Getting the Book Tested – Book in Progress, Part 7
by Joe Taylor Legitimate Doubts Just the other day I tore up and threw away the list of over 80 literary agents that I had queried about finding a publisher…
Photo by Anastasia Shuraeva on Pexels.com
Remotely Join TWJ Events via Airmeet
by Sarah Rossey To join an AirMeet event, simply click the link provided on our calendar from a desktop or laptop computer. Read on to learn more! From writer's meetings…
Book in Progress, Part 6: I Believe in My Book
by Joe Taylor To be brutally honest, it's been worse than brutal. It's been silent. A month after Labor Day, when I thought my responses from prospective agents might pick…
Review of Dead Letters: Delivering Unopened Mail from a Pennsylvania Ghost Town
Byron Hoot reviews author Jess Weible's new publication, Dead Letters: Delivering Unopened Mail from a Pennsylvania Ghost Town What Fragile Hope Dies ... ? Imagine being given a letter written…
Image by Greg Clary
Submitting to The Watershed Journal, an Inclusive Literary Magazine
Inclusive, authentic, diverse storytelling Got some work you'd like to submit to The Watershed Journal literary magazine? Check out this overview of our magazine production cycle to learn more about…
Should You Strive To Be A “Prolific” Writer?
by writer Patricia Thrushart The words ‘prolific’ and ‘writer’ are used together as often as ‘rough’ and ‘draft' or ‘copy’ and ‘editor.’ The assumption is that writing a lot is…
Letter From the Editors (Summer 2020 Edition)
Cover image by Featured Artist Madison Gasper The 2020 Summer Edition of The Watershed Journal is a product of a particularly challenging time. Globally, the pandemic made choices that used…
Preparing for a Literary Agent – Book in Progress, Part 5
My first couple of days of submitting to agents were exhausting and extremely frustrating. I would identify a target agent then send her (90% are women) whatever she requested. About a quarter of them came back immediately as undeliverable. Thinking, I guess, that "this agent was my only hope" I'd keep trying to find a better email address or resending it. Finally, I realized she may be out of business or posted a bad address and moved on.
Enacting the Edits: Book in Progress, Part 4
Surgeons have often been accused of being emotionally removed from the patient they're operating on, removing 'this' and 'rewiring' that. I could relate to that as I performed literary 'surgery'…
The System is Broken: Using Dissonance to Engage an Audience
Engaging and engrossing writing can be simple or complicated, but never flat. Just as in real life, we can incorporate adversity and differences, rather than avoid them, in order to build a system that feels real and moves our readers. Even when our goal is to find patterns, draw conclusions or describe a beautiful future, our stories are more powerful when we consider the exceptions to the rules we create. Introducing dissonance into our writing invites our readers to bring themselves into the story and empowers them to take our narratives personally.