A Teacher First and other writing gigs

My new novel, A Teacher First, is now available on Amazon.com in print and as a Kindle edition. I realize that for many people the latest is always the greatest, but I really do believe that this is the best story I've written. Check it out and let me know if you agree.

I've been doing a lot of guest blogging lately. In September I had work published by Grown and Flown, Ripped Jeans and Bifocals, and Writers Weekly, as well as having one of my short stories appear in Page & Spine. I haven't written many short stories lately so I was happy to get one of the few I've written published. I have ideas for a couple others which I hope to write in the next month or so.

Because I've been having success in recent months with columns and essays, I'd like to focus more on this sort of thing. The problem is finding markets for my work. I'm sure I'll figure it all out, but it would be nice to get a regular gig writing for a couple of publications. Until then, though, I trudge on.

I'm off now to write another column. I've got Bruce Springsteen's The River on the turntable and a candle burning, so the creative juices are ready to flow (I hope). Hopefully it won't be another two months before my next blog post.

10 Albums I'd Want if Stranded on a Deserted Island

I used to wonder a lot about the 10 albums I'd want if I were stranded on a deserted island. I've spent a lot of time thinking about this, and my list has changed as my musical tastes have changed over the years.

Of course, I'd have to start with a couple of Beatles albums. I'd probably go with Abbey Road and Revolver.

But then I thought that I may want the White Album, which led to wondering if that counted as one album or two because it's a double album. I'd want something tropical and sunny, because I'm on a tropical island, and so I'd take Jimmy Buffett's Greatest Hits and the Beach Boys Endless Summer (again, a double album, so does it count as one or two).

I'd also probably take Journey Escape, Eagles Hotel California and Bruce Springsteen's The River (a third double album). For harder rock, I'd take Van Halen Women and Children First, AC/DC Highway to Hell and Guns & Roses Appetite For Destruction.

 Due to the double album question, I have no idea how many choices I have left, but I know I'd also want The Masterplan and Definitely Maybe by Oasis and Just Enough Education to Perform by Stereophonics.

I'm not sure if these last ones were even released on vinyl, so I then wondered if I would be allowed to have a CD player instead of a record player. This would solve my double album problem, because a double album takes up only one CD, allowing me to take most of my choices to a deserted island. And would it be possible for me to bring 20, or even 15? Because 10 just isn't enough.

Then I realized that regardless of which choice I made, I wouldn't have electricity on a deserted island. Plus, would I have the foresight to pack a record player or CD player, and 10 albums or CD's? Doubtful. So even if I had the music, I'd have no way to play it.

Unless I was stranded with the Professor...

My graduation essay in Grown and Flown

It's sunny and 80 degrees and I'm sitting on the couch in my living room. Here in Maine we get about a dozen of these days per year, if we're lucky. I asked my son if he wanted to go to the lake but he said no. He's now in his room sorting his Pokeman cards. Oh well, he's focused and quiet. I may sit on the back deck and read. Or maybe I'll just take a nap.

I recently had an essay that I wrote about my son's high school graduation published on the website Grown and Flown. It's called Graduation and the Heart-Rending Optimism of Youth. I like this one, if I do say so myself (and I do). And here's a picture of the family after graduation:

I also had an essay accepted by the site Ripped Jeans and Bifocals, which I will share when it is published. I've apparently discovered the parenting / aging market. It's usually what I write about in my columns for the Sanford News, so it's really not a stretch for me.

Well, I think I'll go take that nap now. I will definitely not take so long between posts next time.

Lemmy documentary

I thought I would have a column in the Sanford News this week, but it won't be in the paper until next week or the week after. But I am still in the paper this week because my picture appears in an article on Goodall Library's book sale. So I'm really having a big month. Like George Costanza had the Summer of George, this might be my April of Gary!

I know, that was stupid. So last night I watched the documentary Lemmy, about Lemmy from Motorhead, of course. I love that the fathers of metal, guys like Ozzy and Lemmy, love the Beatles. Even today, they talk about them with awe. The best part of the documentary, to me, was near the beginning when they show Lemmy going to a record store to buy a Beatles box set. Then he said something really interesting, which I've heard before but most people don't realize. He said something like, "Most people think the Beatles were the nice guys and the Stones were the tough guys, but it was the other way around. The Beatles came from the streets of Liverpool, a really tough city, and the Stones came from middle class homes in the outskirts of London". That's basically what he said.

