Kirk

These look like great ideas. Thanks, Nikita!

Hi again, Nikita!
Thanks! I am pretty excited about this publication. I am also excited that they want to see more of my work!
As far as how I thought about an editor/book doctor (and I think it will vary from project to project) I firmly acknowledged that there is a lot about putting a book together and the publishing process that I am naive or just plain ignorant about. So I wanted to get ahead of any problems before they became critical. My story started out as a modular fiction experimental project in one of Joe’s classes. It then grew into a short story; now it is a novel-length work in progress, which I am very excited about and having a lot of fun with. It has three distinct parts to it with several chapters in each part. My editor and I decided it would be good for her to review each section as they are completed. It took her a few weeks to review, comment, and suggest edits once I gave her the first section. While she was doing that, I stopped writing on the novel and awaited her feedback before I moved too deep into the next section in case I needed to do some major reworking on the first section or if she told me that there just wasn’t a story there and I really need to reconsider my project. It turns out I didn’t have any major structural issues and she gave me a lot of good and material edits – and she loved the story and encouraging me to write the story – “keep going,” she said. During that time off, she also encouraged me to keep writing on other projects and try to get smaller pieces published or enter a writing contest. So I went back and worked on my Hemingway narrative essay and submitted it and that is the one that is getting published. It is advice we constantly hear as writers: “keep writing, writers write, etc.” But this is when I finally got it and learned the importance of it as a (aspiring) professional writer. So I kept writing and now I’m finally getting published. I’m now about done with the second part of my novel, and I will give it to my editor soon and then work on cleaning up another essay or two and trying to get those published while I am waiting to hear back from her. It’s a process that has really worked for me. I think one of the greatest things that has come out of this is that she has given me a lot great advice and coached me through the process. Hope this helps some!

I have used both. They seem to be different tools to me. Nikita, I get from what you are saying here that you can see status updates in Duotrope? If that’s true, I wasn’t aware of that capability. I thought it was just a log were you could enter your own updates that you may be otherwise notified of; I didn’t think you could link it to actual status out there! That would be great if so. Please share how to do that because I haven’t seen that functionality. But you are correct about finding opportunities with Duptrope. It is an excellent resource for that! Thanks!