Thanks to a few good friends who understand these things a whole lot better than I do, I just learned that you don’t have to own a Kindle to read an excerpt from Running Secrets and to write a customer review on www.amazon.com books. That’s good news since nobody I know has a Kindle and because the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award is one really weird contest... a bit like American Idol for books!
Here’s how it works… they accepted 5,000 general literature submissions. 1000 moved to the Second Round. Then 250 Quarterfinalists were chosen (my first novel, Running Secrets, has made it this far – yeah!). Now the complete manuscripts of those 250 are being reviewed by Publishers Weekly (the magazine that can make or break a book!) and they choose 100 semifinalists. Of those 100 (and I won’t know if I make this next cut until the end of the month), editors from Penguin publishing will choose 6 finalists.
You can go on-line to read the two Amazon.com Reviews and a Production Description. You can also access a short-short excerpt and write review “providing feedback to the Penguin Editors about the submissions.” They only give you the first page of the manuscript, but at least it’s free! I suppose they figure that’s all most agents or editors will read, so it’s enough. If it gets the reader’s attention, that’s what matters. And here’s the good part… as I mentioned above you don’t have to own a Kindle to submit a customer review. There’s a really simple way to download Kindle software to your PC (not MAC, I’m afraid). Just click on “Available on Your PC” right there in the right column next to the book info. I did it last night and if I can do it, anybody can!
Of those 6 finalists that the Penguin editors will select, only 1 manuscript is chosen for publication. Amazon customers will choose the winning manuscript through on-line voting!! The winning manuscript will be published by Penguin books. It does sound a bit like American Idol, doesn’t it?
Anyway, if you’d like to help me get my first novel published, or if you just want to see what I’ve been up to lately, please check it out at www.amazon.com books. Just type in my name or Running Secrets. And, of course, I’d love it if you’d write a review!
Friday, April 2, 2010
Thursday, April 1, 2010
Amazon Breakthrough Novel Contest
Some exciting news today!
I just learned that my first novel, Running Secrets, has been selected as one of the 250 quarterfinalists in the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Contest. As a quarterfinalist, the full manuscript will be reviewed by Publishers Weekly. The Top 100 Semifinalists, to be announced on April 27th, will be read by Penguin editors who select the 6 finalists.
Are any of you Kindle readers? According to the contest guidelines: “Amazon customers can download, rate, and review excerpts on Amazon.com, providing feedback to Penguin Editors about submissions.”
So if you go to www.amazon.com books and type in Running Secrets - Kindle, this is what it looks like (or you can just click on the Running Secrets link below):
Running Secrets - Excerpt from 2010 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award entry by Arleen Williams (Kindle Edition - Mar. 23, 2010) - Kindle Book
Buy: $0.00
I’d really love to get some reviews… especially if they’re good!
I just learned that my first novel, Running Secrets, has been selected as one of the 250 quarterfinalists in the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Contest. As a quarterfinalist, the full manuscript will be reviewed by Publishers Weekly. The Top 100 Semifinalists, to be announced on April 27th, will be read by Penguin editors who select the 6 finalists.
Are any of you Kindle readers? According to the contest guidelines: “Amazon customers can download, rate, and review excerpts on Amazon.com, providing feedback to Penguin Editors about submissions.”
So if you go to www.amazon.com books and type in Running Secrets - Kindle, this is what it looks like (or you can just click on the Running Secrets link below):
Running Secrets - Excerpt from 2010 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award entry by Arleen Williams (Kindle Edition - Mar. 23, 2010) - Kindle Book
Buy: $0.00
I’d really love to get some reviews… especially if they’re good!
Saturday, March 6, 2010
Juggling
Do you ever feel that life is just one big juggling act? I sure do. Like many of you, I find myself juggling family and friends, work and writing. Within each of the areas of our lives, there seems to be an endless number and variety of balls that we're trying to keep in the air at any given moment, on any particular day. When I began this blog, I intended to update it monthly. Somehow I dropped the month of February.
