maquil123

[maquil123]

Blog 10: Submissions

I have really enjoyed this class! If it were not for our community blogs, peer reviews, and Dr. Byrd’s comments, I wouldn’t have grown so much during this course. Reading your blogs and drafts, not only allowed me to follow other methods to write my first short story, it also helped me understand where I fell short in my draft. I really appreciate everyone for taking the time to read my draft and offer their comments as well. I just don’t think I'm ready to submit my story, even after my revisions. I believe that some areas need a serious makeover before I feel confident enough to submit it to a literary journal. I tend to have major anxiety when I’m under the microscope of criticism, only because I don't like to be rejected after I’m happy about my work. I know that rejection is the painful part of the process, so I think I have thick enough skin to take (maybe) a couple of blows, lol.

During my research to find the most suitable journal, I found one that I believe would be a nice fit for my short story: One Story Inc. They are a non-profit journal that accepts all genres of fiction, and offers cash prizes with an entry fee. These guidelines that you need to know before you send your story to One Story:

Submission Periods: January 15th - May 31st | September 8th - November 14th

How do I submit to One Story? We have an automated system for you to send us your work. It will securely send our editors your story and email you a confirmation that it has been received.  

Does One Story pay? Yes. One Story pays $500 and 25 contributors copies for First Serial North American rights. All rights will revert to the author following publication.

How soon can I expect to hear about my submission? We do our very best to respond to submissions within 3 months after they are received. If you don’t hear back from us within that time, please be patient! It is our goal to make sure that each submission gets a good read.

The submission does require you to submit a short author bio, write a letter to accompany your submission, and also open a submittable account to publish your work. I plan to focus a lot of my time and energy doing revisions this summer (I may even write an entirely different story and submit them both, since One Story allows for multiple submissions of your work), before I have the courage to contact One Story. My overall plan is to never stop reading, learning, writing and going place to place until I’m accepted into a journal.  

* I hope to see everyone's published work one day. Never stop working on your craft until you become published. I too plan to continue working, enough to publish my story and some day develop and own a literary journal. See you soon.

[maquil123]

Blog 9: Revisions

I felt as if my story had the structure of a monument and the detail to make it noticeable, but after I read my peer’s stories, I realized that I had to develop my story even more than I originally thought. Because I’m very critical of my work, I really wanted to change my entire structure, move scenes around, and add a new one, but I took the advice of my peers and developed what I had. 

I decided to go back to Chapter 10′s 12 strategies for revision and do my first revision using the second strategy: “Read your own work like a writer” (Kardos 167). I saw my draft differently after reading each question over and over and answering them until I became satisfied. Through the process, I realized that some of my content lacked the raw emotion that I tried to convey in my story. Even though I believed that changing my story’s point of view would connect to my audience, I couldn’t change it. I did the best I could using the first person narration. I also saw how I overlooked my intention to start my story Medias Res because I had trouble with deciding on the opening of my story. The end needed help too. I had a different ending in mind before I turned in my draft, but thought that it didn’t fit, but I decided to see if I can bring everything to a close, differently.  

After I saw my troubled spots and places that I needed to spend more time revising, I got back to work. I started by changing the beginning of my story (In Medias Res). Next, I added more detail to my atmosphere, scenes, and locations based on my peer’s request (It actually added a good vibe too). Then I focused on my ending. I changed the end entirely, hoping that my readers would understand the cycle of violence that plagues communities. My story intended to show how a person can become part of their environment, thinking that they can use it to get out of it, but they don’ t understand the cycle that’s being created and the effects that it has on the whole community is life long and never stops. I don’t think I clearly showed that, but I tried!

[maquil123]

Blog 8:Plot, Conflict, and Climax

Chapter 6 has a lot of valuable information when you are organizing and building your story. For example, I enjoyed doing the exercise from Chapter 6:structural imitation. I found that ZZ packer’s short story “ Drinking Coffee Elsewhere,” had the form that I was attempting to produce. Doing the exercise provided me with a lot of information about how I can structure and write my own. I had a problem with truly developing my first-person narration, but after understanding how Packer uses it in her story, I tried to develop my style to resemble hers. I also learned how important a summary is when using the first-person narration because it helps add clarity to each scene, and it speeds up your story.

