Celebrating the Power of Revision

Celebrating the Power of Revision

by | Apr 12, 2020 | How to Revise a manuscript, Writing | 0 comments

 Celebrating the Power of Revision

I want to celebrate Emily and her writing journey. She is one of our writers from the Writing Gym program, currently writing a novel set in ancient Egypt during the New Kingdom period. 

“I’m an elementary school teacher and I had this vision two years ago to write a novel set in ancient Egypt, because I studied and taught the theme,” Emily states. “I have a real story to tell about the artist’s life in Egypt. What it’s like working on the temples, working on tombs and more. It was a very respected lifestyle, and quite high up on the caste system in the dictatorship in Egypt.” 

Tackling middle-grade historical fiction is no small undertaking. So, kudos Emily. 

I met Emily at a local bookstore where I was running a class with some local writers.

“I was pretty much surprised, myself, that I went to your class,” Emily says in hindsight, “I really enjoyed it. It was at that point where I was trying to work up the courage to take writing more seriously. I immediately thought: ‘That’s someone who I could actually work with.’”

Emily, before we met, had already written and finished her longer story. She revised it a couple times but “it was in this sort of a standstill.” She wasn’t ready to submit and knew that she needed professional help with the submission process. 

“That’s what I thought it was kind of going for, but then when I talked with Annalisa, and being able to revise it and learn about writing has been the gift. She made that really clear when she described what the Publishing Mastermind was. That maybe the end result is getting published. But throughout it all you’re going to learn a lot. That’s what I’m celebrating.”

Once Emily and I started digging into her manuscript, her energy was so high with so much to celebrate. I asked her what that moment was like. 

“During that writing period, I used it to understand techniques and learn other techniques, experiment with other techniques, know what’s out there, know others who I might have overlooked, and read some different styles of writing within my genre.

“It made me rethink my story and how my characters needed to be doing more, speaking more, and interacting more. Sometimes, it’s those character moments where one character is thinking one thing and the other character is also thinking something, but they’re both saying something out loud. That has a whole other form of communication you can do in writing, but you can’t really do it in other forms of storytelling.” 

Emily also thinks that the inspiration that our Writing Gym community brings makes the experience so much more powerful.

“It’s really confidence-building. It makes me like writing more.” 

One takeaway that stands out to her as a bigger celebration than others is that confidence-building:

“Now I have the confidence to know that I can write a longer piece and have other projects as well.”

“Be alert and take risks. Know that there is potential out there.”

So, what is the Writing Gym? Why should you care about this? 

“Annalisa Parent is an incredibly professional who leads this inquiry-based study that is the Writing Gym. You, as the guide, ask the right questions to make you grow on your own.” 

Thank you so much, Emily. We appreciate you at the Writing Gym. 

Top Author Tips to Get that Novel You Wrote in a Month to PUBLISHABLE

Top Author Tips to Get that Novel You Wrote in a Month to PUBLISHABLE

by | Mar 29, 2020 | How to Revise a manuscript, Writing | 0 comments

Top Author Tips to Get that Novel You Wrote in a Month to PUBLISHABLE

 

While we are all at home, doing our part to flatten the curve, our Writing Gym members are taking advantage of this quarantine time to work on their writings. One of our amazing Writing Gym members, O’Dell Isaac, is at the Revision phase of our program. 

Currently, he is working on a detective story in which the main character is helping the Health Department find a person who is HIV positive. During his search, he finds himself in the middle of craziness as he works to solve his case. 

I reached out to O’Dell when I saw his post on our Writing Gym page on Facebook, celebrating his completion of a 50,000 word novel for NaNoWriMo. I congratulated him on his achievement and then asked him: “What’s your next step?” 

“I actually didn’t know what to say,” O’Dell states, “I was too busy doing my victory dance to actually think about what I can do next. I realized that what I was celebrating was not something I was comfortable giving to an agent.” 

“It’s one thing to want something, but it’s another to have a concrete plan with steps to take and here, we’re talking about my publishing career,” O’Dell insightfully states. We talked in hindsight of our first telephone call. From there, I asked him to send me the first 20 pages of his manuscript. I called him back, had a longer conversation with him, and he finally joined the Writing Gym. 

“I didn’t really have any idea what I was getting into. I was nervous but excited too,” O’Dell continues, “because I was taking a step that I had never taken before. I didn’t know what was out there, but I figured it was going to represent forward motion. It was going to take me further than I had been in this process.” 

O’Dell credits the Writing Gym for its accountability aspect:

“Someone is getting you to work out the tools that you have and develop new ones that you may not have had before. Someone comments on your results and looks at your writing and sees the maturation, the progress.” 

O’Dell states that he has come such a long way in his writing, that when he opened his manuscript again it seemed to him like someone else had written it.

“I’ve come so much further that it almost looked like it had been written by someone else, but the encouraging part of that is that I’ve become a much stronger writer.” 

The most important and beneficial thing O’Dell learned with us is to believe in himself. “Self-belief is something I never really had before. But now, I know that I have the tools that work best for me and my genre. It’s just a matter of knowing how to apply those tools.” 

We love analogies here at the Writing Gym, and I especially love what O’Dell states about the toolbox. There are a lot of programs out there that, in the context of the toolbox analogy, would come up to a broken door that you’re trying to fix and replace your hammer with a screwdriver or a wrench or something else. Then, you’d have to figure out how to use that tool instead of the one that you are familiar with. Now, you’re stuck with a tool you have no experience with.

At the Writing Gym, we open your kit and we take note of what works and what doesn’t work for you personally and move forward with that knowledge. 

Indeed, the Writing Gym wants our writers to improve and to succeed. We want to point writers at the right direction and help them achieve their writing and publishing dreams. 

We are so happy that we have O’Dell in our Writing Gym membership. We are proud of all his achievements and we hope that you, too, can take advantage of your time inside your home to write and write and write. 

Stay safe and happy writing.

What’s one of the most overlooked elements to write and publish?

What’s one of the most overlooked elements to write and publish?

by | Jan 1, 2020 | Writing | 0 comments

What’s one of the most overlooked elements to write and publish? 

About two years ago, I was at St. Louis to speak to the Gulf Managers Association of America to speak about clarity in writing.

A lot of fiction writers think clarity doesn’t apply to them, or it’s not important.

But if you’ve ever revised anything, you may have found that clarity can be an elusive attribute even fiction writing.

Getting your message across, whether in your theme or in the actual progression of your chapters, there are lots of issues fiction writers have with clarity.

So, clarity is a really important element even for fiction writers. It’s super super important. And so, the Gulf Managers Association of America have invited me to speak at St. Louis to help writers learn about the importance of clarity in writing. 

I’d love to talk to you about getting clarity in your writing, and not just in your writing, but also in your writing goals.  

I can also guide you in what way it is best for you to publish–whether it’s self-publishing or traditional–since publishing is not a “one-size-fits-all “ solution. 

I’d love to talk to you about where you are, where you’d like to go, and how you can get there. Drop yourself right into my calendar and chat with me there by clicking this link. 

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