Connie's Corner

My Sunday...

I enjoyed another interesting writers' group meeting yesterday. The speaker was Mary Glazer, a freelancer for a Florida gardening magazine. She recently, February, I think, secured a permanent spot as one of Lowes' garden magazine writers. If you Google "Lowes gulf coast gardening", her articles will pop up.

She was very funny and shared several personal experiences on her road to writing. She titled her presentation "A Freelance Writer's Maiden Voyage". She gave some tips that work for her especially now that she has deadlines to meet. Never before using an outline, now she values it above all else. Also, she gives high praise to her editor even though sometimes she disagrees with his suggestions. She has never seen him in person, only gets emails, but she has made up an entire story about him just as you would for a character. In her mind, he is French and speaks with a French accent, wears a beret, and uses his hands a lot for emphasis. His real name is Luke. She had us rolling in the aisles. But the gist is that feedback is very, very important to a writer.

She has to submit pictures with her articles and places a special value on them. Pictures help her write what she sees and what she cannot see...interesting. Also, she never starts with a blank page, even if it only has her name at the top, that's something to get her started. She keeps desktop icons of all her articles in progress so she can click on them instantly when an idea pops to mind. Sounds like a plan.

Anyway, I had an enjoyable hour and a half and thought I would share...

until next time...c