I wondered where this came from...

So this turned up in my email yesterday:

I didn't know who "AIscreenplaycompetition.com" was or how they got my email address, but I found out this morning: it's good old Scriptapalooza. And boy oh boy, was the blowback quick: Artificial Intelligence Screenplay Competition Opens & Quickly Closes. They've also already taken their website down.

That didn't take long.

With the WGA embroiled in a lengthy strike where one of the key issues is AI, I'm kind of surprised anyone thought this was a good idea. I've already seen a couple of calls for submissions in the short story market where the rules include "NO AI", including one where they mentioned that not only can they spot a story written in AI, but if you submit one they will never consider another submission from you again, ever. So yeah, AI is a sore subject among writers, so again, not sure why this was even considered. 

I haven't played around with AI, ChatGPT, or anything like this (in fact, I'd completely forgotten about this and I wrote a blog post about it), but from a writer's POV it doesn't seem like this is something we want to embrace. Time will tell, but if nothing else, this was really bad timing given the WGA strike. I still think highly of Scriptapalooza - they've been around forever and I've never heard anything negative about them before this debacle - but they really bungled this. That black eye may take some time to heal.

Update 7/8/23: Got this in the email, this time clearly from Scriptapalooza, not AIscreenplaycompetition.com:

A welcome sense of normalcy

Yes, I live in The People's Republic of Commiefornia, but even we are beginning to see a return to normalcy. Sort of. Finally.

The past week or so I have not worn a mask into grocery stores or at the car wash, and it hasn't been a problem. Some customers are still wearing masks, while others are not. Most employees seem to still be wearing them, probably required by their employers just to err on the side of caution. 

In the past week, I registered for two in-person 2023 writer's conferences and gotta say, it felt kind of weird (but a good weird) to be looking at hotel info, indicating what kind of meal I'd like at the banquet, offering to serve as a volunteer and requesting to be put on panels, all in person. It was delightfully normal. On the other hand, I should be at Left Coast Crime in Albuquerque as I type this. I was signed up since it was originally scheduled in 2021, but in December they sent us an email stating that vaccinations would be required to attend, so that ruled me out. I can understand that four months ago they weren't sure how things would be going at this point, but fingers crossed that next year this won't be an issue.

 

Also, today I submitted a story for the first time in over a year. I have been writing and publishing, but the writing has been ongoing works in progress and the published stories have been out there for a while. The one that was accepted in March was submitted over a year prior. I did "win" NaNoWriMo in November, but even that project is in first draft condition, not anywhere near ready to go out into the world, so getting something out, even a flash fiction story, still felt good.

I like the feeling of not being on hold anymore, even as our political and media overlords seem to be tentatively floating the idea of yet another deadly strain of COVID. But I think people are sick of it, sick of having their lives and livelihoods put on indefinite hold by the powers that be despite the fact that COVID did not turn out to be the black plague we were promised. People are not dropping dead in the streets, populations are not being wiped out. There are numerous deadly diseases and medical issues out there, many of which are contagious and most of which have been around for years, and we never shut down our entire society for any of them, at least not in my not lengthy lifetime. Not sure what ultimately was the point of shutting it all down for this one, but I look forward to books that will no doubt be published on the subject in coming years. Yeah, I'm a little skeptical.

Fortunately, one constant that can be relied on to make life better is Sophie being ridiculously cute. Enjoy!

GIANT. BUNNY. FEET.

We have cover art and a release date!

This is the cover of The Fish That Got Away, the anthology that includes my short story "The Legend of Bahama Bobby". This is the one that was supposed to come out in March but got delayed, and will now be available June 21. So far it's not listed on Amazon and the authors are waiting for instructions on how to order it from the publisher, so unfortunately no link for now.

I've avoided discussing this one because it wasn't the usual fun, easy-peasy editing experience that I've had with my other stories. First of all, I totally misread the editing schedule, which gave us an entire month, then seemed to indicate a second re-editing month. Turns out that there was only the first month. So that was a massive fuck-up on my part as I didn't finish editing by the deadline and I got reamed for it.

