Small Steps to Big Success with Bardsy Anthologies
Transform your writing, one email at a time
Nov-14 - Member Spotlight
Silence That Speaks Volumes, with Nicholas Darmody
Oct-03 - Contest
Why You Should Enter Our Holiday Anthology Contest
Sep-07 - Your Process
Fall Is Your Season to Succeed—With Our Free Success Plan
Aug-22 - Your Process
Persona Recap and Something Special Coming Soon
Aug-15 - Your Process
What's Your Persona 5: The Final Three
Aug-08 - Your Process
What's Your Persona 4: Sending a Message
Aug-03 - Your Process
What's Your Persona 3: Pat or Pretender?
Jul-25 - Your Process
What's Your Persona 2: Motivation to the Max
Jul-05 - Your Process
What's Your Persona 1: Do you want to write better?
Jun-15 - Try This
You’ll Love Writing with Will.Power
Jun-08 - Contest
Submit Early for Success
May-24 - Member Spotlight
Metaphorically Speaking, with Gideon Garcia
May-18 - Contest
Max your chances with our Publishability Index
May-10 - Try This
Determine the Next Step in Your Writing
May-04 - Try This
Break Through Your Blocks with Will.Power
Apr-13 - Try This
Idea Today, Novel Tomorrow
Mar-24 - Contest
Avoid Instant Disqualification
Mar-18 - Member Spotlight
The Fight of a Lifetime
Mar-09 - Try This
The Power of Naming
Feb-22 - Contest
Turn Your Contest Entry Into a Winner
Feb-02 - Writing Romance
Love, Sex and Happy Endings
Jan-26 - Writing Romance
Out-Of-This-World Storyworlds
Jan-19 - Writing Romance
Creating Characters You’d Like to Be
Jan-13 - Writing Romance
Plot Your Way to Romance
Jan-05 - Try This
Three Writing Tools to Get You Going This Year
Dec-14 - Try This
Give and Ye Shall Receive
Dec-08 - Member Spotlight
From Aspiring Writer to Contest Winner!
Dec-01 - Try This
Story Development: Take This Next Critical Step
Nov-22 - Try This
Three Minutes to Start Your Holiday
Nov-17 - Contest
Announcing Our Holiday Anthology Contest
Nov-08 - Try This
Turn Your Short Story Into a Novel
Oct-21 - Try This
Revise Your Story Into a Masterpiece
Oct-20 - Try This
End Your Story with a Bang
Oct-13 - Try This
Five Tips for Actually Finishing a First Draft
Oct-04 - Try This
How to Turn Your Idea Into a Story
Sep-22 - Try This
A Winning Plan For NaNoWriMo!
Sep-16 - Try This
Chasing Inspiration with a Club
Sep-11 - Try This
Three Ways to Stop Sabotaging Your Writing
Sep-01 -
Are You Ready For Success?
Aug-25 - Try This
What Did You Say?
Aug-20 - Try This
A Little Subversion Will Do Your Trope Good
Aug-11 - Try This
Why You Should Add Romance to Your Story
Aug-04 - Try This
Grading Loki and Sylvie’s Relationship
Jul-23 - Member Spotlight
Cupcake Antics
Jul-20 - Try This
You Should Take Advantage of Romance's Popularity
Jul-06 - Try This
How Bardsy's Writing Contests Are Unique
Jun-29 - Try This
How to Get Your Book Published
Jun-25 - Member Spotlight
A Serpentine Midsummer Night Dream
Jun-21 - Try This
Take This Tip Alliteratively
Jun-16 - Member Spotlight
Paradise Found
Jun-15 - Try This
Show and Tell for Adults
Jun-09 - Member Spotlight
Defying Gravity
Jun-04 - Member Spotlight
A Stitch in Time - Literally!
Jun-01 - Try This
What the greatest openings say to you
May-28 - Member Spotlight
A Hitchhiking Cow's Guide to the Universe
May-25 - Try This
Risky Business
May-24 - Member Spotlight
A Story of Chance and Romance
Contest - Jun 22, 2022
Take your first step by submitting to our anthology contest.
Very few writers publish their first short story in the New Yorker or land
an agent for their debut novel on that initial query letter. Success,
however you define it, just doesn’t happen overnight. You know that
intellectually, even if you dream of a six-figure book deal or self-published memoir that rocks the world.
Instead, writing success is a product of many steps, in terms of both the
craft itself and the quest for publication. Sometimes it’s difficult to know
just where to start.
Even legendary literary figures have had to work their way up. William
Faulkner had his first short story, “Landing in Luck,” published in an
undergraduate university magazine, the Mississippian. Zora Neale
Hurston’s initial piece, “John Redding Goes to Sea,” appeared in Stylus.