A friend once suggested the importance of determining which of the balls we juggle each day are made of crystal and which are just plain rubber. If we drop a rubber ball, no harm is done. It bounces and rolls. We can retrieve it if we choose or let it roll into a corner or under the sofa and just leave it there for a while, for that day when we're taking stock, when we collect all the balls and reassess their value, their texture, their importance in our lives. But the crystal balls are different. The crystal balls shatter if dropped. A million tiny shards. Gathering those shards, a dangerous, impossible task. Reconstructing the ball, an unthinkable challenge. The crystal balls must never be dropped. They must be treated with gentle care and deep respect. Polished and cherished. Freed of the mars of daily juggling.
Now, when life seems to be racing out of control on a blind collision course, I stomp on the brakes, slow down, stop. I gather my juggling balls, some from the corners where they've rolled, others from their boxes. Some of these boxes are made of simple cardboard, nothing more than deli food containers. Inconsequential, disposable. Others are finely crafted beauties of stained glass, pressed silver or fragrant cedar, each lined with deep, rich velvet of varying hues. I line up the juggling balls, both rubber and crystal, on the table in front of me. A row of balls. Another of boxes. And I begin another kind of juggling act. I examine each ball, assessing its weight and texture, its value in my life.
Some balls have always been, and will always remain, cherished crystal. These retain their precious boxes with velvet lining. Others are rubber, nothing more, a lifetime of rubber. But I usually find that some of the balls have mysteriously transformed, magically changed from rubber to crystal, and others from crystal to rubber through the passing months and years. I must recognize and respect these changes. Should I fail, I could carelessly drop a crystal ball, mistaken for simple rubber.
A friend once suggested the importance of determining which of the balls we juggle each day are made of crystal and which are just plain rubber. If we drop a rubber ball, no harm is done. It bounces and rolls. We can retrieve it if we choose or let it roll into a corner or under the sofa and just leave it there for a while, for that day when we're taking stock, when we collect all the balls and reassess their value, their texture, their importance in our lives. But the crystal balls are different. The crystal balls shatter if dropped. A million tiny shards. Gathering those shards, a dangerous, impossible task. Reconstructing the ball, an unthinkable challenge. The crystal balls must never be dropped. They must be treated with gentle care and deep respect. Polished and cherished. Freed of the mars of daily juggling.
Now, when life seems to be racing out of control on a blind collision course, I stomp on the brakes, slow down, stop. I gather my juggling balls, some from the corners where they've rolled, others from their boxes. Some of these boxes are made of simple cardboard, nothing more than deli food containers. Inconsequential, disposable. Others are finely crafted beauties of stained glass, pressed silver or fragrant cedar, each lined with deep, rich velvet of varying hues. I line up the juggling balls, both rubber and crystal, on the table in front of me. A row of balls. Another of boxes. And I begin another kind of juggling act. I examine each ball, assessing its weight and texture, its value in my life.
Some balls have always been, and will always remain, cherished crystal. These retain their precious boxes with velvet lining. Others are rubber, nothing more, a lifetime of rubber. But I usually find that some of the balls have mysteriously transformed, magically changed from rubber to crystal, and others from crystal to rubber through the passing months and years. I must recognize and respect these changes. Should I fail, I could carelessly drop a crystal ball, mistaken for simple rubber.
Friday, January 29, 2010
Curriculum Writing
There are many kinds of writing, and many writers do more than one. I write both memoir and fiction, both manuscript length and short pieces. I also write curriculum.
For the past year and a half, I have had the pleasure of working with a wonderful group of creative, fun people at South Seattle Community College (SSCC). We call ourselves the AANAPISI grant team. That’s “ay-na-pea-z” and it’s the acronym for Asian American Native American Pacific Islander Serving Institution. In 2008 the U.S. Department of Education created this designation, and SSCC was one of only six two-year and four-year schools in the United States to receive this award. To learn more, please visit our temporary website at www.successatsouth.org or go to www.southseattle.edu.