The other issue is that this is the first experience I've had where I had to delete a major aspect of the story because the editor didn't like it. I didn't realize that her comments about it weren't open for discussion, so I tried to explain why I had it in there and why I thought it was important to the story. The main aspect of the story was people keeping secrets, both their own and others. It turned out that by going to bat for this part of the story I just pissed her off some more after the deadline fiasco. I really got the idea that she just didn't like the story at all.

At the time it was only my third time getting accepted for publication. I had a great deal of confidence that the story as it had been submitted (and accepted) was strong, partly based on the fact that it was the co-winner in one short-story contest (Moondance International Film Festival) and also picked up an Honorable Mention in a genre short-story contest (Writers' Digest Annual Writing Contest). But at this point in my writing career I wasn't really in a position to dig in my heels to defend the story as written.

In addition, the genre is in some ways a very small community. You see a lot of the same names popping up not only in print, but also at conventions and in classes and newsletters, and I certainly didn't want to gain a reputation for being difficult. So I made the changes and apologized profusely, and tried to put it down as a learning experience, which wasn't easy as I'm pretty hyper-sensitive and it's hard for me to blow off a negative experience like that. But at some point you have to move on.

Luckily, about two weeks later, I had another story accepted and my experience with that editor could not have been easier or more pleasant, so that eased some of the sting. She was extremely complimentary about the story, the voice, and especially the ending, and had me re-write all of one sentence for clarity. It couldn't have been easier. That anthology, Avenging Angelenos, was the one that was supposed to be published in April, but it's also been delayed. Hopefully we'll get some news on that one soon.

Updated 6/8/21: You can order the book from Amazon here.

Submitted for your approval - January 2020 edition

I started out with an entry on New Year's Eve. It was the only December submission, so I decided to count it here. I would have submitted it much earlier except I had a question about the process that wasn't covered in the submission rules. I'd emailed them a couple weeks earlier for clarification, but because of the holidays they weren't able to get back to me until December 31 and since the entry fee was going up effective January 1, I decided to get it in at the last minute.

This is contest is for works (books, plays, and short stories) that have been published. They judge the potential for adaptation into film and/or television. I submitted "Crime Drama/Do Not Cross" since it's the only thing I've had published so far (at least until next month, when Crossing Borders is released). I have no idea if "Crime Drama" is film material, but I thought I'd give it a shot. Unfortunately, the final deadline isn't until August 31, so it will be a while until they announce.

The second and third submissions were existing stories that matched the themes for two upcoming crime/mystery anthologies. I took an editing swing through each one, and one needed a lot more work than I'd anticipated. That one was submitted mid-month, the other one just a couple days ago. The mid-month one will announce by April 1 and I have reasons to have high hopes for it. Even better, it will be published in June, so that would give me two published stories in the first half of the year. I'm not sure if the other anthology will be published this year or early next year. They didn't give announcement or publication dates.

February and March should be busy. There are two more February deadlines, plus a March 1 deadline for what will be a high profile annual anthology. There's also three other markets with March deadlines (11th, 22nd, and 31st) that I'd like to submit to.

Also (as I mentioned here) we received images showing the cover of Crossing Borders, which will be available for pre-order soon. When it is, I'll update the image in the left sidebar to include a link for ordering. Crossing Borders is the first anthology from Partners in Crime, the San Diego Chapter of Sisters in Crime. It will be officially released in mid-March, in conjunction with the Left Coast Crime Conference, which is being held in San Diego this year.

Now, back to my regularly scheduled writing.

Dealing with this year's writing drought and moving forward

This past year was one big writer's block, so I've been going over ideas to move past it. One thing I've decided to try again is submitting as much as possible.

In 2018 my goal was at least two submissions per month. I submitted two each in January and February of that year, but then my Mom died unexpectedly in early March 2018, so March and April were total busts - nothing submitted in those months, which was understandable. There was a lot to deal with suddenly that I was completely unprepared for.

I also moved in July 2018, which was rough for a number of reasons, but I did pretty well with submissions May through September. Then the block seemed to settle in - there were no more submissions for the rest of the year. Still, I had fifteen submissions for the whole year, including five that placed in contests and one that was a winner. On the other hand I didn't get published, so I wasn't thrilled with that. But overall, for a year that was tough I felt okay with my progress.

