Some good news…and some bad news

First, the good news: congratulations to long-time reader Jeanne Ryan (better known in Author! Author! circles as clever and insightful commenter Serenissima) for taking third place in the Science Fiction/Fantasy Genre Novel category in the Pacific Northwest Writers’ Association Literary Contest! Everyone, please join me in a big round of applause!

I recognized a few names of Author! Author! commenters on the finalist list, but the Organization-That-Shall-Not-Be-Named has not yet posted the winners and placers. Please, those of you who have triumphs to report, report them so we may all gloat properly.

Ditto with landing agents, selling manuscripts, placing articles, and other triumphs of the writers’ life — this long, long road is considerably easier to traverse if we can cheer for one another along the way.

That’s the good news. Now for the bad news.

I must have been overdoing it of late, as I seem to have picked up a touch of the demon pneumonia again. (I thought the docs were just kidding about needing to take it easy for a year or two after my late bout with mono. Apparently, they weren’t.)

As a result, I am going to be taking an unplanned hiatus from blogging. I’m hoping that it will be no more than a week (at least, that’s the period during which the docs have threatened to storm my house and rip the keyboard out of my fever-weakened hands), but I can’t say for sure.

I’m really, really sorry about the timing, of course — I will, rest assured, be going over submission packets, standard format, and query letters upon my return. For those of you who have need of advice on any of the above in the interim, I please check out the SUBMISSION PACKETS, STANDARD FORMAT BASICS, STANDARD FORMAT ILLUSTRATED, and/or HOW TO WRITE A QUERY LETTER categories from the extensive list at right, as your requirements dictate. (Yes, it did occur to me just to rerun each of these series while I’m knocked out, but in my experience, these are all topics that tend to generate mountains and mountains of thought-provoking questions that take much concentration and time to answer. Better to wait, on the whole, until oxygen can reach my brain on a more regular basis.)

I shall be back as soon as I can, I promise. In the meantime, keep up the good work!

16 Replies to “Some good news…and some bad news”

  1. Sorry to hear about the pneumonia. Good luck with the recovery.

    I guess congratulations are in order for Serenissima. One thing that caught my eye in this entry, though, was her genre. It probably should have been obvious, but most of the commenters probably write somewhat within the bounds of a certain genre, but despite forming a blogging pseudo-community, we really don’t know quite that much about each other. I’m writing in the same genre and never even knew it.

    Some shameless networking would probably benefit a great deal of us. If an agent likes something we write, it’s completely reasonable to offer a referral based on the grounds of “we had the same teacher,” right?

    So in lieu of new entries for a while, I’d like to post a question to the others:

    What genre(s) do you write?

    As I mentioned, I’m sci-fi and fantasy.

  2. Thanks for the kind words Anne. And congrats to Auburn for the poetry ribbon.

    Hope you take good care of yourself, Anne. Sending healthy, non-demonic pneumonia thoughts your way.

  3. Even if you weren’t ill, you so deserve a break. The volume of helpful information you put out daily is amazing. I’m sorry you are sick and wish you a speedy recovery. Shelley

  4. Dear Anne:

    First I must say that Jen J’s admonishments to get well must trump us all. Damn, she really cares.

    A while back I read with sympathy of your long bout with mono, and your apparent recovery from it. Now you have a form of pneumonia, the demon kind, my God! The demon kind!!

    It could be worse though, you could even be, well it could’ve gone to, geez Anne, I don’t know. Maybe I’d best echo Jen J’s wishes – get well, take care and come back to us stronger than ever. Gordon

  5. While we all will be gnashing our teeth awaiting your return, we all realize that your health is MORE important than anything else. Just ask some elderly folks.

    Follow your doctor’s orders. S/he also wants you well, as all of us. Just rest and be assured we wish you a speedy recovery!

