As you may have already spotted, my writing work has been published in a number of different places over the years. However, as many aspiring writers will tell you, this can be a long somewhat difficult process. With this in mind, here are just a few top tips on how to get published.
Firstly, you will want to decide where it is that you are hoping to see your work published. Don’t forget, some platform are much more difficult than others, and certain outlets will be better suited to your individual writing style. Are you happy to have articles published online, so that people can read them around the world while they catch up on breaking news and play games of online Binguez? Or are you looking to secure a book deal, which will see your novel in print, and placed in bookshops nationwide? Knowing exactly where you are hoping to get your work published can save you time in the long-run, as you will be able to focus your attention on the types of publications which are most appropriate.
You will also need to make sure that you have work which is publishable. If you want to write a book, then you will need to have at least the first couple of chapters ready. If you’re simply looking to get your work published in a magazine, for example, then you may not need to have an article already written, but you should have examples already available to show the commissioning editor. Whatever you intend to submit to whichever publication, the content and presentation should be impeccable. With such strong competition within the publishing industry, this is essential in making sure that you work isn’t disregarded early on. Lastly, you will need to have a good mix of patience and determination. Often, it might take some time before you are published, but it’s important that you don’t give up on your goals. Keep trying, and good luck!”
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“How to Get Published
May 17, 2012 by Patricia
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Hallo #Steven Banyard, Acting Director General Personal Tax at Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs – are you listening?
April 29, 2012 by Patricia
Unlike most people, I don’t hate the taxman. I don’t like paying tax, obviously, but if you want to live in a civilised society, you have to pay for it.
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I do my own tax forms and ever since I could no longer afford an accountant, I’ve always made an appointment with a proper tax inspector to check the forms before I file them.
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I did file online for a few years on the excellent website HMRC started with. Unfortunately HMRC then switched providers to a bunch of bozos who didn’t even number the sections so you could refer back to them and made the whole online form so impossibly complicated and frustrating, I went back to paper.
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For years I’ve made my April visits to the Truro tax office, usually to a lovely man called Simon. He made sure I didn’t claim any expenses I shouldn’t and put everything in the right boxes.
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He’s gone now. Retired. HMRC is presently being run by the usual bunch of besuited bozos. They’ve made it almost impossible to get through to a human being on the number they give you for Self-Assessment enquiries; instead, they waste your time with a ten minute recording on the wonders of their online presence and then cut you off because all their advisors are busy.
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Or you’ll be sitting in the Truro tax office, for example, wanting to get the extra pages you always need to declare your various sources of income (which they haven’t sent you). Also you want to make an appointment at the Truro tax office to check over your forms as usual.
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This is how you now have to do it. The girl at the tax office where you’re sitting calls a secret number on their phone so you can talk to an advisor. He does an identity check. Then you ask him to send you the extra pages (which always used to be stored in the grey filing cabinet in the corner). He promises to send them. Then you tell him you want an appointment to check your form. Then he promises to contact Truro tax office (where you’re sitting) to ask them to arrange an appointment for you. Then they have to phone you later (though you’re sitting there) to arrange the appointment for next week. As my daughter’s lovely friends say: *facepalm*
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Steven, dearie, I know you want to stop paying for tax inspectors and offices and all that, but you’re missing the bigger picture.
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Let’s assume that, ideally, you want to get people to pay their taxes as fully and willingly as possible, in a world where more and more people are filling in self-assessment forms because they can’t get into the luxury of a PAYE job. How do you encourage them to do that? Do you do it by making the process as stupidly bureaucratic and complicated as possible?
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No, Steven, you don’t. You make it simple and easy. Otherwise every time you prosecute someone who got their taxes wrong because of your stupid complications, you create another implacable enemy of the tax system and the government. Produce enough of them and you’ve got the situation in the USA, where paying tax is regarded as a sign of being feeble-minded and poor. Carry on that way and revolution is a possibility.