Although I didn't put a number on submissions for 2019, the year started out with a bang. I had eight submissions in the first three months of the year, then... nothing. April through the rest of the year was pretty much a drought and not only was I not submitting, I wasn't writing much either. The good news was that I did have a story accepted for an anthology, but "Like Deja vu All Over Again", the story that's getting published in Crossing Borders in March 2020, is an old story I had kicking around that just happened to fit the theme for that anthology. I did submit to a short story competition in October that I don't think will place, but the entry fee was minimal and it made me feel like I at least did something, even if it was kind of pointless.

Late October into early November I attended both the Writer's Digest Novel Writing Conference in Pasadena and Bouchercon in Dallas and in addition to being exhausted by the time I got home, it did light a fire under me, both in terms of writing and finally tackling some personal stuff that's been lingering since Mom's death and the move away from the beach.

So the new plan is not to have a particular number of submissions per month, but to really examine the markets and opportunities and try to submit to as many as possible. There are a lot of anthologies coming up as well as other short story markets that I want to be more aggressive about submitting to, and I think that's my best shot at getting published again and seeing some progress in my writing career. I really don't want to have to wait another three years to be published again.

I've also got two other longer projects to work on that will be my A/B projects when I'm not working on short stories. One is a play and the other is one of my ideas for a novel. I've had multiple ideas for novels over the past few years and the difficulty has been focusing on just one while setting the others aside. The play is the A project because it will be quicker to complete, while the novel will be the B project with the goal of at least having a first draft by the end of the year.

Yep, that's the plan. We'll see how it rolls out, but for the first time in a long time I actually feel positive not only about writing, but about a lot of personal things as well. The Brother and I have been discussing this lately and he feels the same way - 2019 was rough for a number of reasons, but we're feeling really positive about 2020's potential.

I hope anyone who is reading this is feeling great about the new year and new decade. May the new 20's roar! And may I also take this opportunity to wish you a wonderful, creative, and productive 2020! Let's succeed together!

Submitted for your approval - February edition

February roll call!

1) Submitted a short story to a crime anthology. It's one I've had kicking around for a while and I'd really like to get it published so I can retire it. It's earned it. Did a rewrite on it before submission, so I feel like it's a lot more polished than when I've submitted it in the past. Way more polished, as in I can't believe I actually sent it out like that! I also just found out that they've extended the deadline to March 15, almost a month later than the original deadline. Trying not to read anything into that, but it also means that it's going to be a while before they notify about acceptance or rejection. I'd really like to get into this one for a number of reasons, which I'll elaborate later when I hear from them, whenever that is.

2) Sent Chick Stuff with Whitney and Alannah to another short script contest. Those girls are really getting around.

Rejections! You want 'em, I got 'em!!!

• The Atlanta Film Fest rejected Chick Stuff ever so politely.
• As did the anthology Best Laid Plans, to which I'd submitted a short story last month called Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas. They received 72 submissions but could only accept 22. I like to think I slotted at #23. I have a very active imagination.
• And neither of the stories I sent to the Writers' Digest Short Short Story last month made the cut.

Continue to tell your stories

Gotta love the personalized rejection. Seriously, if you have to get a rejection, this is how you want to get it. I understand the script isn't terribly edgy and probably isn't film fest material, except for the female-centric Moondance Film Festival, where it did well. I think the Atlanta Film Festival has a lot of class and I look forward to submitting to them in the future and you should too.

Hi Melinda,

Thank you so much for sharing your work, and giving us the opportunity to consider it for the 2019 Atlanta Film Festival Screenplay Competition. We truly appreciate all the time and energy you put into your project and the fact that you chose us to read it. Unfortunately, your screenplay, Chick Stuff with Whitney and Alannah , did not advance in this year’s competition.

This was an unprecedented year for us. We received over 1,200 screenplays in total. While we were incredibly excited and honored to have so many writers choose our competition, it also sadly meant that we were faced with more difficult choices than ever before.

There were more great scripts than available spots, and the talent was overwhelming. Our dedicated team of programmers and readers reviewed each screenplay. Many members of our reading committee reached out to us throughout the process to tell us how the screenplays they read impressed and touched them. We were personally awed by the boldness in storytelling and immense creativity we saw collectively in this year’s submissions.