I'm reading a book by Elizabeth Strout, The Burgess Boys. I like that part of it is set in Maine, that's always interesting to me. Not all books set in Maine are good, but this one is.

How to Organize Your Short Stories

I've been writing and submitting short stories for about four or five years now. With each submission I send a short query letter and either attach my story or paste it in the email, depending on which they prefer. Many publications now use Submitable, which still involves the query letter and attaching or pasting the story.

Yesterday, for the first time ever, I made the mistake I've always worried about - I sent a story that did not match the query letter. The query begins, "I've attached a copy of my 1,200-word story, Late November... But instead of sending Late November, I sent a different story.

I'd estimate that I've written 40 to 50 short stories. I've had 14 published, which I consider a good percentage, although it could be better. With that many short stories, it's important to keep them well organized. It's easy, too.

First, I just create a new file in my Documents and title it "Short Stories". Pretty creative, I know. Then every story I read gets its own file, with the story, a query letter, and a list of submissions. The title of each file is the title of the story. So inside the file Late November, located in the Short Stories file, is the story Late November, the query letter, and the list of magazines I've submitted it to, along with the dates and the name of the editor it was addressed to.

I also keep a separate file titled Published Stories, inside the Short Stories folder. Every time a story gets accepted for publication, it goes to the Published Stories folder. Easy, and for me easy is usually better.

Some people use a program like Excel to keep track of all this, but those people are far more computer literate than I am. My way is organized and simple, and being organized is so important, especially if you start writing and submitting a lot of stories.

Recycling some old stories

I finished another edit of my novel. The title is A Teacher First. Final decision, as they say on 'Who Wants to be a Millionaire'. I really like the title now, whereas I was never really comfortable with the original title, Bring Back Coach Zim! I'm pretty satisfied with how the novel is looking.

I've also been doing some other writing lately, sort of. It's more like recycling some old writing. I've taken a short story I wrote about twelve years ago and rewritten it. It was poorly written but a pretty good story, in my opinion. One thing I've learned since then is how to tighten a story up. Now it's still a good story (I hope) and less poorly written. It'll be ready to submit to a few magazines by this weekend. I haven't had a short story published in two or three years, mainly because I haven't really written any for two or three years.

And I've wanted to write a few articles to submit to magazines but have been too busy (lazy). So I've taken a couple of columns that I wrote but never submitted to the Sanford News, tweaked them a little, and sent them out. I don't have a lot of faith in them, but you never know. They aren't bad, just not the best I've ever written.

I'm reading a book called Bang Your Head, about the rise and fall of heavy metal. It's good, I'm really enjoying it. And I've been reading a series of mystery novels, the Bernie and Chet series by Spencer Quinn, which I believe is a pen name for the author Peter Abrahams. Bernie is a private detective and Chet is his dog, and the stories are told from Chet's point of view. It's a good idea and really well done. I've read three of the books so far, I think there are a total of five.

Deciding on a title for my manuscript

I've only posted here once since September, which is not good. But I do have an excuse because I was writing my new novel. Don't believe me? Well, here it is: 

I finished the first draft last month and it will be ready to go by the end of the week. Where is it going? I'm not sure. Send to agents and publishers, or self-publish and try to market it? That's the question. It's really good and I like it a lot, so I'm happy with it.

Another question is the title. Here's a short description of the story:

Jim Zimmerman was once the best high school baseball player the state of Maine had ever seen. Now middle aged and known to everybody as Coach Zim, he’s the winningest high school coach in state history and everybody’s favorite history teacher. When he is unexpectedly fired from his coaching job by the school principal, a former teammate still harboring jealousy from high school, Coach Zim faces a future without baseball for the first time in his life.

 Before long a former player offers Coach Zim a dream job with the Red Sox organization. While pondering this job he finds himself helping a gay student who is being bullied and discovers that, inconceivable as it might seem, his work as a teacher may be more important than his work as a baseball coach.

That is a short and not very well-written description, but it gives an idea, at least. My problem is, do I title it Bring Back Coach Zim! or A Teacher First. It's been Bring Back Coach Zim! for a long time, but I just read a line in the story and thought A Teacher First sounded pretty good. So I'll decide soon. Any comments would be appreciated.