In my heart I’m a writer, but like Yue, unrealized. The closest I’ve come to being published is the Neverending Story on this self-same board.
Unfortunately, I have to pay bills. That’s why this writer’s heart is chained behind a desk working as a temporary administrative assistant (call me a secretary if you must).
I’ve written hundreds of short stories, now lost to the mists of antiquity.
My other problem is that the time I could be taking to actually write more stuff is usually spent here. Oh well.
To tell the truth, even if I had a story I was sufficiently proud of, enough to attempt to have published, I’d have no idea what to do with it.
My dream job would to be a humor columnist, not unlike Dave Barry, but on the other hand, nothing like Dave Barry, if you see my meaning. I’m not completely sure my ideas, and style of writing, twisted as they are, would fit well in the novel format.
Anyway, nevermind when you got published; I need to know how you got published.
Well, I’ve yet to get anything published, but several of my plays have been produced. I even got paid enough to have to declare it as a second income for a couple years. That’s gotta count for something. I’ve also written the obligatory screenplays-that-will-never-be-read-let-alone-optioned.
I have had several technical articles published in trade magazines. Two more are to be published later this year and I have commitments from publishers for two more I am working on now.
Does that count?
“http://www.geocities.com/pepperlandgirl4/poems.html”]My Poems
“http://www.geocities.com/pepperlandgirl4/storm.html”]
This is my best short story, Summer Storm.
Actually, we may soon be finding out how many writers we have here. Stay tuned …
I completely fucked up those links. Just go the webpage in my sig and look around
I must remind everyone of the terribly sexy and marvelous Eve.
[tex avery wolf]
Wooo woow owwoww! pant pant! Ooooooooooowwwwwwwww!
[/tex avery wolf]
Well you can check out my website on my .sig and decide for yourself. And no I do not make any money doing that, but I have gotten some nice comments and it’s a lot of fun. And I know the spelling is frequently bad, grammar, etc. It’s not so much I am bad speller and the like, I am mostly a bad typer and a lazy proof-reader. I’m working on it.
I also won a short story writing contest at http://www.thecase.com. I can’t seem to find it there anymore, but it did garner me a whole T-shirt.
Yep. In addition to my regular movie reviews (see sig), I’ve got a couple of screenplays done. Nothing produced yet, but hey, that’s life.
P.S. I know, I know, I’m way behind on the movie reviews. Maybe I need to quit reading the SDMB for a while and get caught up. Hmmm…
I write science fiction and fantasy, with some success, including a published novel, Staroamer’s Fate. I’ve had over 30 short stories published in professional markets (see my web page for a list.).
Lately I’ve been having trouble finding time (I’ve never written full-time, except as a technical writer), primarily because I got involved in running the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (I’m on their board). However, I have a few good things I’m working on, albeit more slowly than I’d like.
It has been a pretty good week on the writing front – I get an e-mail from My Weekly Reader out of the blue, offering to publish an old story of mine. 
Well, I write greeting cards, for what it’s worth…
It aint War & Peace, but it does take a certain talent to write something funny in the short span of a greeting card. At least without doing something thats already been done a thousand times over.
I’ve just recently finished the rewrites (about a hundred of them, it feels like, and I keep finding frigging mistakes) on a novel. I will shortly be sending it out to publishers, to see if I get something more than rejection slips.
I’ve got 2 romance manuscript no one wants. Does that make me a writer?
Oh, goody. I get to be in two threads that I didn’t even start.
I’m a Scientist and Engineer (two degrees in Physics – c.B. and Ph.D. and one in Optical Engineering – M.S.). I’m also a Mad Scientist.
But I am demonstrably a writer, too. Oxford University Press just put out my first book, “Medusa: Solving the Mystery of the Gorgon” (see my site at http://www.MedusaMystery.com )I’ve also got a stack of articles that are, if nthing else, eclectic. Except for the J AAVSO, no one has seen fit to publish more than one of my articles. If there were such a thing, I’d be a Mad Writer, too.
I write but I am not published nor do I ever plan to be. I write poems, song lyrics, novels, short stories, and I’ve written two children’s books. I plan on writing for the rest of my life.
Oh yeah, I have has several articles published in a regional film journal called , The Final Cut. Bits and pieces just keep coming back to me!
Thanks, Byz. (Sorry to come back this late.)
I’ll think about working on a bigger narrative hook. The excellent one you gave as an example, unfortunately won’t work, as the name of the character (Both of them actually), isn’t Lee Harvey Oswald.
It’s the reverse, Oswald Harvey Lee.
But hey, it’s free, good advice, so I don’t mind. Thanks again!
–JOhn
Count me in–I’m a writer. I believe that since my last position (a marketing/pr position) allowed me to ghost-write articles published by national trade journals I even count as a “professional writer” (paid to do it) even though my name only actually appears on one article I wrote for a local monthly magazine. Examples are all over my website if anyone is interested…
Cheers,
Peta T.
I’ve written on and off for years and never really thought seriously about trying to get published - its always been an occasional pastime for me. Then, a few months ago, I chanced across an ad from some people looking for humourous relationship orientated article’s.
On the spur of the moment I sent an old one that I had ‘just laying around’ and they later sent me a moderate cheque. Paid to write, who’d ever have believed it !
Its still in my profile if you can bear my sense of humour.
I’ve written 3 novels, many songs (just lyrics, but the music is in my head), many poems, and many short stories. I’m still unpublished, but my brother and I are working on a screenplay that will likely be filmed (my brother’s been involved in a few movie projects, so he knows the right people).
I mostly write horror and suspense (that’s mostly what I read also).
If anyone’s interested, here’s some links to my work:
The Magic Castle ( http://hometown.aol.com/KingDavid8/MagicCastle.html ) is a children’s story I wrote for my oldest daughters.
VeggieTales: The Adventures of Jonah ( http://hometown.aol.com/KingDavid8/Jonah.html ) is probably something that non-VeggieTales fans won’t get. It’s a cross between the Biblical story of Jonah and Star Wars. I submitted it to the VeggieTales creators, but no one high-up was allowed to read it for legal reasons.
Doorways ( http://members.aol.com/DAnder5758/Doorways01.html )is an entire horror novel that I’ve been trying to get published.
David