Please don't let this outcome discourage or deter you in your writing. We know how much time and effort goes into producing a completed work. We want to sincerely thank you for giving us the chance to experience it, and we hope that you will consider sharing your work with us again in the future.

Please continue to tell your stories and write your scripts —we can’t wait to see what you create next.

Sincerely,

The Atlanta Film Festival Programming Team

Submitted for your approval - Open the floodgates edition

I find it hilarious that after I decided I wasn't going to hold myself to x number of submissions per month, I have a huge month of submissions. Last year my goal was two per month, and I didn't make it overall.

This month? Wait for it...five submissions. FIVE. More than double my previous goal. Two and a half months worth if this was 2018. Of course.

1 & 2: I submitted two of my existing short stories (Come Fly with Me and Mad as Hell to the Writers' Digest Short Short Story Contest (no, that isn't a typo - it's a short short story contest).

3 & 4: Chick Stuff, which did great in the Moondance Competition, went into Scriptapalooza Screenplay's short script category and Film Pipeline's Short Script Competition. It's pretty light-hearted, so I don't know if they'll love it, but someone did, so it's going out whenever I get a chance. And since the final deadline for Film Pipeline isn't until September 1, and winners aren't announced until December 1, this one will be out there for pretty much the entire year.

5: I also submitted a new short story called Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas to an anthology that will be published later this year. I actually started this one a couple years ago for a Bouchercon anthology, then set it aside when it became clear I wasn't going to make the deadline. I realized it fit the theme for the new anthology and dragged it out of mothballs and finished it (just in time, of course).

No results or responses on submissions this month. Onward and upward!

Submitted for your approval...or not

It looks like my 2018 plan to submit to at least two markets/contests per month is going out with a whimper. I had planned to submit three stories to ScreenCraft's Cinematic Short Story Contest this month to go out with a bang of sorts, but when I got a look at the entry fee - $60 per story - along with consideration of what effect, if any it would have on my writing career (not much, except some bragging rights) I decided that money could be better spent elsewhere. I've got a couple of big writer's convention trips planned for next year so I'm trying to rein in the spending. It's weird, because this is the first time I can recall being deterred by the cost of an entry fee. I just thought it seemed like a lot for a short story, especially when multiplied by three, and I couldn't settle on just one.

If I had entered these stories, that would have given me 18 entries for the year out of a minimum of 24. Without them I only have 15 for the year. Not a great percentage, although at least a couple of down months (March and April) can be explained by the fact that my Mom passed away in March, and the ensuing months were a crazy whirlwind of cleaning out her apartment and then my moving in July. It's just been a rough year. I think I did okay under the circumstances.

As I mentioned here, I'm going to focus more on some lengthier projects going into 2019. Now that I'm officially done with 2018 writing-wise, I'm getting really excited about what next year could bring.

Happy writing everyone!

Here, have some writing contests

Planning on making 2019 the year your writing career gets a boost? Here are some options for getting your work seen, judged, hopefully rewarded, and maybe even discovered.

As I mentioned here, not only did I have a lot of success with Moondance International Film Festival, but they have a boatload of submission categories, so whatever you're writing, there's probably a category for you. Plus, they're already accepting submissions for 2019, so here's your chance to get a jump on the new year.

ScreenCraft has fifteen different competitions including a fellowship, so again, pretty much something for everyone. They have produced a nifty interactive calendar showing the opening date, early deadline and late deadline for each contest.

Some others: Fade In Online has a bunch of competitions, TrackingB has TV and feature contests, PAGE International has contests for features, shorts and TV pilots, and Writer's Digest has their usual slate of annual competitions.

Happy writing!

We have a winner! And a finalist! And a couple of semi-finalists! And a new writing plan for 2019!

As I posted in August, I had submitted four entries to the Moondance International Film Festival, three in the short story category and one in the short screenplay category. Last week I was looking over old submissions and realized I'd never received any notice from Moondance, and since it's been months I assumed that meant my entries hadn't placed. I tried checking their website multiple times for results, but the results link only led to a page that appeared to be down.

I decided to check again and not only does Moondance have their website issues resolved, but all four of my submissions were listed in the results:

All the winners can be found here.

