Jibber Jabber - Q1 - Volume 34

[Athena]

wotf058

Almost had a heart attack when I heard Joni's voice!

WOW! Congrats! Isn't it thrilling to hear her voice on the other end of the line? So happy for you!

[Tamlyn]

grats, greenroom, vjalrik, Jude-Marie, hlreinhold, Athena (woah, lots of semis on the board), and double grats Jeremyteg!


HM for me. Slightly surprised, but I'm sure I'll be back in straight rejections next quarter :p

[Galen]

Way to go forumites! You all rock!

[Randy Hulshizer]

Congrats everyone! I was working on a western mash-up and Dave sent out his Kick about how he was seeing too many of those.... But I sent it in anyway and hey

Hey, vjalrik, congrats! Could you share the link to Dave's Kick that mentioned westerns? I don't think I've read that one. Thanks!

[kentagions]

Forumites rule! HM for me.
Congratulations to everyone.

[disgruntledpeony]

Congrats everyone! I was working on a western mash-up and Dave sent out his Kick about how he was seeing too many of those.... But I sent it in anyway and hey

Hey, vjalrik, congrats! Could you share the link to Dave's Kick that mentioned westerns? I don't think I've read that one. Thanks!

http://davidfarland.com/2016/10/great-ideas/

I'm willing to bet part of the inundation of western mashups came about because of the western mashup story of his that was published in V32. (I will admit to sending in some western fantasy pieces, myself, but that's because I have a western fantasy setting I've been developing for the better part of a decade. I want to write novels about it.)

[bobsandiego]

HM

Congratulations to everyone above.

To be honest I knew this one had a problem but until today I didn't know what to do about it. Strange how it seems so easy when it's too late!

By the way, newer members might want to calculate their WotF batting average. It's simply every entry = at bat and every HM or better = hit.

Some of us have no idea the total number of entries and our old brains refuse to dredge up the number.

[bobsandiego]

wotf058

Almost had a heart attack when I heard Joni's voice!

WOW! Congrats! Isn't it thrilling to hear her voice on the other end of the line? So happy for you!

Old timers here know my story of Joni calling me for an HM. I suspect she grabbed the wrong number and didn't mean to call me and simply made the best of it. (She's such a nice person in that way.)
So hearing her voice in that context was emotional whiplash.

[Jeremyteg]

wotf058

Almost had a heart attack when I heard Joni's voice!

WOW! Congrats! Isn't it thrilling to hear her voice on the other end of the line? So happy for you!

It is thrilling! I was at work and spent the rest of the night in a bit of a daze. Hopefully I didn't mess up any customer orders!

[Randy Hulshizer]

Congrats everyone! I was working on a western mash-up and Dave sent out his Kick about how he was seeing too many of those.... But I sent it in anyway and hey

Hey, vjalrik, congrats! Could you share the link to Dave's Kick that mentioned westerns? I don't think I've read that one. Thanks!

http://davidfarland.com/2016/10/great-ideas/

I'm willing to bet part of the inundation of western mashups came about because of the western mashup story of his that was published in V32. (I will admit to sending in some western fantasy pieces, myself, but that's because I have a western fantasy setting I've been developing for the better part of a decade. I want to write novels about it.)

Thanks!

[Athena]

Congrats everyone! I was working on a western mash-up and Dave sent out his Kick about how he was seeing too many of those.... But I sent it in anyway and hey

You know what I find funny? Mine was a dinosaur western! I wonder if any westerns made it to finalist. We shall see when the anthology comes out.

[J'nae Rae]

Congrats all!

[Dustan Moon]

I see many of the Usual Suspects, and a few new ones, with honors. Conga rats! And special grass skirt hula conga rats to Jeremy! Hope you clear the final hurdle!

Cheers,

~Moon~

[Imagination Vortex]

Congrats everyone! It's great to see so many people hitting the high marks! Go forum!

[sea-urchinz]

Hello everyone. This was my first entry to WOtF, and I got an Honorable Mention. I've poked around the board, but can't figure out exactly what this means. Is this something you would include in a cover letter? Or is it more of a moral-booster?

Many thanks!

[jficke13]

wotf024
Hello everyone. This was my first entry to WOtF, and I got an Honorable Mention. I've poked around the board, but can't figure out exactly what this means. Is this something you would include in a cover letter? Or is it more of a moral-booster?

Many thanks!

I've seen people describe Honorable Mentions as either top 10% of entries or at least had something unique and compelling that stuck with the judge. It's a great morale boost and they send you a fancy certificate, but at the end of the day it's a rejection. Consensus is to not put it in a cover letter, and if you submit your HM-winning story elsewhere not to mention that it was an HM, because that's kind of like saying "hey this got rejected somewhere else, but do you want it?"