It took me time to build my story the way I wanted my readers to understand it. I love the quote from pg106 “Rhythm must have meaning,” it helps me remember how I intend to make my readers feel while they read each page. I want them to feel my characters frustration, happiness, and even sadness. My goal is to have one person read my story and understand everything that I wrote. My biggest problem still is mood and my conclusion.

I want my end to make sense but I don't want to write a typical story, with a typical ending. I was so focused on making an ending that showed how my character's environment changed, I neglected to show how he changed internally. Chapter 6 gave me an understanding of that as well. It says: “Your main character will and probably should, undergo some change or development or regression, or reveal an aspect of his or her personality that had as yet gone unrevealed” (Kardos 106). Without understanding that insight, I believe that my story would just be another cliché.

[maquil123]

Blog 7: (Further) Research

Since my story focuses mainly on my character’s perception, deception, and yearning to get out of his circumstances, I researched how to present my character’s interior life inside my story. In Chapter 7 of our book, it says: “A story that focuses exclusively on the external situation at the expense of its characters and what motivates them will not be compelling” (Kardos 127). 

It takes getting more information on your character’s interior lives that makes the story become meaningful and give answers to the most important questions about why your character is the way he/she is in the story?

Also, I did more research on how to embed more suspense into my story. It’ s difficult for me to find creative ways to build up the coming scenes in my story  (mainly because of the point of view ) but after reading more information about it I saw that I missed a common link. Suspense requires my readers to have more knowledge about my character’s flaws and actions. Chapter 7 explains it well: “The readers need to imagine your story accurately and know what the stakes are so that they can experience the mounting tension right along with your character. After understanding this, I believe i got it covered.

[maquil123]

Blog 6: POV and Perspective

What does a clown, a bad magician act, a broken heart, and cake all have in common? It's a part of Tandolfo's troubled life.

Personally, I love the way that Richard Bausch captured the limited omniscient POV: the thoughts and feelings of a single character, in his short story, Tandolfo The Great. I felt as if I was right there seeing Tandolfo's life unfolding with every page I read. Bausch's choice of POV, showed how deeply his character bagan to self destruct, how mentally disturbed he truly was, and most of all how ironic it was to be a clown that has nothing to laugh about.

The point of view that Bausch chose was a perfect choice, seeing as his intention was to allow readers to experience Tandolfo's life first hand (as an observer of his personality, events, and his response to his world). In my story, I decided for my readers to see the world from my character's first person point of view. Since I'm telling a story that uses my character's bad choices as a foundation of turmoil and drama, I thought the the first narrator is better suited for my readers. My character is limited and I thought telling my story from this view would help show readers how a limited mindset can cripple anyone. In Chapter 4 the writer encourages anyone that uses the first person POV to know the character's limitation and understand that the "first person narrators just like living breathing people have reasons for telling their stories and these stories color the stories they tell" (Kardos 58).

[maquil123]

Blog 5: Setting and Description

Settings are very important to a story because it creates the world that your character lives, and the type of personality he/she will have, based on the location and description. In reality, our environments dictate a lot about ourselves and what we do. We usually connect people’s actions and ways with the type of area that they stay, or the area that they grew up. That type of real-life occurrence is how readers will tie your character personality to your story setting. For example, if you were to set a story in rural Utah in the winter, your character and story will be limited to the winter elements of low visibility, thick fog, and icy snow. Your character will also be limited to what he/she wears (thick bulky coats and snow boots), and even limited to the type of vehicle that is used.

When writing my setting, I plan to take the advice of Eudora Welty when she wrote, “location is the crossroads of circumstance, the proving ground of ‘What happened? Who’s here? Who’s coming?’--and that is the heart’s field” (Kardos 55). I want my story to connect to my theme and set the mood for my characters, so I set my story near downtown Chicago. My setting alone allows my readers to perceive the type of violence that might take place, and it allows me to use real-life events to make my story believable, and my setting easy to imagine.  

I’ll leave with something for you all to consider. In Chapter 4 of our textbook, it asks us an important question: “If You changed your story’s setting, how much would it change the story? (Kardos 56) If you said “not much” then you should re-evaluate your material.

