Jeff Cutler – columns, essays and opinions

I’ve completed the Nanowrimo challenge and written my 50K words in the month of November. Now it’s on to editing and smoothing out the manuscript.

I can’t put into words – maybe because I’ve used so many in the past three weeks – how great this feels and how energizing this task has been.

Thanks for your support and I welcome anyone to tackle this challenge next year.

Now I’m off to put some content – not the novel, just content that’s been sitting in the back of my mind – onto the 14 blogs I had chugging alone happily until the novel took over my fingers.

Keep reading!

Buzz This Post

At my office away from the office (Panera), I tried to see how easy it would be to write 2000 words on a cohesive topic.

The exercise was part of the NaNoWriMo event coming up in less than 15 days. That’s right, National Novel-writing Month is November.

Part of my anxiety – aside from the actual word-count issue – is topic. I’m a font of silly ideas, smart commentary and unique introspective conversation starters. But that’s where it ends.

The stuff I usually write are concise and powerful 600-775 word diatribes. How can I hope to create characters, plot, description and wild action in chunks of 650 words? Further, how will I paste the whole thing together well enough to entice a major agent or publisher to take a flyer on my project?

It can’t be that hard, can it?

I mean, at every Tweet-up, cocktail party, family gathering and trip to the dentist, people bludgeon me with their ideas for books once they learn that I’m a professional writer.

Sure, I get paid to write and have done so since the days of green screens and mimeograph machines. But that doesn’t mean I’m a modern-day literary Midas.

Just look back over this rant and count the number of times I’ve used a hyphenated descriptor. That’s amateur hour, but you must concede me the errors in style as I’m trying to pound out the characters.

Nimble fingers are necessary. Just like a toy boat will tangle your tongue, you should try writing alliteration always. Or don’t.

How many words is that? 900? Not even?

C’mon. I’m going to have to do twice this amount AND make it tell a story. I think what I need is some acid. Or at least a lucid dream.

Thank god it’s Friday and I won’t have to think about this heinous challenge until Monday when I’ll be limbering up my fingers again.

What?

NaNoWriMo requires you to write EVERY day of the week? That means my trip to NYC mid-month will include some frantic banging of the keys.

And TurkeyDay will make me look like Mike Felger in a previous life. Anti-social wanker with his laptop at every family event. But it’s for the greater good.

And whatever I end up with next month better be good. And it better be greater than this collection of words.

Every day.

All month long.

Until I reach 50,000 words.

Yikes.

Keep reading…I’ll keep typing.

*Leave your thoughts on NaNoWriMo in the comments. And let me know if you’d like me to dump my daily words right here on the blog. It will give you a chance to see the novel as it travels along a path from concept to abysmal reality.

Buzz This Post

Sent a contest entry off to Mystery Writers of America, sent a few queries off today to some small publications with niche readerships—probably great spots for some of my columns or articles, and read through some more of my magazine pile.

When editors ask you to peruse a handful of issues to figure out their style, they mean it. But it’s time well-spent. So far I have a much better grasp of what types of features, columns and fillers go where. It’s also helped me generate article ideas for other markets.

As your teachers told you, READ!

Buzz This Post

Just doing interviews in town (Boston) today and trying to stay dry.

The rest of the week is brainstorming and query letters to different publications. Updates will be posted here.

AND, with today being CONTEST WEDNESDAY, I have located a contest or two to enter. But each requires a longer piece of writing so I’ll start crafting those for submission either next week or the week after.

Got brainstorms yourself? Send them here in the comments. Thanks!

Buzz This Post

Today I wrote a piece for the “Share your UC story” contest being put on by Procter & Gamble and the Crohn’s Colitis Foundation of America. The contest is based on the belief that people do have fulfilling lives after being diagnosed with, and living with, Crohn’s (which I have) and Ulcerative Colitis.

Here’s the link for entry.

Because the rules of the contest state that my submission cannot be previously published, I’m at a loss. I want badly to share it with you, but want to ensure that I follow the contest rules precisely. That means if I post the submission here I have published it and therefore disqualified myself.

If you didn’t understand that distinction, here’s a tiny primer on copyright and publishing. And down the bottom I’ve pulled an excerpt from my entry—something that IS allowed.

Whether you want to believe it or not, the very words you’re reading here electronically have the same legal protection as the words that appear in any John Grisham novel or any video that appears in a major motion picture. Creative expression is protected by copyright the moment it is put into a ‘fixed’ form. By writing my thoughts here, or recording them on tape, or even putting them in an email to a friend, those words immediately are considered copyrighted.

Publishing is a tiny bit more complicated, but very similar. A piece of writing is considered to be published when it is made available in a fixed format for an audience other than the original creator. This is simplified, but semantically correct.

If I were being realistic, there’s probably nobody on the judging committee at the contest who would wander by this site and read my entry. Many magazines also ignore prior publication of submitted materials if the earlier publication was in a tiny paper or magazine that none of its readers ever see.

So, I’m being overly careful with this, but will post the entire entry once the contest has closed.

Here’s the excerpt…

I choose to experience my life, not be a hostage to my body’s vicious complaints and frustrating physiology. I choose to be happy. Therefore, I am in control of my UC.

The rest of the piece is about 140 words explaining my journey through life having Crohn’s and the ways in which I have coped. If you’ve got a story like that, go enter. Or just share it here in the comments.

Buzz This Post