Rejection slips and wearing your endurance on your sleeve

I was just reviewing an old folder with all my rejection slips going back to the 1980s. I got so many I had to start a second folder. Oh, I really don't think I recommend this journey down memory lane for anyone. It's making me want to jump off a cliff. All the frustration came rushing back up off those pages and smacked me hard, in the face.

This blog article is for those new writers who have never been published. But also for those who are still trying to get somewhere and thinking it will just never happen. I can think of three things you need for it "to happen". You have to have skill, perseverance and, action. Anyone can write. Pen to paper, move it in the form of letters, words, sentences. Put a few sentences together in a cohesive theme and you have a story. Come up with a unique "voice" and an unusual story, hit your right market (at the right time) and there you are, you've sold a story.

But in putting that all together just right and in having the Luck to hit it at just the right time; that is, get it to the right publisher at the right time when the have room and need it, especially if it is at its Zeitgeist; then you will have something happen.

One of those rejected stories of mine is now published in an anthology with other authors. Yet, it had rejection after rejection. Of course, I had brushed them up over the years and learned a lot and had become hopefully, a better writer. In some cases I was ahead of things. A story I couldn't sell in 1980 sold just fine in 1990. So sometimes, that has something to do with it. Being progressive, ahead of the times, is all fine and great, but being too far outside the scope of popular understanding can really work against you.

I once heard one of the most famous writers in American history say that you should start a hobby of collecting your rejection slips. Wallpaper your home office with them and when the wall fills, fill another. When the walls all fill, do the ceiling. When the office is full, start on another room. Fill your house if you have to. The point being I think, not to give up.

I put my heart into it. So, I started to just collect rejection slips with no thought to actually selling something. Therefore, I was no longer looking for an acceptance letter. I wanted a rejection slip. I have rejection slips from The Twilight Zone magazine, and others (see below). I started focusing my submissions on magazines I wanted to be rejected by. Of course, the hope was always to be accepted one day by one of them, but more importantly I needed to survive yet another rejection, and then go on to submit to another story, to most likely get another rejection.

As a writer you have to survive. Somehow. Tricking oneself, works.

All that being said, here are some of my favorite rejection slips....

Seriously, how could I NOT want to get a rejection slip from The Twilight Zone? "Dear Writer." At that point it became a "thing" to get a rejection slip with other than a form letter, with a personal inscription of some form on it.

Still a form letting, but so what? It was Playboy! I'm not sure there is really anything to really say about this one. What guy wouldn't want to have a story published in Playboy? As I remember it, stories went for $2,000, going up $1,000 each successive story sold. A great deal for a writer that got hooked up in that system. But it was an almost impossible market to break into.

Now this one is interesting. The short story they are rejecting there is now in an anthology published in 2010.

I remember when Omni started up. I have the first issue still, somewhere around here in a plastic cover. I would have loved to have had a story in Omni. But, I knew I didn't have a shot. As you can see, I was trying hard to get published but I was also making it a game. I LOOKED forward to getting a rejection slip from Playboy or Omni. That really went a long way toward buffering the rejections at magazines where I thought I had a chance and really wanted a story published there.

I would say I probably sent of 1 in 10 submissions where I knew I had no chance of getting accepted but you have to shoot for the stars sometimes because you never know when something might click, and you get a boost in status where maybe you shouldn't have. We have to "pay our dues" but what's wrong with jumping a rung on the ladder here and there? Right?

This one would have just been cool. I thought I had a chance and I was kind of sad about this rejection, but then, as I put it in my folder with the others, I felt good in having one from them and now I knew what their rejection slips looked like. Not everyone could say that, could they?

Analog is another one that would have lead to a big party, had I gotten other than a rejection slip from them.

Don't you love that? "Dear Writer." So personal. Makes you feel all warm and ugly inside. I mention this particular rejection slip for a good reason. No matter how hard I tried, I would still from time to time, run into a magazine that had gone dead after I found information about them, or sometimes, way before I had found them but my information was, for whatever reason, completely out of date. I remember at least one instance where someone told me I should submit and when I did, I got a nasty letter back saying they were no longer in publication. Hey, you takes your shots.