[maquil123]

Blog Post 4:Research 1

Since I never wrote a fictional short story before, I spent a good amount of time doing research on my character's setting, personality, career, and illness. I googled various internet sources to get as much information as I can so that my story will be congruent with real-life events. I found that creating an atmosphere (mood) in my setting is challenging for me. So, I decided to employ some of the suggestions that I got from writingcommons.org, which encourages writers to project all 5 senses in their opening so that the reader is emersed in the story. 

I also researched information on the symptoms of liver disease to gain knowledge of the different types of illnesses that are hereditary, and the types that deal with alcoholism. WebMd.com has ample information about cause relate illnesses that anyone can use to enhance your story and make it very realistic. Also, I went back over chapter 3 and 4, just to refresh myself with how different author’s opened their stories, and to find out which perspective would be best for my own. Even though it’s fiction, I want my story to be teachable, authentic, and inspiring as possible. After all of the research that I found, I still have some hurdles to cross, and rough patches that require me to redo my work, but I believe that I have enough to create my first story. 

[maquil123]

Blog 3: Characters and Yearning

For me, creating a character is fun and exciting at times. The real challenge arise when I focus on making my character believable and relatable to my audience. I have those stressful moments when I develop my character’s personality, but his/her personality does not line up with the central theme to my story. Trying to mix my creation with an attractive purpose sometimes puts a bump in the road and causes me to pull over and think: Where am I going with this? How can I connect my character back to the main road?   

Staying on the right path requires me to focus what drives my character, and what he/she yearns for. After reading chapter 4 in our text, and after spending time working on my “character’s profile,” I was able to eliminate personality traits that would not fit within my storyline. I understand the importance of how developing my main character first will help sharpen my plot and allow me to stay in line with my overall goal. For example, My character is Narcissistic, and on a mission to save the world by saving every soul that she encounters. Her personality is counterintuitive because she takes does everything for everyone, but failed to take care of herself. Without having the right personality traits and aligning my plot to show how destruction can come from lack of care within, my audience would never get the picture I painted, leaving them going down the wrong road. I now have a deeper understanding of how developing my stories main character's personality is crucial to the development of different scenes, undertones, and other characters. 

[maquil123]

Blog 2: Starting My Story

Before I read chapter 3, I would spend some of my free time asking myself: What makes a good story? How can I make my story appeal to my audience senses, and leave them with something to think about? After brainstorming, with some of the ideas from chapter 3, I quickly found the answers that I sought. The key to success that I found was: 

 Focus on the relationship among my main characters; who is your main character and what is she/he going through? (Kardos 28). Since we live our lives through relationships, the best way to keep your “contract” with your readers is to develop a connection to them through your main character’s relationship with other characters. For example, the first paragraph in Tim O’Brien’s story “On the Rainy River” captures his audience by opening up about his darkest secret. 

 Start in Medias Res. Once I began writing Flash Fiction, I developed a love for starting my stories off “in the middle of things.” It’s catchy, and it gives your story the necessary hook it needs to reel your audience in. 

 Choose the right perspective. Your audience needs to see what you’re describing in your story. The right perspective will guide them throughout your story, so that they can experience your world as you’ve created it, conflict after conflict.

These keys helped me to develop a solid foundation to build upon. It is now a matter of which of the countless senarios that I envisioned, will be the scenario that I will include in my short story. I plan to make sure that I keep it simple and break away from the routine (Kardos 35). I believe that keeping things simple helps the reader to plainly understand your view and it allows the writer to revel key information that’s vital to the story. Some things should be omitted for the sake of suspicion, but overall I want my short story to be clear, insightful, and full of unexpected suspense. I’ll leave you all with something that I go by before I begin to write: “It takes years, months, days, hours, minutes, and seconds  for a writer to create, develop, and write a story worthy of reading and experiencing. But for a reader, it takes minutes and seconds to decide if your story is even worth their time” (Aquil).

[maquil123]

Blog 1: Introduction

Hello all my fellow bloggers. My name is Mustafa Aquil; I aslo go by Stafa. I’m a novice at writing the type of fiction that you are used to reading, but bare with me I’ll do my best. I wrote a mini short story years ago for my then fiancé, and I fell in love with writing fiction. I love how writing allows me to walk in my own creation and share my experiences, feelings, emotions, and drama in ways that I can’t express daily. I wish everyone well, and I look forward to writing blogs and reading fiction.