Congrats and keep submitting.

[Dustin Adams]

wotf024
Hello everyone. This was my first entry to WOtF, and I got an Honorable Mention. I've poked around the board, but can't figure out exactly what this means. Is this something you would include in a cover letter? Or is it more of a moral-booster?

Many thanks!

Here's what HM means:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1lnHvYzhsg

Feel free to watch the entire video, or skip ahead to 3:30 for a quicker illumination of my point.

(and congrats, and welcome aboard!)

[sea-urchinz]

Thanks! No cover letter then. Just look in the mirror and repeat: I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and doggone it, I got an Honorable Mention!

[Allison Thai]

1st time WOTF submitter with the 1st sci-fi short story I've finished. It's near future sci-fi playing around with neuroscience and espionage. Since the 137 day wait, and thanks to beta reader input, I shaved off 2k words from the original 7500 and rearranged important scenes I kept. I'm actually glad I didn't place any higher, because I wouldn't want to publish a form of the story I've revised.

[Jeremyteg]

I made the mistake of re-reading my submission today. Of course everything even potentially wrong with it stuck out to me like the words of God in a red-letter bible. Well, it's an honor just to make finalist, anyway. Or third place. I'd be perfectly happy with third place...

[amyhg]

Congratulations, everyone!

It's great to see the diversity of awards. If any of y'all are willing, I'm interested in reading your Q1 submissions to sharpen my analysis skills. If you're interested in letting me read your story, I'd be more than happy to send feedback, but honestly, I'm more interested in finding out from you what award you received and why you think (in general terms) why the story didn't go farther. I'm hoping that by doing this I can get a better feel for what to watch out for in my own writing and possibly what makes a more successful WOTF story.

Anyway, PM me if you're interested.

Thanks!

[hlreinhold]

If any of y'all are willing, I'm interested in reading your Q1 submissions to sharpen my analysis skills. If you're interested in letting me read your story, I'd be more than happy to send feedback, but honestly, I'm more interested in finding out from you what award you received and why you think (in general terms) why the story didn't go farther. I'm hoping that by doing this I can get a better feel for what to watch out for in my own writing and possibly what makes a more successful WOTF story.

Sounds like a good idea to me. Even a skim-read through submissions is likely to be helpful just to get a feel for what's what. Of course, reading the actual winning entries in the WotF anthologies is also good. Maybe we could take a look at a few of them and try to figure out what it is that made them work so well. I'm trying to read as many winning stories as I can, but I don't think I've yet stopped to properly analyse any.

Anyway, happy to help if I can. PMed you.

[Dustin Adams]

Congratulations, everyone!

It's great to see the diversity of awards. If any of y'all are willing, I'm interested in reading your Q1 submissions to sharpen my analysis skills. If you're interested in letting me read your story, I'd be more than happy to send feedback, but honestly, I'm more interested in finding out from you what award you received and why you think (in general terms) why the story didn't go farther. I'm hoping that by doing this I can get a better feel for what to watch out for in my own writing and possibly what makes a more successful WOTF story.

Anyway, PM me if you're interested.

Thanks!

Amy(?)
Here's a handy link for some non-winning finalist stories.
viewtopic.php?f=16&t=2081

[Ysocks]

can someone point me to a link for the Q1 results please.

I've looked and looked, but must be missing them somewhere

[Ishmael]

can someone point me to a link for the Q1 results please.

I've looked and looked, but must be missing them somewhere

Not likely to be available for a while. Final judges have yet to pronounce and the blog won't be published before everybody involved knows the outcome.

[Ysocks]

Ah! Thanks, Ishmael.

Thought I was going mad.

[disgruntledpeony]

Ah! Thanks, Ishmael.

Thought I was going mad.

Yeah, we usually so informal reporting as we find out individual results, but I don't think the 1st, 2nd and 3rd place entries have been decided on for the quarter yet. We have a few finalists, but not final results. :)

[bobsandiego]

any market recommendations for a christian themed vampire story?
I really have no clue where to send this HM....

[Ysocks]

Before discovering the forum I'd sent a message via the WotF website. Response from Joni earlier:

The blog has not been posted yet. That will be next week. Thanks for understanding.

Best,
Joni Labaqui
Author Services, Inc.

[Jeremyteg]

Before discovering the forum I'd sent a message via the WotF website. Response from Joni earlier:

The blog has not been posted yet. That will be next week. Thanks for understanding.

Best,
Joni Labaqui
Author Services, Inc.

I wonder if that means she expects the finalist judging to be finished by next week?