So yes, sometimes I got chastised by the editor for bothering them when I had sent them a story and they were no longer publishing, or it was just the wrong genre. Or as in one case, they had gone out of business and even when they were publishing, had only published non-fiction. That one really was my fault and a complete waste of time. Of course, even though it was only a few stamps and an envelope or two envelopes actually (an SASE for a return of my story), it was a waste nonetheless.

I found that in the end that you do the best you can and you simply never give up. Not completely, anyway. From time to time you have to bolster your ego, boost up your energy and take another full contact attempt at it. It is a long term marathon kind of endeavor and by no ways a sprint. The efforts can come in waves of productivity. Some people misinterpret that and quit. Don't. If you find you've slacked off, ask yourself, "why?" If' it's because it all seems useless and pointless, look at why you feel that way, reorient yourself, get up some steam and hit it full force again. Then just do that, over and over and over and--

Presently, we have many more options open to us as writers than I did when I received those rejections above. I suggest you find what those are now if you want to get published. Resources are everywhere online now. Use all of them. If you do, you will get published somewhere, eventually. Just keep going.

Under those circumstances, you almost can't avoid it.

Does your TV show run a minute longer now?

Have you noticed that lately some TV shows are running just a minute over their normal thirty or sixty minutes time slots? If you have noticed, have you wondered why? Did you think, "Oh, awesome. An extra minute of my favorite TV show!"

First of all, are you actually getting an extra minute of your TV show? Or are you getting an extra minute of advertising? Do you use Tivo or a DVR to record your shows? Do you ever record two shows when one is on a different channel and one is running a minute long? It is really annoying. Especially, if you are trying to record three different shows on two different stations. My HD DVR can record two separate stations at the same time. If some of you still have systems that can record only one station at a time, this may not be as interesting an article as it will be for others.

Some DVRs have a fix for this extra minute beyond the 30 or 60 minute show; it just "clips" a show for that minute. Excellent. Well, maybe. My old nonHD Tivo DVR does that. The one that is now in my bedroom. But my new, more expensive, main HD DirecTV Tivo DVR does not have that capability. One might wonder why, right? Wouldn't you think that the more expensive system would have the extra capabilities? I would too. Yet, it doesn't.

What does this extra minute being added to shows mean then?

I submit that it is just one more abuse heaped upon the viewer by the networks and the middle media suppliers like DirecTV. It's bad enough that we have the studios and networks, now we also have to contend with the middleman of cable and satellite providers. No, this is nothing new really, it's just that it got me really annoyed this past week. Why? Because it's happened before, and one has to assume that it will happen again; and probably get worse in ways we have yet to think up.

I don't know about you, but I'm tired of it. I'm sick to death of being abused by these companies internal issues. Last week I put on "House", one of my favorite TV shows and now in its last season. I sat down, turned on the recorded show on my DVR while it was still recording, and all I got was a static screen saying they are sorry but the FOX Network is to blame as they forced them to not carry their signal anymore due to lack of payment, or agreement, or something, and they (DirecTV) hoped it will end soon. After all it wasn't their fault, it was the fault of the big bad FOX Network. Right. Lovely.

I think back to when there was only the big three stations, ABC, NBC and CBS and this was something that would never have happened. Why? Because they had advertisers to answer to, they had the public to answer to. And back in those days, probably the FCC. If this happened back then, someone would be getting fired, or God knows, going to jail or something.

So what does this mean now? Maybe that they just don't have us all to answer to anymore? So, how is that?

All this diversity in having so many channels available now has not only given us more viewing options, it apparently has given the studios, networks and media providers more options, too. Like to act unprofessionally and treat their customers like lower class citizens. It would seem that we just don't matter that much, anymore.

So we now find ourselves at the beck and call of those who should be at the beck and call of we the public, the viewer, the ones who are really, in the end, footing the bill for all this nonsense. We should all remember that they, believe it or not, work for us, and not the other way around. It is the same thing with all corporations now a days and we need to realize that this kind of thought has even been seeping into our government.

We the general public, have allowed ourselves to be pampered into submission so that now we take pretty much anything that is offered to us. We grumble and then allow it. Well, Occupy the Networks, Occupy the Cable and Satellite carriers! We need to kick some digital signal carrying ass!

We really need to speak up. Obviously, the best thing would be for all of us to just cancel them. This situation would end, overnight. But let's face it, that will never happen. No more than that internet thing that floats around every so often saying that on some certain day, no one is going to buy gas from the oil companies. Right! Like that is going to happen.

