Questions

I ***?rsonally like Science Fiction, ***?ntasy, Mystery, Thriller…

I’m definitely NOT into romance ****? I like the Twilight ***?ries. It’s because I liked the vampires and werewolves stuffs. Does it make me weird?

How about other guys on here? I don’t feel like talking them to my friends because whenever we talk, we talk about basketball, soccer, skateboard, and stuffs like that. So I ****?t to hear it from here?
- I eat ****?nach!

I have really bad writers block and I am trying to write a teen novel but I just don’t have any ideas I would like it preferably to include vampires but it is not essential.

Please help me.
- Paul G

If there is a good science fiction movie maybe with werewolves, vampires, or something of the sort. I like for it to have some romance, but none of that nasty soft porno crap. I dont really care for Underworld, but if you got anything else please comment.
- Mikki

I read all the Sookie Stackhouse Books, by Charlaine Harris, it had romance, and Science Fiction ( vampires, supernatural ) i was wondering if anyone knew any books that were kinda like Sookie Stackhouse? Or Close?
- HotChoclate

I really dont want to read about vampires or anything fantasy like that. But I would like to read something about space.
- I bite

I have just completed my first book of short horror fiction and was wondering if anybody knew of any agents or publishers who would consider my work for publication? The book is around 88,000 words and covers a wide range of horror subjects, from vampires to ghosts.

I hope I CAN find a publisher, as I cannot afford to self publish!
- alan213006

You can learn a lot about what it takes to place a story in an ezine by starting up one of your own.

Last month we started work on a new ezine for writers, which we intended to use to publish high-quality, contemporary fiction, from writers all over the world. We placed a few adverts asking for submissions of just that. What we got was a revelation.

As a writer myself, I know how competitive the market is. Even non-paying markets are deluged by wannabe writers desperate for a by-line and some publicity. Competition, I had thought, would surely lead to a high quality of submissions, with every writer determined to submit only their very best work. Not so.

Of the handful of submissions we received the day after the adverts went out, only around four were fiction. One was a “how to write” style article. One was an essay on “the day my gran died”. Two were stories about vampires. One guy just sent us his CV – in Arabic.

Lesson one, then: read the guidelines carefully. If the market you’re aiming at publishes fiction, then no matter how brilliant your essay or article is, it’s not going to be accepted. Neither is your CV….

Lesson two, I hardly even need mention: If the publication is in English, don’t send your submission in Arabic, on the off-chance that the poor, beleaguered publisher will understand it. Simple.

Having deleted the non-fiction submissions, I moved onto the “good stuff”. Or so I thought. Of the four remaining pieces of writing, none had been proofread too carefully. One story made reference to a businessman “clenching the deal.” One made frequent use of the word “the” and had apparently random. Punctuation. A bit like. This. The other two were … stories about vampires.

Lesson three: Proofread. Or, ideally, get someone else to do it for you. Any writer knows that once you’ve worked on a piece of writing, you become blind to its mistakes. You can “proof” it as many times as you like, but you’ll still just see what you think is there, rather than what actually is there. In any artistic Endeavour, a fresh pair of eyes is essential in providing a little bit of clarity and perspective. For this reason, I present:

Lesson four: constructive criticism is your friend. There are a lot of aspiring writers out there. Get together with one, even if it’s only by email, and swap stories with them. Chances are they’ll be able to point out something about your story that you’ve missed. They may have some knowledge about your subject matter that you lack – for example, the fact that it’s called a “bass” guitar, not a “base guitar”, as one enlightening submission had it.

Finally, a quick note about bio’s. When you send your work to an ezine, of course you want a little something in return – other than cold hard cash. You’re looking for publicity, and your author bio is the ideal way to do it. Keep it simple, though. Of all of the submissions we’ve received so far, the one that sticks out the most is the one from the author with the most impressive credentials of the lot. So impressive, in fact, that her bio ran on for four A4 pages.

The problem was, her work stood out for the wrong reasons. She had certainly been published in a lot of magazines (I know, because she’d listed every single one of them) and won a huge amount of competitions (yep, she’d listed all of those too. Every one of them.) , but by the time I’d waded through all of the story titles, publication dates and other non-essential info, I was heartily tired of her. Her bio was four pages long: her story only two. When that happens, you know you’ve gone into overkill.

Essentially, too, after such a tremendous build-up, I was expecting something utterly spectacular which her writing failed to deliver. It seemed almost as if she was trying to use her bio to persuade me to publish her – the story was just an afterthought.

Lesson five: let your writing do the talking. When it comes to biographical info, less is more. I want to read your story, not a breath-by-breath account of the last twenty years of your life. Keep it simple, keep it short.


- DEV DAAS

I love to read these kind of books. I would love to read something around the lines of these series: His Dark Materials, Harry Potter, Artemis Fowl, A Wrinkle in Time, Inskpell, etc. Anything about vampires would be nice too. Just don’t put series longer than 10 books for monetary reasons
- Slifer!

I really want to write a fantasy novel, but have no leads in what I should write about.
1st: Would you rather read fantasy or Fiction? Why?
2nd: What would you like to read about?

Just so you know, I am not going to write about Vampires or Witchcraft and Wizardry.

Thanks for your help!
Ok, I meant realistic fiction or fantasy?
- Distance Runner

I need some ideas for a science fiction/dark romance novel, because I’m almost finished this other teenaged-drama story but I don’t think it’ll go anywhere seeing as it is basically like The O.C just more characters and different stories and I’m into vampires and other mythical creatures but sometimes vampires get boring. Any ideas?
- yurplee