Playing the Short Game: Free online workshop #2

Submitted by Douglas Smith on Thu, 2020/04/23 - 12:31pm

Short Game coverYou can still attend the last two of my free online workshops on how to market and sell short fiction, based on my Playing the Short Game writer's guide. The workshops are sponsored by the Newmarket Public Library and the Writers' Community of York Region (WCYR). You can still register online for the remaining two workshops, which will take place on the next two Tuesday evenings: April 28 and May 5.

This past Tuesday, workshop #1 covered rights and licensing for short fiction, how to build a strategy for marketing your short fiction, finding markets, picking the best market to start with, and how to submit (and how not to submit). See below for what the next two will cover.

Tuesday, April 28, 2020, 7-9pm EDT — Playing the Short Game #2: You Sold a Story! Contracts, Editing, & Reality

This workshop takes a writer from when they learn an editor wants to buy their story to after it's published and the reviews start coming. Topics include:

  • Understanding how editors and slush piles work
  • Why editors choose or reject stories
  • What to look (and look out) for in short fiction contracts, and how to ask for changes
  • How to work with an editor during the editing process for your story
  • How to handle rejections and reviews
  • How much promotion is reasonable when you sell a story
  • Cool things that might happen: Awards, best of anthologies,…and even movies

Tuesday, May 5, 2020, 7-9pm EDT — Playing the Short Game #3: How to Make Your Short Fiction Work for You

This workshop focuses on the phase in a short story writer's career when they've established themselves and have built up a backlist of published short fiction. It will explain the many ways a successful short fiction writer can leverage their own inventory of published stories, as well as other aspects of an established short fiction writer's life. Topics include:

  • Leveraging your backlist
  • Selling reprints
  • Selling in foreign languages
  • Selling audio rights
  • Publishing a collection
  • The indie option for short fiction
  • Discoverability tools and promotion for established writers
  • Career progression in short fiction

Again, you need to register online with the library.