Still, we can make some noise about it. And we should. But I have to tell you, exactly what that noise will be, I'm still trying to figure out. If you know what that is, well, we're all ears.

Anthology of Evil free ebook through Friday April 6, 2012

"Anthology of Evil" by JZ Murdock Free through Friday, April 6th, 2012.

I'm also happy to announce that I got a mention on the very cool Indies Unlimited Freebie Friday list of free ebooks!

I am offering my new ebook free through Friday, April 6th. This is a unique opportunity to read a collection of my short Horror and Sci Fi stories. This includes a favorite of actor Rutger Hauer, that he chose in an international writing contest he personally selected, “Poor Lord Ritchie”. Previous blogs of mine give more detail, but what do you have to lose?

Oh, yes I did.... This is the "proof" copy

The final story in the collection, “Andrew” is the prequel for my epic coming out later this month titled, “Death of Heaven”. Check it out.

 https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/146744

Controversy over Death of Heaven, my new book

This is similar but different, to my last blog article over the weekend about my new ebook having hit Smashwords and Amazon.

"Anthology of Evil" is of course, my collection of short Horror and Sci Fi stories. Look at my last article for the cover image. The proof just came in for the paperback version. Which is, awesome!

This time though I'm talking about my next book to come out, "Death of Heaven". Hopefully it will be out within a week or so. By the way, if you do read it and you had already read the Anthology, let's just say you will get an extra, added experience out of it all.

Now about "Death of Heaven". I'm pretty sure I am going to get some noise over it. I didn't intend for that to happen and I didn't even realize it might until I was more than half way through with the writing of it. At some point, and any author will tell you this, the characters can take on a life of their own, or the book just starts to write itself heading in a direction different from where you had planned to go. You then go where the story goes because telling a story that holds together, that maintains its conceit, is the main idea. Sometimes you don't like it, sometimes it's a real fun roller coaster ride.

What brings this all to mind is that today a reader of mine who is most of the way through the book now, warned me that this is probably going to get banned by some religious group or other. Well, isn't that special?

But that's not why I wrote it. I wrote it to entertain but also to supply a vastly different and more logical, speculative fiction story. That is to say Science Fiction and Horror in this case. An Alternative History of the entire Human Race; an explanation for everything we have believed up to this point that is radically different from whatever we had talked about before.

The name "Death of Heaven" actually made sense after it was written and so I named it that because it was so very appropriate. What will come after DOH (pun intended) gets published and read, only time will tell. Regardless of whatever ends up happening, it should certainly be interesting.

Feel free to stand by as specator as it would be an extra entertainment. One that could in the end open discussion and make people think, in Humankind's ongoing march toward lucidity, clarity and enlightenment, and away finally from the ironhold of the lunacy that it has been gripped in for thousands of years. If you find you agree in anyway feel free to speak up. Remember that it's not so important to preach to the choir, but to speak in the face of adversity offers the biggest chance at change and progress.

Of course, first we have to find people to read it. That is my problem to solve and something that I am working on. Also, we have to finalize the cover and we're working on that, too.

So, with all that being said there really is only one thing left to say:

Cheers!

Free Sci Fi ebook - Celebrating my new book coming out

My new ebook has hit Smashwords and will be available soon on Amazon once they have approved it.

"Anthology of Evil" is my collection of short Horror and Sci Fi. This is the final design of the front and back covers.

So in celebration for a short time I'm opening up for free, my currently available short story eBook, Simon's Beautiful Thought. If you haven't yet heard, it's about a guy who falls for his sixth generation cell phone digital assistant, after teaking it a bit. One day he takes her out for lunch (you have to read it to understand how that makes any sense), and from then on his life will never be the same.

Getting back to my Anthology, the titles are as follows, along with a few interesting pieces of information:

• In Memory, Yet Crystal Clear - Social Horror, a man turns himself into a computer chip to rule the world, or at least, the US
• Gumdrop City - Horror moves into the neighborhood
• Quantum History - How is it to wake and not feel quite yourself?
• The Mea Culpa Document - Life for a witch hunter in old England
• Poor Lord Ritchie's Answer (To A Question He Knever Knew") - Rich kids have it hard even in medieval times
• Sarah - psychological horror where Alzheimer's meets Geology
• The Fall - be careful who you allow to fall in love with you, not that you have a choice
• Japheth, Ishvi and the Light - The apocalypse hits a religious commune
• Andrew - what's it like to be five and see the most horrible thing in the world?

