Poetry Anyone?

I got this notification in one of my email newsletters. While I am not a poet, I thought since there is no fee to enter, some of you out there may be interested in this one. Cash Prize!

WERGLE FLOMP HUMOR POETRY CONTEST - NO FEE

10th annual free contest. Fifteen cash prizes totaling $3,600.
Top prize $1,500. Submit one humor poem by April 1 deadline.
No entry fee. Winning entries published online. Final judge:
Jendi Reiter. Sponsored by Winning Writers, proud to be one
of the "101 Best Websites for Writers" (Writer's Digest, 2005- 2010).
Guidelines and online submission at www.winningwriters.com/wergle

What are Shelby Glasses?

A few days ago, a writer friend of mine (Joce Adams *shout out* - Great Writer - check her stuff out. There's a link to her blog in my sidebar somewhere) recently asked me to critique one of her stories with an eye toward the 9 year old voice.

As some of you may know, I have two daughters. The youngest of which is my ten year old, Shelby. I told Joce I'd put on my "Shelby Glasses" and see what I could find to pick at.

Just this evening, I found some of her schoolwork on the counter, a common occurrence. One of the pages had some paragraphs of writing on it, and I thought it might be a story of some kind, or a book report.

It turned out to be some kind of journal page. There are two sections. Friday and Saturday. What I read for Saturday explains Shelby Glasses perfectly. You will have to let me know if you agree.

The following is not edited in any way. It is VERBATIM what is on the page and what made me laugh today.

Saturday

On Saturday I went to my friends and slept over. Once we went on youtube we looked up Etrade baby grounded. After that we did a complete minute to win it night. I won and I got (dramatic pause) 1                 Penny!! It wasn't worth dropping an egg on your head. I had to take 2 showers to wash it out. surprisingly it makes your skin nice and soft.

(NOTE: I wasn't able to make the !! properly after Penny --the way shelby wrote it- because it is a smiley face using the periods as the eyes)

I was particularly impressed with the addition of the stage direction for dramatic pause and the importance it warranted to add it for her teacher to get the full affect of the story.

Shelby glasses ROCK.

The Sharp Angle: Conquering the Logline

I decided to cross post this, as recently I had learned about the existence of this thing called a logline. Not to mention, many of you I know check in are in the query letter and synopsis stages, so I thought this might be an appropriate cross post. Thanks to Lydia Sharp for allowing me to share it with you all.


The Sharp Angle: Conquering the Logline: "A blog reader recently asked if we could discuss how to craft a logline, to which I said, 'Of course!' I lurrrrrve this topic. First, pleas..."