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Now I realise that His Cameronness is far too rich ever to have had to deal with his tax forms personally, so I realise he can’t be expected to understand any of this. Tell him, would you?Category Uncategorized | Tags: , David Cameron, HMRC, Steven Banyard, taxpayers | No Comments
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Listening to #Patrick Gale at #Waterstones
April 5, 2012 by Patricia
I don’t often go to author evenings – I know, I know. It’s a mixture of envy and embarassment because I often haven’t read any of their books. This is because, when I’m writing a book which I usually am, I don’t want anyone else’s words in my head, particularly not if they’re really well-written.
So I hadn’t read anything by Patrick Gale before seeing him this evening at Waterstones in Truro – but I will once I’ve finished the next Carey Elizabethan crime novel. He read aloud from his latest book A Perfectly Good Man – very well indeed, which is something not all authors are good at. As #2 son said on the way home – it’s not the sort of book he’s normally interested, but now he wants to read it. Patrick Gale also answered fan questions with wry self-deprecating humour which is mandatory for authors, but his felt genuine.
One thing he said which I found fascinating: he writes each of his characters’ story seperately and then weaves them together in the second draft, which is when he finds out what the book is about. I tend to plod along chronologically but I think I’ll be trying this method out with the one I’m writing.
The envy came, of course. I envy his self-discipline to start writing at 9.00 and finish at 2.00 and then do some more in the evening. I feel proud of myself if I get in two hours a day. Hey ho.
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Tune in to hear me on BBC Radio Cornwall, Friday 30th March at 4.15 pm (British time)
March 29, 2012 by Patricia
I love doing radio interviews – what’s not to love? You don’t have to dress up or put on make up, it doesn’t matter if you have a spot on your nose, there’s no camera to add the traditional fifteen pounds and you can talk to interesting people. It’s all very relaxing.
Tiffany Truscott will be interviewing me tomorrow about The Poetry Diet on the BBC Radio Cornwall afternoon programme – I hope I’ll have time to read a poem or a recipe and get you dribbling at my descriptions of chocolate and then laughing at the whole daft situation. And that’s just one of the recipes…
Yes! The Poetry Diet is the only known poetry book with added recipes!
Buy your copy right here.The Poetry Diet – £5.99 plus postage and packing of £2.00
Category Books, Food Glorious Food, Poetry | Tags: , BBC Radio Cornwall | No Comments
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Coming soon!
March 28, 2012 by Patricia
My Publisher and I confidently predict that these titles will be flooding into the shops within about a year (probably by Christmas).
“The Hungry Throne” – vampires hunt humans across an apocalyptic landscape – but all they want is love!
“Swedish Girl Games” – a tough and miserable female Scandinavian journalist investigates an old scandal – and meets her match in an abused computer hacker.
“Twilight Games” – a tough girl vampire has to beat a lot of other vampires to save her cute human lover.
“Thrones in Twilight” – improbably vicious and sexually depraved medieval people fight each other in a world where nights and days each last for year. When night falls the vampires come.
“Rug” – the hilariously sad story of how somebody sat on a rug for a year.Any other suggestions?
Category Books | Tags: , Game of Thrones, Hunger Games, Twilight | No Comments
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So THAT’s what I should have been doing all this time…
March 15, 2012 by Patricia
I did a poetry reading and gig at Waterstones in Truro tonight – it was a blast. Slightly a blast from the past as I was cavorting in my amazing purple corset, but everyone ate my chocolate truffles (damn fine, though I sez it myself), drank some wine kindly provided by Waterstones and then sat and listened to my poetry and discursions on…
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Actually I’m not sure what. I do remember censoring the bit about when I was having my first baby and then explaining how to make your daughter’s eighth birthday sleepover go really well for all the little girls in her class. It involves meticulous doses of Haribo sweeties and ice cream with chocolate sauce for breakfast, the recipe for which is in “The Poetry Diet” (published by Thingley Press).