Needless to say, this was very good news. I needed some encouragement with these stories. Bahama Bobby was written for the St. Petersburg Bouchercon anthology but didn't make it. It did score an Honorable Mention in this year's Writer's Digest Annual Writing Competition (in the Short Story/Genre category), so I figured it wasn't a total waste. Plus, I just love it. It was inspired by this meme, which I thought was hilarious:

Christine Thirteen was written for the most recent Sisters in Crime/LA anthology but wasn't chosen, and Deja vu, which has been around forever. was rejected by the SinC Guppies 2017 anthology (I received that news shortly before Crime Scene/Do Not Cross was accepted for LAst Resort, the 2017 SinC/LA anthology). Chick Stuff was something I wrote years ago and been filed away and forgotten. Nice to see it still has some life.

I haven't done submission posts for October and November because I haven't submitted anything recently. There were several anthologies and markets I wanted to submit to, but ultimately couldn't come up with stories for. I've also been reconsidering my "two submissions per month" plan because it's keeping me from working on larger projects while spending a lot of time and energy on markets that don't pan out. There is one more competition with a December deadline (for cinematic short stories) that I'll submit to and that will be it for 2018.

So the plan for 2019 is to work on a couple of novels. I have an A project that's been kicking around for years and a B project that's a more recent idea that will be my fallback when I hit a wall with/need a break from Project A. I also have a play that I'd like to spend some time on in the next couple of months, in the hopes that it will be ready for 2019 competitions.

There are a couple of upcoming crime anthologies (2019 Bouchercon and the San Diego Chapter of Sisters in Crime) that I definitely want to submit to since these are right up my alley, but other than that I decided I need to try to market my completed short stories to publishers, rather than trying to keep coming up with new ones whenever a theme is announced. Since most of them have placed in competitions, I'm going into 2019 with the mindset that they're worthy of publication if I can just find the right fit for them.

Happy writing everyone!

Submitted for your approval - August/September edition

So, the past couple of months has been slow on the submission front.

August saw the aforementioned Chick Stuff with Whitney and Alannah submitted to short screenplay competitions with Screencraft and the Atlanta Film Festival. Screencraft already announced their first cut and we didn't make it.

I hit a major writing block in September and didn't get much of anything accomplished. I thought about submitting a couple of previously written short stories, but they didn't quite match what the publications were looking for and I know how much editors hate it when writers submit stories that don't match the announced theme, so I decided to move on.

I went ahead and submitted a story yesterday for an upcoming edition of Chicken Soup for the Soul. Titled The Cat in the Hat Box, it was one of two entries I submitted to the Writer's Digest Annual Contest in May. I am pleased to say that both earned Honorable Mentions. The Chicken Soup deadline isn't until October 31, but since it was ready to go I thought I'd get it out so I'd have something to show for September.

In better news, I just started a new UCLA Extension writing class, this one for original 1-hour pilots. The instructor is the same one who guided me through my Better Call Saul spec last year. I had tried the pilot class with another instructor, but her methods didn't work for me the way the previous instructor's had, so you can imagine my joy when I got the catalog for fall and first instructor was doing the pilot class. I already feel like it's reigniting the writing fire that's been so dormant lately, plus I'm already enjoying interacting with my classmates.

Submitted for your approval - July edition

Rough month. Expensive move (lots of damage) away from the beach and into crippling heat, and a rejection from the upcoming Sisters in Crime/Los Angeles anthology. I could have used some good news right about the time I got that email. It was a dark and stormy night, at least inside my head, even if it was quietly broiling outside.

I wanted to get more submissions in this month, but a couple of the projects I wanted to submit are still works in progress and need some more time and polishing. Still, I managed four submissions, all to the Moondance International Film Festival.

Moondance has about five million categories, which is fun. I submitted to the Short Screenplay and Short Story categories. The submissions are:

Short Screenplay category: Chick Stuff with Whitney and Alannah. This is a short script I wrote years ago when I was concentrating on screenplays, and then never did anything with it. It needed a bit of updating, but that turned out to be easy-peasy. Better than I remembered. Will be looking for more contests for this one.

Short Story category: Moondance gives you three short story entries for the price of one, so I submitted Like Deja vu All Over Again, Christine Thirteen (the SinC/LA reject) and The Legend of Bahama Bobby, which had originally been written for the upcoming Bouchercon anthology.