So what does any of this have to do with writing, you might ask. Well, my role on the grant team is to write curriculum. With the collaboration of numerous colleagues, I have created the Transition Portfolio. This is a collection of activities designed to help English as a Second Language, Adult Basic Education, and other pre-college students learn to navigate the American college system. The Transition Portfolio is available on-line, free-of-charge at www.successatsouth.org. Just click on “Resources.”
Another of our AANAPISI grant projects involves creating a series of short videos to provide college-related information to students or potential students and their families. As the curriculum writer, my task is to create instructional materials for classroom use with each video. The videos are being posted to the website as they are completed. The the curriculum packets will follow by summer 2010.
Just as creativity takes many forms, so does writing. The challenge sometimes lies in finding a way to balance it all.
For the past year and a half, I have had the pleasure of working with a wonderful group of creative, fun people at South Seattle Community College (SSCC). We call ourselves the AANAPISI grant team. That’s “ay-na-pea-z” and it’s the acronym for Asian American Native American Pacific Islander Serving Institution. In 2008 the U.S. Department of Education created this designation, and SSCC was one of only six two-year and four-year schools in the United States to receive this award. To learn more, please visit our temporary website at www.successatsouth.org or go to www.southseattle.edu.
So what does any of this have to do with writing, you might ask. Well, my role on the grant team is to write curriculum. With the collaboration of numerous colleagues, I have created the Transition Portfolio. This is a collection of activities designed to help English as a Second Language, Adult Basic Education, and other pre-college students learn to navigate the American college system. The Transition Portfolio is available on-line, free-of-charge at www.successatsouth.org. Just click on “Resources.”
Another of our AANAPISI grant projects involves creating a series of short videos to provide college-related information to students or potential students and their families. As the curriculum writer, my task is to create instructional materials for classroom use with each video. The videos are being posted to the website as they are completed. The the curriculum packets will follow by summer 2010.
Just as creativity takes many forms, so does writing. The challenge sometimes lies in finding a way to balance it all.
Saturday, January 9, 2010
It's About Time Writers Reading Series
Happy 2010! We've survived the holiday season, and now it's time to get back to what matters...writing! I find I need structure. I need a schedule. And I need the opportunity to share my work...
If you're in the Seattle area, I'd like to invite you to a group reading at the Ballard Public Library at 6:00 p.m. on Thursday, January 14th. The It's About Time Writers Reading Series, coordinated by Esther Altshul Helfgott, is now on Facebook. For more information and regular updates, you might consider joining the Facebook group by going to www.facebook.com. For information on past readings, you can check out http://itsaboutimewriters.homestead.com/.
January seems like the perfect time to share a bit of the old and a bit of the new. To that end, I'll be reading a short selection from The Thirty-Ninth Victim and another from my work-in-progress, a memoir carrying the working title, Moving Mom. It's the story chronicling the 7 years and 6 days between my father's death and my mother's move to a dementia care facility. It took an astute writing partner of mine to point out to me that Moving Mom picks up where The Thirty-Ninth Victim left off. Funny how we (or should I say "I") so easily miss what's right under our (my) nose. Or in this case, pen.
I hope to see you Thursday night!
Sunday, December 6, 2009
The Supermarket
I'm happy to share a new memoir piece, recently published in Crosscurrents, the annual literary publication of the Washington Community College Humanities Association. Because this publication has limited distribution, and because this edition is not yet on-line, I've decided to share the piece here. To learn more about WCCHA, please go to www.wccha.org.
The Supermarket
The supermarket was shiny – newer, bigger, fancier than anything my sleepy hometown had ever seen. A farm girl, I knew little of supermarkets. With nine kids, Mom shopped alone whenever possible. How could a woman shop with nine kids trailing behind? We’d fill a whole aisle, even one of the long aisles in the new supermarket. No, I rarely went shopping with Mom. But now that I was in junior high school, I could walk down the hill after school to the new supermarket off Front Street to wait for a ride home with Dad on those days when I stayed late.
