And that funny thing was I just entered a pitch party called Pitch Madness. It is going on until midnight EST, so you still have almost 4 hours to enter...stop reading and go enter!!!

Okay, now that you've entered let me briefly tell you what I know about Pitch Madness and pitch parties in general. Pitch Madness is where you send out a 35 word pitch for your novel and the first 250 words of the manuscript (must be finished and polished and ready to be read in full), and several "teams" go through and pick their top 60 entries. These finalists then go on to the agent round where they are introduced to an agent.

As I said before, Pitch Madness is a thing known as a pitch party. It is an event where people throw out their pitches to agents in a flurry and may be able to get to then query an interested agent. These are pretty magical, fairy things in my opinion because they remove the need to painstakingly research agents and send out query letters to agents just not looking for what you're currently writing. They are like elevator pitches without the elevator!

If you are reading this blog post Friday, February 24th, 2017 at midnight, then do not fret. There will be another form of Pitch Madness happening on Twitter (#PitMad) on March 23rd: 12 hours (8am - 8pm), 140 characters, 3 pitches. Also, I guess these pitch parties are pretty common, so do some Googling and I'm sure you'll turn up some others.

Now seriously, stop reading and go attend a pitch party! ;)

Keep Writing and Edit On.
I Write, I Edit, I Write Again. Witness!
We're Making Better Words, All of Them, Better Words.
I Write to Burn Off the Crazy.
A Good Day Writing is a Day Writing.
It Puts the Words on the Page or it Gets the Hose Again.
Just Keep Writing, Just Keep Writing; Writing, Writing, Writing...

Off we go into the unknown…well, not exactly the unknown, but a new Con. Capricorn is a science fiction, fantasy, and fandom convention near Chicago where I’m hoping to meet some new friends while running a fun, prompt- based writing workshop. It is also a good opportunity to branch out from Michigan Cons.

We arrived here at the Westin Chicago North Shore around 4pm, settled into the room, registered, and crashed into the Editing Yourself panel where I ran into old pal Clif and his editing program, editomat (http://editomatic.com).

Next was a helpful panel on pitches, then a chance to mingle at Writers and Donuts, and finally dinner at the restaurant in the hotel lobby.

So far Capricon 37 is proving to be a casual convention with quite a few familiar faces [I’m looking at you Martin Shoemaker ;)].

Tomorrow is my big day, starting with a reading at noon from my novelette, Miles from Manistique (now available in paperback!), and ending with an autograph signing at four, squeezing a panel and the writing workshop in between.

Wish me luck!

Keep Writing and Edit On.
I Write, I Edit, I Write Again. Witness!
We're Making Better Words, All of Them, Better Words.
I Write to Burn Off the Crazy.
A Good Day Writing is a Day Writing.
It Puts the Words on the Page or it Gets the Hose Again.
Just Keep Writing, Just Keep Writing; Writing, Writing, Writing...

Keep Writing and Edit On.
I Write, I Edit, I Write Again. Witness!
We're Making Better Words, All of Them, Better Words.
I Write to Burn Off the Crazy.
A Good Day Writing is a Day Writing.
It Puts the Words on the Page or it Gets the Hose Again.
Just Keep Writing, Just Keep Writing; Writing, Writing, Writing...

So lately one of my big problems has been figuring out how to flesh out my story idea bones into full short stories. So I did a little research, and here are some suggestions that I found online.

Writers Digest Forum Boards:
1. Start Freewriting.
2. Think of the Characters.
3. Start Basic.
4. Play the Why Game.
5. Work on Relationships.

Writing 4 Success:
1. Add a new plot twist.
2. Add a new sub-plot.
3. Add a new character.
4. Add a new dimension to your main character.

io9 - How To Turn a High Concept Idea Into An Actual Story:
1. Who's your main character?
2. How does your main character's agenda run diagonal to your plot?

Hope this helps you and me both! :)

Keep Writing and Edit On.
I Write, I Edit, I Write Again. Witness!
We're Making Better Words, All of Them, Better Words.
I Write to Burn Off the Crazy.
A Good Day Writing is a Day Writing.
It Puts the Words on the Page or it Gets the Hose Again.
Just Keep Writing, Just Keep Writing; Writing, Writing, Writing...