After 15+ Years, I Started Submitting My Work and Other Upbeat News #barrioblues

Monday, I was sure I was going to quit writing or at least suspend that dream until retirement, but after much thought, I decided to stop being such a panocha. No offense to panochas everywhere.  I also refocused on my writing motive--which has absolutely nothing to do with sales--and started reading great stories.  (I would like to say that work is less busy, now that the union contracts have been ratified, and that I have more energy, but I have a number of member hearings coming up and grievances.)  Now that the artistic crisis is over, I started submitting my work again.  I haven't sent in a story in like fifteen years.  Last night, I sent in two poems and am going to submit flash fiction after I get some beta readers to give them a once a over.  I also got a short, but sweet cover letter done with a 50 word bio.  I was heartened that my cover letter was pretty close to what editors want, but I hope the Switchback editor isn't laughing his or her ass off at me because the first bio I sent was ridiculously long, so I resent the cover letter with a shorter bio. 

I also submitted a writing article, to Inner Circle Magazine, and I have to thank my writer-sister Carmen Baca for giving me some grammar lessons on my first draft--even though I only wanted content feedback. #EnglishTeachers4EverYo--and positive feedback on the content.  Phew!

Last night, I also got a hold of my friend Brett who is designing the cover for Not Your Abuelita's Folktales. He is working on that for a March deadline.  Like me, he is very busy with his activism, so I appreciate the maximum effort.  I also sent him the manuscript, so he could give me feedback on the design.  I'm not sold on the chapter dividers, but I couldn't find anything magic related that was free to use for commercial purposes.  The table of contents also needs some work and alignment.  I managed to do just fine with La Bruja del Barrio Loco, but I want this book to look nicer than the last one.  That's not a bad goal to have in general. 

Today, I am also going to an old bookstore and going to see if they take books printed through Lulu.  Now, I've never used Lulu, but it farms out books to Amazon and Barnes & Nobles.  The only thing is the book won't be available for Kindle Unlimited, and I won't be able to lower the price.  Still, there is a hard cover option, which is titillating.  I have a growing soft spot for hard cover books.

That's all the good news I have.  There was probably more, but I need to save some writing energy to revise my novel, The Harvest. 

Sending Magical Energy your way, so you can get your work done!  #barrioblues