men - do yourself a favour, and check their work out.

Fiction an easy place to start, but needs to work in tandem with actual experience. This is where you really need to put your back into your research. Be ready to go places you have never been before. Stay calm, it's all in service of your art.

To really write women well, you have to get to grips with good characterisation. Your reader will believe your characters if they seem real; and poor characterisation always results from drawing on too little. Write a character based on only one or two people, and it will always come across thin. But write based on many, and you'll have something believable. It's as true of female characters as it is of males.

It will help to start meeting new people. If you only really ever meet women as a means of dating them - if you only know women your own age, say, or if you only know women who are dating your friends - this isn't really a wide enough pool to draw upon. You need something outside your social background. You need to meet women of differing educational backgrounds, and of different heritages. Always think about expanding the range of your experience, and most importantly, of doing it deeply.

There are tons of good ways to do this. A good way to start is by meeting women of different ages. You'll find you can learn a lot from older women. They'll be able to tell you how women's status has changed over the generations, and the struggles they faced when they were young. If nothing else you'll find their stories fascinating. Where do you meet them? Well, that's up to you. Older women are all over. Join a book group. Start going to a knitting circle. Seek them out, hear their stories. Seek out that which is outside your immediate experience. Find it and soak it all up, and write it down in your notebook afterwards.

But the best way of all to learn about women - and I know many of you will baulk at this - is to do what has become women's work. Low paid, low status jobs in the health and care industry are crawling with women. Why do women do these jobs? Go and do one yourself, and you'll find out. It's not just one answer, but many. The hours might suit for childcare; or perhaps this job is the only one your colleague has the skills for. Perhaps it's a stopgap between graduating university and finding something better. In amongst doing this low status work, during which you'll have the chance to find out what it is to do that work - literally what it is to be a woman - you'll have the chance to meet women from a whole range of different backgrounds. You'll find out why they do the work they do; you'll hear them talk about their home lives, their domestic arrangements, their wishes for the future. All of this is stuff that you can draw on for your female characters. As always, make sure you do it with respect. Be mindful that the women you're working with are real. They're not just somebody you're going to take the piss out of later to get a cheap laugh when you come to write your novel. They're real people, with real lives, and most likely many of them will still be doing this work when you are long gone. Tread carefully and you can represent them and their lives well. Giving accurate voice to someone who can't speak up for themselves is a big responsibility.

Above all, my advice would be to pay your female characters the same amount of attention you would your male. Give them backstories. Know where they come from and what they want. If your characters are drawn from a range of experience in life, they will have that much more of a ring of authenticity. Don't assume that you can make it all up in your head and get it right. You won't. Listen to women; collect their stories, blend what you know from life well into believable characters, and you will get it right.

Currently reading

Best European Fiction 2012 Ed. Aleksandar Hemon
The Shipyard Juan Carlos Onetti

Appearance at Words on Tap

I'll be reading at Words on Tap, "A Celebration of spoken word and booze", at The Chemic in Leeds this coming Friday. It's free in, I think, and I'll be reading excerpts from some short stories I've recently been working on. You can click this link for more info.

Currently reading

Budapest Chico Buarque
Bartleby & Co Enrique Vila-Matas
Falling Through Clouds Anna Chilvers

Literary Sisters interview

The absolutely lovely and talented Rachel Connor, author of Sisterwives, interviewed me over on her Literary Sisters blog. Many thanks to Rachel for the interview, and you can read it by clicking here.

Currently reading

A Hologram for the King Dave Eggers
Not Fade Away Jim Dodge

Willesden Herald International Short Story prize

I'm really pleased to be able to reveal that I've been shortlisted for this years' Willesden Herald International Short Story Prize for my story, Dance Class. The story will shortly appear in an anthology of the competition, with the winners being announced shortly. It's exciting to appear on a list with nine other excellent writers, and I bet they're all as chuffed as I am to have their work appear in the book. Many thanks to Stephen Moran of the Willesden Herald for organising, and to David Means for judging.

The full Willesden Herald shortlist is here.