I loved the new supermarket. The bright lights and colorful packaging. It was clean and neat and full of abundance. On cold winter days, I was pulled towards the delicious aroma of the bakery, pretending I was in the kitchen at home and Mom was baking cookies just for me. On warm spring afternoons, I wandered the frozen food section, dreaming of huge ice cream sundaes with thick chocolate syrup and peanuts on top.
It was late spring. School was almost out and my afternoons of exploring the long aisles of the supermarket would soon end for the summer. Living eight miles from town, summers were spent doing farm chores or playing in the woods. Trips to town were rare in the summer. Only for church on Sunday, and those trips didn’t involve a stop at the supermarket.
I was alone, walking up and down the long aisles, my long dark hair in what Dad called squaw braids, large coke-bottle glasses weighing my nose, so tall and skinny my older siblings called me String Bean. My ill-fitted hand-me-down clothes hung off my scarecrow body – high water pants and a baggy T-shirt. To the eyes of the supermarket manager, I suppose I looked needy, hungry, and in my shyness, a bit shifty.
I had no backpack. Kids in the sixties didn’t carry backpacks. I carried a paper grocery bag full of library books and homework assignments. A sweatshirt stuffed in on top.
“You there. Stop right there.”
I heard a harsh male voice. It was a voice I didn’t recognize, so I ignored it, intent on my dreamy wanderings, reading labels, trying to figure out what all these strange and exciting items stacked high above me on each side of the aisle could possibly be used for.
“Hey, you there. I told you to stop.”
Again, the voice. Then a hand. A hard, tight hand on my shoulder spinning me around.
“Come with me, young lady.”
The man released his hard grip on my shoulder, and I followed him in obedient silence to the front of the store. I’d been taught to obey authority. Adults were authority. Especially big, tall men with loud, harsh voices and strong hands.
The man stopped near a cash register at the front of the supermarket. “Now young lady, what have you put in that bag?”
I was stunned. It was one thing to be ordered around by the store manager. It was a totally different thing to be called a thief, and despite my silence, I was smart enough to know who this man with the name tag pinned to his broad chest was and what he was calling me.
I broke my silence. “I haven’t put anything in my bag.”
“What’s in it then?” he demanded.
“Just my school stuff.”
“Show me.”
I couldn’t believe it. I heard the words, but I didn’t understand, and I didn’t react. The next thing I knew, the store manager pulled my bag from my arms and dumped the contents on the checkout counter. I watched in silence, willing myself not to cry as I felt the curious eyes of strangers watching the show. With all my might I prayed to be invisible, to disappear. I prayed that nobody would recognize me. In such a small town, that was a mighty prayer.
The store manager fingered through my books, notebooks, pencils and sweatshirt. Finally, satisfied that there was nothing of any worth there, no unpaid for candy bars or gum, nothing that I had shoplifted, he shoveled it back into the torn bag and pushed it into my arms.
“Okay, it’s clean. But don’t you be wandering around in here, young lady. We don’t take kindly to shoplifters.”
I could only look into his dark angry eyes. Words wouldn’t come. I couldn’t defend myself against this bully. At the very least, I knew he owed me an apology, and I knew just as clearly that I would never get one. So, I hurried out the sliding glass front door of the new supermarket and sat on the curb waiting for my ride home, tears of anger and frustration streaming down my young face.
The Supermarket
The supermarket was shiny – newer, bigger, fancier than anything my sleepy hometown had ever seen. A farm girl, I knew little of supermarkets. With nine kids, Mom shopped alone whenever possible. How could a woman shop with nine kids trailing behind? We’d fill a whole aisle, even one of the long aisles in the new supermarket. No, I rarely went shopping with Mom. But now that I was in junior high school, I could walk down the hill after school to the new supermarket off Front Street to wait for a ride home with Dad on those days when I stayed late.