  6. I echo and amplify Jen’s and everyone elses wishes for you to recover quickly and completely, Anne.

    As to Jake’s question regarding what genre we Author! Author! readers and commentaters write… I started out writing Naval Adventure, ala Hornblower or the Master and Commander series. But as time as passed, the stories have grown to where I believe they have a strong science fiction/fantasy content. My own belief is that they come closest to the Temeraire stories by Naomi Novik, which are sometimes categorized as Historical Fantasy. An editor at the recent conference by the organization that shan’t be named suggested that what I write is Alternative History.

    As I’ve progressed in knowledge of the publishing industry and participating in the literary contest sponsored by that same unnamed organization, I’ve gone from entering it as Mainstream, to Adult Genre, (which I would have done this year had the category remained) to Science Fiction/Fantasy. So to round it out, I guess I write (at least a version of it) Science Fiction/Fantasy as well.
    Dave
    P. S. Anne, if I forgot to mention it, GET WELL SOON!

  7. Get well soon, ma chere. I think we can all speed your recovery (while you do absolutely nothing) by working on our queries, sprucing up our writing and getting that writing out!

  8. I checked back here to give well-deserved congratulations to Serenissima which I neglected to do in my quick post yesterday — CONGRATULATIONS! — only to be chagrined to see my sincere, but redundant, get well wishes for Anne.

    Actually, it’s kind of funny. At least it was short.

    But seriously folks, I swear, I looked at my comment after posting and there was only ONE! I fear I’ll appear to have ulterior motives since I know we’ll all miss her daily insights. So, can we agree I just spoke for those who didn’t get the chance? And would someone catch that imp who messed with my comment? :0)

  9. Anne — I’m so sad that you’re sick again. Get well quickly, dear!

    Good thought, Jake. My particular specialty is mainstream or women’s literature, although I’m working on a mystery at the moment. I also have a third place ribbon for Poetry, so I guess I’m a poet as well. Who’d have thought?

    Also, do others have websites or blogs where we can pop in now and then? I have one at http://www.DancingBirds.com. Anyone else?

    Finally, Jen … your good wishes were only the start of a larger echo across this canyon of writers in calling out healthy thoughts for Anne, our dear mentor and guide. Good job!

  10. I hope including links to our web-sites or blogs doesn’t cause (you) Anne additional strain, should she desire to check them out before allowing them in Author! Author! I’m sure you don’t need that at the moment. In all, I doubt that any of us who regularly comment on this blog would have anything that other commentators would fear to go to. That being the case, I have a blog at: http://vespican.livejournal.com/
    Dave

  11. Thanks, Auburn! Reading your comments and those from others were almost worth the gaffe. Still, next time I’ll try for a response to startingly fabulous prose.

    Jake — My writing is somewhere between romantic suspense and hip adult fiction. I’m still figuring that out.

    I don’t have a website — yet.

    Thanks to those who have included the information. I’ll looking forward to checking them out!

  12. Hi, Anne!

    May your good health return quickly and remain with you all the rest of your days.

    Congratulations to Serenissima and Auburn. Well done!

    Jen, I’m sure your repeated wishes represent many folks who haven’t posted their own.

    Jake, great question! I appreciate the community Anne has created here and enjoy reading the questions and comments folks post. I write children’s books (from picture books to young adult). I am still slogging away trying to finesse my work and catch an editor’s interest. It is slightly different from trying to publish in the adult world, but Anne’s advice is of great value. Thanks, Anne!

  13. Thanks, everybody — and I’m so glad that you’ve been chatting amongst yourselves! That makes me feel SO much better about taking a break.

    I’m going to try a dictated partial post this afternoon, to see how that works out. If I don’t drive my assistant batty, I’m going to try to run through standard format second-hand, as it were, so I can stop having nightmares about folks sending out improperly-formatted manuscripts. (Hey, what kind of dreams did you expect an editor to have?)

    1. You deserve a break now and then! But we are all anxiously awaiting your recuperation and return to the blogging world.
      Dave

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