The writing world is bursting with opportunities to be published. Some of
them are renowned publications, with acceptance rates only a hair
above 0%. And while I always encourage writers to aim for their dream
publications, low chances of acceptance can leave even the best
among us feeling discouraged.
What you need is a foothold, a small-scale win that paves the way for
bigger ones down the road.
In my blog last week, I mentioned the value of breaking a larger goal
down into smaller, manageable tasks, as it pertains to writing a story.
That same idea can be applied to your overall journey as a writer.
A story published in one of our anthologies can be an excellent first
step.
We publish every contest finalist’s story in our anthology. Bardsy may be
the first step you need to succeed.
I spoke recently with one of our former contest winners, who told me
exactly that. Author Beri Balistreri says she hadn’t been writing for a
while when our Golden Pineapple contest came along. She entered it on
a whim and won! That win motivated her to get back into the game,
and she had several pieces published as a result. You must read her
story, "Silence Is Golden (And Paradise)," here.
Become a Published Writer with Bardsy
[On getting published:] I feel like a 1940s teenager at a Frank Sinatra concert!
— Katrina D. Miller
It feels amazing to say you are a published writer—in fact, I still pinch
myself! With our anthologies, it’s possible for you too.
We pride ourselves on producing a collection of well-written stories with
sharp prose and salient themes, but unlike the New
Yorker or Ploughshares, we emphasize promise, not perfection.
We work diligently with the authors of the most promising stories
submitted to our contests, to help them polish their work before we
make any final decisions. And by the way, being able to work with an
editor will be key to YOUR success regardless of where your work ends
up.
You don’t have to submit a story that scores a 100% on our Publishability
Index, in order to catch our eye, but don’t think we will be swept away by
your genius in spite of typos and glaring grammar issues. Carelessness
is universally off-putting in the publishing world. Just send us a great
story, then make it even better if you are encouraged to do so. Always,
always, always put in 110%.
Once you’re published with us, the benefits accrue in more ways than
one. First, publication by a legitimate press helps to establish you as a
writer. Make sure to include previous publication in Bardsy in your query
or CV. This demonstrates that others have found merit in your work,
which could help nudge an agent or editor into requesting a full
manuscript.
Publication also helps you build your audience. With both print and
ebook formats available, our anthologies provide an opportunity to
grow your readership. Include links to your published work on your
website (remember, if you’re an Elite member, we give you your own
author website), and social media.
I know that writing can be a long, sometimes lonely process, where
rejection grows like weeds. Publication is a tall glass of encouragement
that can motivate you to keep going.
From a Short Story to a Novel
A short story is a photograph; a novel is a film.
― Lorrie Moore
Writing a novel can be scary. Writing a novel without having written a
short story can be even scarier.
I encourage every aspiring novelist to write a short story first. This allows
you to get a feel for the process of creating a story from beginning to
end, with all the necessary elements.
Short stories provide a finite space, ideal for practicing your skills and
honing your craft. You can write a story in a day, rather than months or
years, and evaluate it to see how you can improve. As Alex Award and
Shirley Jackson Award winner Kevin Wilson says:
I learned how to write by working in the short story form. It seemed an
ideal way to figure out craft, because it offered great rewards without
the soul-shattering grief of spending five years working on a novel that
sucks. If I spent a month or two working on a story and it was bad, then
I didn't feel like I'd ruined my life. So I wrote a lot of stories and tried to
improve and, little by little, I did.
This advice is especially true of our current Character Anthology
contest. The prompt is to write a short story that features a character
worthy of a novel.
You could create, for example, a compelling narrative from a defining
moment in their backstory, an out-of-character action that
foreshadows a key conflict or an important or problematic relationship
that constrains or empowers them.
Whichever direction you choose, you will be better positioned to write
your novel once you’ve written a few thousand words focused on a
compelling main character. When you’re ready to tackle your novel,
you’ll hit the ground running.
The deadline for our Character Anthology contest is this Sunday, June
26. Take the first step to success and submit your story. Enter here.
CLICK A TAB TO USE WILL.POWER
TO DO LIST:
Add tasks to your sortable list, then revel in checking them off.
SCRATCHPAD:
Cache your gems as the fall in this always accessible place.
PRIVATE JOURNAL:
Reflect on your process — good, bad and ugly — in your dated diary.
TRACKING:
Measure your progress with key writing metrics, automatically,
TO DO LIST:
Add tasks to your sortable list, then revel in checking them off.
SCRATCHPAD:
Cache your gems as the fall in this always accessible place.
PRIVATE JOURNAL:
Reflect on your process — good, bad and ugly — in your dated diary.
TRACKING:
Measure your progress with key writing metrics, automatically,
ADD DO
Show Dones
Metric:
ADD
Words
Minutes
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