From their website, it looks like Moondance is looking for message-heavy submissions, and although everything I submitted features female protagonists, I don't know if they will be message-heavy enough for the judges. I guess we'll see.

Submitted for your approval - June 2018 edition

Considering I spent the first half of the month blocked and the entire month prepping for a move, I was surprised I ended up getting anything submitted this month.

I submitted a very short story to the Writers Police Academy's Golden Donut Short Story Competition. This is a fun annual contest. They give you a photo (see this year's here) and you have to write a story based on the picture that is exactly 200 words, including a title, which is required. Winner will be announced at the WPA Banquet in August. The award is actually very pretty, with the winner's name etched in it in glass, and not in fact a donut, which I think would be hilarious. Bonus: I submitted it on June 18, a full thirteen days before the deadline. I think that's a new personal best.

There were a couple other markets I wanted to submit to, but packing for the move took over and I had to pass on those. Once I get moved and settled in my plan is to spend the rest of the year submitting as much as possible.

I also found out that I didn't make the quarterfinal cut of the Script Pipeline TV Contest. I had entered my old Better Call Saul spec last December. It was already out of date (but still less than a year old) at the time, and I'm guessing the fact that the contest was open until June 1 of this year didn't help that situation. It's also the second consecutive TV contest where it looks like they much prefer original pilots to specs, as those were the majority of the scripts that made the cut. A BCS script did make it, so I'm pulling for that guy.

Other news: Sisters in Crime/Los Angeles announced that they will reveal the authors and stories selected for their next anthology on July 18, so fingers crossed. And as I type this I realize that when they do, I will no longer be living by the ocean and that makes me sad. Wonder what kind of stories I'll be writing while cooped inside the next few months to escape the scorching San Gabriel Valley summer.

Image snicked from somewhere on the internet. If it's yours please let me know so that I can give credit where credit is due.

Submitted for your approval - May 2018

Three submissions! Back on the horse! That makes a total of seven submissions this year. I was aiming for two per month, so I'm still short, but given that my Mom died unexpectedly I feel like March and April being unproductive is more than understandable.

So May was a good month:

• Submitted a short story for Fatally Haunted, the next Sisters in Crime/Los Angeles anthology with a whole hour to spare, rather than right at the last minute. Progress!!! Also, I just found out yesterday that they will announce on July 18. Fingers crossed!

• Submitted two entries to the Writer's Digest Annual Writing Contests: one in the Genre Short Story category (the one originally written for this year's Bouchercon anthology but not selected) and one in the Memoir/Personal Essay category.

Hopefully June will be nice and productive. I've got only two things to worry about this month and that's get started moving my stuff to the new place, and writing. I'm also hoping June will bring some good news about at least a couple of these submissions. Bring on summer!

Submitted for your approval - February-April edition

Due to my Mom's death, March and April submissions kind of went off the rails, then I forgot to post this altogether. Nor did I get around to posting what I'd done in February, so here's everything from February through April:

Writer's Digest "Your Story Competition": February's contest was a caption contest for this photo:

Of course my mind went straight to crime, so the caption I submitted was, "I double-counted my poisonous treats, one for every time he'd broken my heart."

I wasn't quite sure if I wanted to submit it, because I couldn't tell for sure if the hand in the picture belonged to a child or just someone pudgy. I decided to go with the latter because if I'm confused about it, other contributors probably are too.

I also got a submission in during March for another anthology. The short story involved is the one I talked about here. It ended up being one of my twice in one day rejections. The other one was for the quarterly ezine mentioned here.

On the bright side, as I mentioned here, my now-aged Better Call Saul script did well in the latest Scriptapalooza competition.

On the downside, I found out that the short stories I submitted for two upcoming anthologies (Mystery Writers of America and Bouchercon) were not selected. Either one would have been a career moment. I really liked both stories too, will need to try and find other places to submit them.

The MWA anthology had almost two hundred entries and chose ten. Bouchercon had about 300 and the "wish we had better news" email I got raved about the quality of all of them and how hard it was for the judges to pick just a few, so I'm trying not to feel too bad, but just one of those would have been huge.

Oh well, onward and upward.