My next book to come out will be "Death of Heaven" and hopefully will be out within a week or so after the Anthology. By the way, if you do read it and you had read the Anthology, let's just say you will get an extra, added experience out of it all.

Cheers!

Head Medical Aurhority in British Columbia speaks out on marijuana war

Really, we need to stop being afraid of the unknown, as they were at the alcohol prohibition time, and make this work. She has some very good points in this statement. Fact has got to outweigh belief. Arianna Huffington said this week that she believes in God because she just knows it. Okay, fine but admit it, that does not work in government millions of people. Decisions have got to be made on fact and the facts here are that warring on one's own citizens, even in metaphor, is untenable and unsustainable. Grow up, stop it.

Oh, and when you're done reading this, check out medicalmarijuana.procon.org.
From the article:

Dr. Evan Wood, founder of Stop the Violence BC, said experts are advocating not for easier access to marijuana but for a regime whereby purchases and production are regulated and taxed. 

“If anyone takes a sober look at the current situation we’re in, it’s a totally unsustainable model. We could do a lot better job in terms of bending public resources in a way that would actually reduce crime and increase public health.

“There’s some bad irony that we’re expecting a federal budget that will make cuts to health and social services, yet billions of tax dollars will go to building prisons to lock up minor drug offenders.” 

The report is co-authored by British Columbia’s provincial health officer.

“Despite the fact that there’s a lot of social costs to illegal drug use, there’s also quite a gulf of evidence that shows what isn’t working with marijuana prohibition,” said Dr. Perry Kendall, the province’s top doctor. 

This report was published in Open Medicine journal and outlines the support from the public-health community for a new approach to these "drug wars" Finally, acknowledging the ineffectiveness of, and the great harm that has been caused by the war from national levels on its on citizenry about drugs.  

For the original article

Theists: "Well, I have Faith"

The woman in this video, brings up a good point. First of all, Faith or not, I would consider listen to anything she has to say. Second-- well, I'll let her explain: Hot woman in video talking about talking to a Theist who ends a discussion on religion by saying, "Well, I have Faith," as a way to explain away any thought to questioning if they should be having "Faith" in the first place. Okay, you don't really have to watch the video. I just thought it was a very pleasant video to watch. I mean, to listen to.

The point here is, when you are having a discussion with a Theist, someone who believes in God, or religion (typically, their own religion), and especially if you think you are making a very logical argument against Theism and they hit a wall so that their final response is, "Well, I just have Faith", that does not have to end your argument; as they are hoping, wishing, and praying it will end and you will leave them alone and not question them any further, because you just might "shake" their "faith". And I use a little "f" here on faith because if your "Faith" can be shaken, what the Hell good is it?

Here's the thing....

If you believe in something, you had better understand it well enough that you can find solid ground in believing it. "Faith" in something requires that you have at least a fundemental basis in believing it. Saying that "someone told me and so I believe", or "I believe because my parents taught it to me as a child", are actually reasons NOT to have faith in something.

Furthermore, if you are going to have Faith in anything, you had best check it out beyond simply hearing about it and believing it. Otherwise, you are really kind of a fool, don't you think? And I don't really think any "God" wants fools for believers. Maybe the "Meek" but where does it say anywhere that the Meek are also fools? Where does it say anywhere that "God" goes through all this merely to claim a bunch of weakminded people who do not check anything against anything substantive, in order to "believe" that they will reap rewards in the "afterlife", by doing whatever random thing they are told or taught to believe by others who have been randomly told or taught what to believe by still others?

Now, you can say if you like that people who belive in science are doing exactly the same thing, but they are not. In science you can look at actual physical evidence to prove a point and logic follows. In religion, you are following the "physical evidence" of the written word and religious pundits.

Look, I'm a writer. I write "Speculative Fiction". I take a premise and write fiction from that point on. My writings make more sense than the Bible does. Now don't fly off the handle on that, my writer's are more focused and thought out. Even most Theists should see that is true. The writer's of the Bible were guided by no more than I am: a belief in what is being said, making sense. But, much of what the Bible says simply doesn't make any sense. And I don't pass my works off as non-fiction. I'm sure those people in the past who wrote the Bible meant well, but perhaps were just misguided. On the other hand, they were tasked to do it and people died over it in the end, not to mention "book burnings". It could also have been a situation where it simply worked for them then. But sometimes you do something that is good for now, but 1,000 years from "now", it can become quite destructive.