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I love making people laugh and I love doing it even more when it’s deliberate and part of selling books, rather than inadvertent because I’ve said something idiotic again. I am, after all, the woman who caused the whole of the village shop to fall about laughing when I spotted an unexpected tenner in my purse and said loudly, “Oh look, there’s some money, better spend it quick before it all goes away!”Category Books, Food Glorious Food, Gigs, Poetry | Tags: , Haribo sweeties, The Poetry Diet, Truro, Waterstones | No Comments
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Round 2, seconds away..!
March 9, 2012 by Patricia
I know I shouldn’t have laughed, really I do. When you look at the background it’s a sad story about a guy who had a chance to make a difference and messed it up… The star of the story, disgraced Labour MP for Falkirk, Eric Joyce probably doesn’t think it’s very funny at all.
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Pretty good though. I mean, one in a ruck against four guys, three of them Tories. Not bad. One headbutt, three punches and one of them was a Labour whip as well. He was obviously pretty fired up (as in blotto).
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Mind you, the Tories are clearly slipping. They’d have been all in, fists flying when I were a lass. They’ve obviously lost form since then, or possibly they’re drinking less.
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Come on, chaps, three of you came off worst against one Labourite? Tut tut.Category Uncategorized | Tags: | No Comments
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Big family party!
February 24, 2012 by Patricia
Last weekend I drove a total of 600 miles so I could join the rest of my family for a big party at my brother’s house. I think there were 26 of us, three generations including my mother and my lovely aunt, my late father’s sister. Both my brothers were there and my sister, over from New York, with her kids and step-kids; all but one of the cousins (who lives in Sidney, Australia) were there, and their kids and boyfriends/girlfriends/spouses… I’m not sure it was 26, it could have been more, to be honest. I keep losing count.
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We do this regularly, about once a year or so. It isn’t always at my brother’s place – sometimes we take over an entire winebar for the day. Food is eaten, large amounts of wine and beer are drunk, the noise must be deafening if you’re not used to it because we all have powerful personalities and we all love to talk.
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I must say this one was a marathon seven-eight hours – punctuated by extended hugs and goodbyes to people who had to take trains back to uni – and I was one of the last to leave, as usual. Well, I didn’t want to go. It had been such a lovely day.
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Plenty of discussion and disagreement, but no quarrels and a lot of laughter. Yes, I know, I’m smug and I naturally think that my family is better than everyone else’s, but I also think there are things we do that make it easier to have a successful family party.
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Nobody has to come – we come because we want to, but if someone can’t make it, there are no recriminations. Everybody missed the cousin in Australia because she and her kids are (of course) beautiful and brilliant – but maybe she’ll be able to come next year. We don’t do the party on an official holiday like Christmas because different people have different commitments and it’s too complicated. We generally seem to do it in January or February when everyone needs cheering up and travel is a little bit cheaper.
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I say “we” but of course, I haven’t organised one because I’m inefficient and I live in Cornwall. Usually my brother or my immensely talented cartoonist cousin Simon sorts it out. Lots of work goes into it – but intelligently with sensible delegation so no resentments boil away in the background.
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Perhaps one of the things that helps is that we all get together regularly. This means that when we have to meet for big family occasions like weddings and funerals, we get along well in emotional circumstances because we already know and like each other. I have never forgotten that, when my husband died ten years ago, everybody turned up for the funeral – all of them, cousins and aunt as well as my brothers and sister, travelling long distances – which made me feel very supported and comforted.
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So I recommend the practice. Don’t wait for a funeral. Do it now: pick a date, hire a winebar or a pub if nobody has a suitable house, invite absolutely all of your family, cousins, nephews, uncles, aunts – the lot. Make a regular (if rare) thing of it. If you don’t all get along the first time, don’t worry, you will the time after or the time after that.
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I know some families have deep rifts running through them. Perhaps that makes it harder, but surely it’s still worth trying if at all possible? If you’re lucky enough to have Family, they are the people you can’t choose, true – but they can still be your friends so long as you meet them for a big party every so often.Category Uncategorized | Tags: , family, party | No Comments