I loved the new supermarket. The bright lights and colorful packaging. It was clean and neat and full of abundance. On cold winter days, I was pulled towards the delicious aroma of the bakery, pretending I was in the kitchen at home and Mom was baking cookies just for me. On warm spring afternoons, I wandered the frozen food section, dreaming of huge ice cream sundaes with thick chocolate syrup and peanuts on top.
It was late spring. School was almost out and my afternoons of exploring the long aisles of the supermarket would soon end for the summer. Living eight miles from town, summers were spent doing farm chores or playing in the woods. Trips to town were rare in the summer. Only for church on Sunday, and those trips didn’t involve a stop at the supermarket.
I was alone, walking up and down the long aisles, my long dark hair in what Dad called squaw braids, large coke-bottle glasses weighing my nose, so tall and skinny my older siblings called me String Bean. My ill-fitted hand-me-down clothes hung off my scarecrow body – high water pants and a baggy T-shirt. To the eyes of the supermarket manager, I suppose I looked needy, hungry, and in my shyness, a bit shifty.
I had no backpack. Kids in the sixties didn’t carry backpacks. I carried a paper grocery bag full of library books and homework assignments. A sweatshirt stuffed in on top.
“You there. Stop right there.”
I heard a harsh male voice. It was a voice I didn’t recognize, so I ignored it, intent on my dreamy wanderings, reading labels, trying to figure out what all these strange and exciting items stacked high above me on each side of the aisle could possibly be used for.
“Hey, you there. I told you to stop.”
Again, the voice. Then a hand. A hard, tight hand on my shoulder spinning me around.
“Come with me, young lady.”
The man released his hard grip on my shoulder, and I followed him in obedient silence to the front of the store. I’d been taught to obey authority. Adults were authority. Especially big, tall men with loud, harsh voices and strong hands.
The man stopped near a cash register at the front of the supermarket. “Now young lady, what have you put in that bag?”
I was stunned. It was one thing to be ordered around by the store manager. It was a totally different thing to be called a thief, and despite my silence, I was smart enough to know who this man with the name tag pinned to his broad chest was and what he was calling me.
I broke my silence. “I haven’t put anything in my bag.”
“What’s in it then?” he demanded.
“Just my school stuff.”
“Show me.”
I couldn’t believe it. I heard the words, but I didn’t understand, and I didn’t react. The next thing I knew, the store manager pulled my bag from my arms and dumped the contents on the checkout counter. I watched in silence, willing myself not to cry as I felt the curious eyes of strangers watching the show. With all my might I prayed to be invisible, to disappear. I prayed that nobody would recognize me. In such a small town, that was a mighty prayer.
The store manager fingered through my books, notebooks, pencils and sweatshirt. Finally, satisfied that there was nothing of any worth there, no unpaid for candy bars or gum, nothing that I had shoplifted, he shoveled it back into the torn bag and pushed it into my arms.
“Okay, it’s clean. But don’t you be wandering around in here, young lady. We don’t take kindly to shoplifters.”
I could only look into his dark angry eyes. Words wouldn’t come. I couldn’t defend myself against this bully. At the very least, I knew he owed me an apology, and I knew just as clearly that I would never get one. So, I hurried out the sliding glass front door of the new supermarket and sat on the curb waiting for my ride home, tears of anger and frustration streaming down my young face.
Saturday, December 13, 2008
Author! Author! :: Anne Mini's Blog
On Dec. 13, 2008, Author! Author! :: Anne Mini's Blog featured a guest entry by Arleen Williams: Bringing a memoir to successful publication at an indie press. Williams writes: "How did a middle-aged straight woman get a memoir published by a small press with a lesbian fiction focus?
"This is a question I am often asked in one form or another. It’s a sort of how and why question, I suppose. So here’s the answer I tell readers and fellow writers alike: it took relentless determination and a whole lot of luck."
Read the entire blog entry…
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