Our friend won

Today was more than a little enjoyable. My friend, Mavis Jarrell (writer of poetry and prose) and I helped celebrate a writing award garnered by another friend and fellow writer, Hazel (Polly) Pope.

Polly's short story, "Fall Picnic on the Hay Wagon," won First Place in the Gulf Coast Writers "Let's Write" contest (read it on http://www.gcwriters.org). Yay, congratulations, Polly!

Short stories are notoriously hard to write, especially those with a 2000-word limit. Every word must move the story forward to its conclusion. Polly had, I think, a more difficult task. She had originally written her story as a kind of flash fiction piece with 500 words. Her task for this contest was to increase the word count to 2000 words without destroying her beautiful story with a lot of extraneous words. (The line-through editing is intentional.) Her accomplishment was duly appreciated, awarded and applauded at the organization's annual meeting in Ocean Springs, Mississippi.

It was an exciting evening for all the winners of the contest's genres, and I am still aglow at being able to share in Polly's celebration.

How about all you writers out there? If you have good news to share, let us know. Lyrical Pens would be happy to applaud you as well. 

You-all guys keep on keeping on, and I'll try to do the same. 

cj

On this Memorial Day, and every day, I remember with gratitude those who served and sacrificed to make our  freedoms possible. 

Writing Contests

Get out your pencils, pens, keyboards - whatever medium works for you and enter some contests this year. The Internet is brimming with writing contests all over the country. If you're just getting started in this roulette wheel of writers' games, you might want to stick fairly close to home, especially if you write regional genre fiction like I do - my settings are almost all Southern. That usually gets you at least one rung up the ladder if your piece has any merit at all. But don't let that limit you. One of my writing friends, Polly Pope, wrote a beautiful piece that's very earthy and set in the South on a farm in Alabama. It's heartwarming and speaks to everyone - a real feel good piece - and she made it to the Writers Digest honorable mention list! Go Polly!



Here's a few you might want to check out. Most have a small reading fee to enable them to gather the prize money.

http://www.alabamawritersconclave.org/

gcwriters.org

writersdigest.com

James Jones Fellowship Contest

The Willow Springs Fiction Prize

The Ledge Magazine 2010 Fiction Awards Competition


Remember: The phrase "working mother"! is redundant. -Jane Sellman-

Mahala