When first drafts attack

One of the best pieces of advice I ever got as a fledgling writer was the importance of understanding that first drafts are shit. They just are. The whole purpose of a first draft's existence is to just get your story down on paper. Then it can be fixed. It's not for public consumption because anyone who reads it (unless they're another writer who understands it's at a really raw stage) will think you're a crappy writer. Writing, as the saying goes, is rewriting.

Another thing that's been on my mind lately is to start submitting well before deadlines, instead of at 11:59:59 pm on the due date like I usually do.

Why do I mention these things? Well, because they've come together the past couple of days as I work on a short story for an upcoming anthology with a deadline of March 23, almost exactly one month away.

The story, which we'll refer to as Hollywoodland (because that's its name) was my submission last year to the Malice Domestic anthology Murder Most Geographical. It wasn't selected and now that I've dragged it out of mothballs to repurpose it for another anthology, I can see why.

It's awful.

Not the story, which I think is fine, but the fact that it reads like a first draft. No wonder it wasn't chosen. But it went out like that because I threw it together at the last second because inspiration didn't strike until the last minute. And also because I am a terrible procrastinator. Kidding, I'm unfortunately really good at it. Point is, because instead of giving myself time to do what turned out to be a much needed rewrite, I sent it out into the world in its sorry first draft state. I feel like I should apologize to the judges at Malice who had to waste their time on it. In fact, I will: Sorry, you guys. My bad. Won't happen again.

I got a lot of work done on it yesterday and a bit more today, and it's in much better shape. My next few days are going to be busy with family stuff, so I won't get to spend more time on it until Sunday. My goal is to have it whipped into shape and submitted by next Wednesday, the last day of the month. That will give me two submissions for the month, meeting that goal again. It also gives me some breathing room in March, because I don't have any other hard deadlines until April and May. I need a new TV spec to replace my Better Call Saul script that is now outdated, so that's probably next in line, as well as the next Sisters in Crime Los Angeles anthology, which is due May 15 and will need to be done well in advance so I don't repeat mistakes of the past.

Writing wise I feel like I'm in pretty good shape. Now if I could just get another acceptance, that would give me two years running. And would be fabulous.

Above image snicked from the internets. If it's yours, A) Great work! and B) Let me know so I can give you credit.

Quarterfinalist in the Scriptapalooza TV Competition

Got an email today advising me that Scriptapalooza announced the results of their latest TV writing competition and I was thrilled to find out that my Better Call Saul spec made it to the quarterfinals in the 1-hour spec category.

Considering I never used to even place in these competitions, it's nice to see some results. Also, there were a total of 257 1-hour scripts submitted, so at most, only 10 - or at most 13 if you include the other quarterfinalists - were considered better than mine. Not too shabby.

My name in print.

Full results are here.

Flattery will get you almost anywhere

In this case it got me to the second round.

I've submitted my Better Call Saul spec that I wrote in the UCLA Extension classes earlier this year to a number of competitions and workshops, and today I got some great feedback from one of them.

The script made it to the second round of the TV writing competition at the Austin Film Festival, but didn't advance beyond that. I'd been notified of that some time ago, but I just received the feedback from both first and second round judges and I have to say, I'm pretty pleased with it.

Initial reader

Concept: Fabulous idea for this show. Better Call Saul has such a profound vision that I believe writing a spec for it is a really big undertaking. This episode feels like it would fit in nicely with others in the series.

Plot: This was such a captivating narrative. The writer really handles all of the moving parts with expertise. This felt like I was reading an actual episode of Better Call Saul. I particularly loved the twist with Mike and the hit job.

Structure: The structure is great. The teaser is done really well and mimics the structure of Better Call Saul beautifully. The pacing was great--this didn't feel like it dragged on. The story was told clearly. This spec turned out to be a wonderful reading experience.

Characters: The characters act as they would within the series. Jimmy does what he does best--run a scam-- to get out of a bad situation. The original character, Chelsea, is developed nicely. She doesn't feel one note and interacts well in the universe of Better Call Saul.

Dialogue: This exhibits some really, really tight dialogue. None of the lines drag on or feel indulgent. I particularly liked the story Chuck told about the girl who picked up the snake. That was a great, totally Chuck bit that enhanced the story nicely. The dialogue feels authentic overall and is done very well.

