Ninth Letter publishes one issue in the spring and one in the fall and accepts submissions of fiction from September 1 to November 30 and from January 1 to February 28 (postmark dates) We are accepting submissions of poetry and essays from September 1 to February 28 (postmark dates). We are interested in prose and poetry that experiment with form, narrative, and nontraditional subject matter, as well as more traditional literary work. Please adhere to the guidelines when submitting your work to Ninth Letter. Ninth Letter pays $25 per printed page, upon publication, for accepted material, as well as two complimentary copies of the issue in which the work appears.
Bella Mahaya Carter & The Priority Pyramid
Today’s guest blogger, Bella Mahaya Carter offers inspiration with a “Priority Pyramid.” The following is an excerpt from her original post. Last November, I worked with Dan Blank, author of Be The Gateway: A Practical Guide to Sharing Your Creative Work and an Audience. In his book, Dan recommends an exercise to help creative professionals get clear about their life and work priorities. If you’d like to try this exercise, get fifteen index cards and write down one word on each card indicating what’s important to you. Then prioritize your cards into a pyramid, with your most important priority at the apex, and work down from there. These cards are a wonderful reminder of what matters if you lose your way. Each person will obviously have different words on their cards. Here’s what mine looks like: For me, a deep spiritual connection with Self comes first. When I lose that…
It’s a miracle . . . Prompt #468
Today’s writing prompt: It’s a miracle . . . Write whatever comes up. Write whatever pops into your head. Don’t judge. Don’t edit. Don’t be critical. Just write! It’s a miracle . . .
Jeff Goins & His System
Today’s guest blogger, Jeff Goins, shares the system he uses to write books and blog posts. Excerpt from Jeff: Most writers think writing is a one-step process . . . it’s a three-step process: coming up with ideas, turning those ideas into drafts, and then editing those drafts into publishable pieces. The Three-Bucket System . . . how I get my writing done. Bucket #1: Ideas Capture ideas [and keep] in a place where you can return to. Bucket #2: Drafts Pull an idea out from the first bucket and start writing. Save in a draft folder. At any given time, I have a whole bunch of half-finished chapters and blog posts on my computer begging to be edited and completed. The point of this system is to think as little as possible and just do the next thing. Bucket #3: Edits Pull out one of those drafts and edit it. Either schedule it…
Childhood dream. Prompt #467
Write about your childhood dream. Is your childhood dream still calling you?
Anne R. Allen & Indie Publishing
The following is an excerpt from Anne R. Allen’s December 22, 2019 blog post. You, too, can be an indie-author. It helps to be informed with willingness to do the work. From Anne: In a few days we’ll be leaving the twenty-teens to enter the 2020s. We’ll be saying goodbye to a decade of wild upheaval in the publishing industry. It’s been quite a ride. On January 5th, [we hosted] agent Laurie McLean from Fuse Literary Agency, for her annual “Crystal Ball” predictions for publishing in 2020. But today I’m thinking about the decade that’s passing, and how it disrupted and radically changed the way authors approach publication. A lot of us got to behave like teens—experimenting with radical publishing ideas and trying on lots of new writing venues for size. Amazon’s Kindle had the right name. It fired up the writing community in a major way. Self-publishing became a…
Women Food And God
Writers usually are deep thinkers and often write in their heads as they go about their day. I’m always looking for writing prompts to inspire writing. Women Food and God by Geneen Roth is filled with practical tips for life as well as inspiration to get the stuff in your head onto paper, where you can reflect and find answers to difficult life situations. You can use the ideas in this book as writing prompts. Excerpts from Women Food and God and writing prompts: “Stephen Levine, a Buddhist teacher, says that hell is wanting to be somewhere different from where you are. Being in one place and wanting to be somewhere else. Being constantly agitated—another word for nonaccepting—about the inevitable. Being in a relationship with someone and refusing to surrender to the low because you don’t want to give yourself to something you will eventually lose. That’s called living in…
Chicken Soup for the Soul
From the Chicken Soup for the Soul website: We have many Chicken Soup for the Soul books in development and we frequently add new titles. If you have a great story or poem you want to submit but it doesn’t fit with any of the topics listed below, please save it and check back to see if we have added a topic that’s a better match. If you have a story or poem that you think fits two of the topics below, you may submit it to both. Then let them know in the Comments section that you’ve done so. Also, you may submit more than one piece for each book. We are always looking for new talent. So whether you are a regular contributor or new to our family, please share your story or poem with us. If this is your first time, please visit the Story Guidelines page, which…
Who? Where? When? Why? Prompt #466
Who? Where? When? Why? Just write!
Nathan Bransford
Guest Blogger Nathan Bransford reflects about this past decade with the constant of books by his side. The following is excerpted from Nathan’s December 30, 2019 blog post. So much can change over the course of a decade or two. Thank goodness the books we read and write will still be there waiting for us when we need them. When the clock struck midnight to ring in January 1, 2010, I was a literary agent with Curtis Brown Ltd. in San Francisco, I was married, and the ink was barely dry on my first book deal for the Jacob Wonderbar series. Little did I know that within a year and a half all that would change. Amid all this change, amid all of this upheaval and turmoil, there’s only one thing in my life that hasn’t changed. Books. The first time I visualized my current life was during a vacation in 2010…