So, the next time you are in a discussion, a debate on religion and suddenly the other person tries to end it by saying, "Well, I just have Faith" as if that is the end all be all, simply ask them to prove that "Faith" by explaining how what they believe in, makes any sense beyond their having that "Faith". And no, you really cannot go simply back to the Bible to prove what you believe.

Here is another video on research that was done. Ask yourself, why it is that Atheists have more knowledge about religion than Theists do about their own beliefs? Actually you need to ask the opposite question. Who in their right mind would have "Faith" in something, when they don't even know what it is that they are really having "Faith" in? It's scary, really. Terrifying, in some cases.

Another interesting video is by Ajahn Brahm about Buddhism and Atheism and gives examples of situations where a belief in a God actually leads people to make choices they should know are not good but they proceed anyway because they believe that they are expected to, by their "God".

People are voting for political reasons in a way to support what they believe, what they have "Faith" in. They are putting it to the real world test. They are bringing their Theists beliefs into the secular world. Secular because it is in a forum that includes others not of their "Faith" or at times, not of any Theist Faith at all. It would be like my believing in some bizarre sexual lifestyle and wanting to vote that way so that you end up having to live some elements of that. I'm not comparing Theism to sexualism or perversion (well? Uh, no, perhaps not....), I'm pointing out how wrong that would be, to try and bring others into whatever that sick fantasy might be. And no, I don't live a sick fantasy. You can have "Faith" on that.

The point is, in my own examination of what Theists believe toward their having their "Faith" has been much in the same with what they talk about in the video of having found out in the public of today. Many people are simply clueless about what their "Faith" actually entails. At times, believing in total nonsense that even educated Theists within their own "Faith" know to be wrong. So what does that say about all this Right Wing Conservative Political talk on what is "Right" and "Wrong" and what "God" wants of them?

We have masses of people trying to change our country and in some cases the world, based on beliefs of an arcane and somewhat insane fantasy.

If you are going to have "Faith" in anything, Ladies and Gentlemen, PLEASE, at least learn what that Faith is all about. Then, dig even deeper, find out where that information came from. Then keep digging, because you will find what I have found, that it is on a foundation metaphorically based in a "desert of sand during an earthquake". It is a shaky foundation that begins to be lost quickly once put under the bright light of examination.

And that does not make it a "sin" in "God's" eyes. Because to examine your beliefs, your "Faith" better assures you are believing in what your religion desires for you to believe in. Do you realize how many people are out there beliving in total nonsense within their own religion? Quite a lot!

My own Catholic mother years ago was telling me some total nonsense about Catholicism. I asked, where did you learn THAT? She said, "My parents taught me that and I belive them. I have 'Faith'." I couldn't believe it. Then one day a couple of weeks later, we had our Parish Priest over for lunch and this topic came up. He looked at her and I waited to hear who was right, her, or logic and the teachings of the Catholic Church. Trying to hide his being stunned, he said,"Who told you that?" She hesitated. He continued, "Because that is not what our religion teaches, that is not what the Catholic Church tells us. It is completely incorrect." Boom! She had to change her belief. Not that it evoked any fundemental changes in her belief, her Faith.

This was from one of the people in a religion who should know. He was a vibrant, intelligent, educated Priest, not some doddering ancient old fool who is loosing his mind, and there are plenty of them in religion. There are also plenty of fools in religion talking total nonsense. I mean really, there is nothing that complicated about archelology. It's not "Magic". You dig down through layers of dirt and you do essentially go back in time to see what was what. Dinosauers did not live with man or exist a few thousand years ago.

If that is not true and functional then what? "God" is lying to you on purpose? Does THAT make sense to you? The ancient Greeks and Romans used to think their "Gods" were like that, playing Humankind for fools as pawns upon a chessboard of sorts, abusing us for their own amusment. If that is the case, then we are lost and might as well give up now.

So, the next time a Theist tries to end an argument with "Well, I just have Faith," don't let them get away with that cheap shot. Ask them, "what exactly is it that you have faith in?" Give them a chance to convert you. It won't happen. Trust me.