Overall: Overall, this is a great spec script. The writer really understands all aspects of Better Call Saul--the characters, the dialogue, the pacing, the structure, the complicated relationships, etc. I really enjoyed reading this. This was a really well done self-contained episode full of the writer’s smart choices. This episode is written concisely yet thoroughly. I thought the teaser was a great addition that had more and more meaning as the episode progressed. The writer really understood and exhibited Jimmy and Chuck’s complicated relationship in only one episode. It was also a clever idea to pit Jimmy against a character like Chelsea, and to see Chelsea get taken down in true Jimmy fashion. My only note, and it’s just a brief technical one, is that “Sphinx” is misspelled in the middle of page 35. This was a great reading experience.

Second Round reader

Concept: Conceptually, this spec fits Better Call Saul very well. Jimmy scams his way out of scam. I could see this story playing out very nicely on the show without interrupting the overall story/character arcs in place.

Plot: Jimmy is hired to help a woman get what she sees has her rightful share of an inheritance. This same woman hires Mike to kill her family who has already hired Mike to protect them from her. Overall, great tie-ins within the story. My only issue would be how the teaser relates to the rest of the script. Is it just to show Saul was a screw up and a scammer. It might be better to show something relating to his family in the past instead.

Structure: Jimmy is hired to help a woman get what she sees has her rightful share of an inheritance. This same woman hires Mike to kill her family who has already hired Mike to protect them from her. Overall, great tie-ins within the story. My only issue would be how the teaser relates to the rest of the script. Is it just to show Saul was a screw up and a scammer. It might be better to show something relating to his family in the past instead.

Characters: The characters also fit the show nicely especially Mike. Series regulars are spot on. The major introduced character, Chelsea, is developed well enough to hold her own in the story, but perhaps more could be done to give her layers and add to her crazy.

Dialogue: The dialogue is very good and would fit the BCS world. Some interactions between Jimmy and Chelsea are repetitive. More could be done to vary these interactions and even further build on the story and characters.

Overall: Overall, this is a great spec for a Better Call Saul episode and a solid second round script. (Also nice title. ) A believable story is presented using all the regular players and introducing a crafty character that ties to Jimmy’s practice, Mike’s side business, and even to HHM. Though the teaser does demonstrate that Jimmy has a history as a scammer, we already know that. It might make more sense to show something that relates to his commiserating with Chelsea as the family black sheep. Chuck’s message that Jimmy can only work an angle to solve a problem instead of using sound judgment and legal means is hard hitting. The script could also use some proofreading. Otherwise, this spec was an enjoyable read and a story that I’d love to see on the show.

Not too shabby, eh?

This spec is still out to a couple other contests. I hope they're liking it as much as these guys did.

I also submitted a short story this week to an anthology from Mystery Writers of America. They will announce which stories were accepted early to mid 2018.

And that's it for 2017 submissions. I'm working on a master list of markets for next year and my plan is to submit as much as possible.

Happy writing, everyone!

How to torpedo your writing career before it even begins

Today is one week out from the May 31 deadline for the NBC Universal Writers on the Verge Program and the Warner Bros. Writers' Workshop. I was even thinking of blogging about it, but there didn't seem to be much to be said except that the deadline is in a week, so I had decided not to bother.

Until I saw this on Facebook:

Writing scripts is only part of the job in television. You also have to be pleasant to work with, cooperative and know your place in the food chain. A fledgling writer is in no position to make demands.

Read that comment. Never mind that English might not be this person's first language. The grammar isn't the problem. It's the attitude.

Would you hire this person? Especially for a job that has way more people wanting in, who know how to conduct themselves professionally, than there are positions available?

There are other issues with this comment. Many successful writers have tales of having to submit countless times before scoring a meeting with an agent, an editor, or a producer. It's not something that usually happens overnight.

I don't know how many writers they select for the program - maybe a dozen -  but they must get thousands of submissions. You can't tell me at least twelve of them won't be promising writers with at least a decent attitude. I'd love to be a fly on the wall at NBC Universal to see what they think of this comment and whether it alone torpedoes this person's submission.

I do know that this is not how you break in.