In Make a Real Living as a Freelance Writer: How to Win Top Writing Assignments (Nomad Press, 2004), writer Jenna Glatzer, who is Editor-in-Chief of absolutewrite.com, may insult some of us in her early chapters as she offers tips on blazing trails toward magazine article publishing, but by Chapter Six, her book is of real value, even to those she seems at first to be excluding.

For example, in Chapter One, “Setting the Stage,” she addresses treating writing as a business:

Writers who think themselves “artists” should probably stick to poetry and diary entries.  If you intend to sell what you write, and to make a living from it, you need to convey an image that does not jell with the eccentric, tortured, starving artist cliché.  You need to become a businessperson.

Although Glatzer doesn’t seem to realize that most of us who write poetry and keep journals are fully employed in and outside our homes and are busy rather than tortured, those of us who write from our personal experience will find her tips valuable.  She helps her readers develop publishable articles by mining their daily experience for topics of interest from alarm clocks disrupting valuable sleep cycles to teaching kids table manners,

Glatzer explains the difference between writing for print markets (newspapers and consumer and trade magazines) and writing for web markets (largely e-zines), and she addresses the use of writer’s market guides, offering many online sites to investigate such as Absolutemarkets.com, writerscrossing.com, writing-world.com, and fundsforwriters.com.  She also explains other avenues for writing for pay, including writing advertising, press releases, media kits, manuals, and more.

 If you want to write for consumer magazines, you’d better understand the mindset of editors and certain lingo, Glatzer instructs. Know that in magazine publishing, editors talk about the front of the book (FOB), feature well (middle of the book), and back of the book (BOB).  To be effective with editors, you need to know what kinds of articles go where and how to assess the areas where newcomers can most easily break in.  Glatzer reveals the specifics.

About the essay market, Glatzer asserts that the competition is high since everyone wants to write essays because they require no research and feel more like creative writing.  I take this as a possible admission that the freelance business is not so completely satisfying that the business-like writer doesn’t need a return to self.  Here Glatzer writes:

Sometimes it’s not the biggest experiences in our lives that make great essays; sometimes it’s the little stuff.  An essay about my dear, departed grandmother and what she meant to me would probably not sell, and yet, the Christian Science Monitor just ran an essay called, “The Catch of the Day Lurked Behind the Refrigerator” by Richard Sorenson, in which he describes how a home-grown orange fell behind his refrigerator and how he worked to rescue it from the “dust weasels.

Although I am aghast at perception that essayists are told they cannot write about their grandmothers in a way that moves and entertains others, I do believe Glatzer offers important words on today’s essay market:

Happily there’s an upward trend in the use of personal stories in major magazines these days.  Perhaps editors have … recognized the need for more warm, personal, uplifting, and fun material during a tough time of war and economic recession.  Perhaps they’ve noticed how much reader feedback they receive on these personal stories, or seen how popular blogs (short for “web logs,” which are usually online diaries or running personal commentaries) have become.  Whatever the reason, if you can spin a good yarn, the market is ready for you.

And past Chapter Five, anyone who wants to publish will begin to feel warmly toward Glatzer’s book.  From Chapter Six to the end, Glatzer does a brilliant job of deconstructing the querying process and the process of building relationships with editors, publishing industry professionals and other writers.  If you’ve ever wanted to publish feature articles based on your experience and areas of interest or if you’ve wondered about how it is done and the commitment and work required to get an article published, you’ll enjoy Glatzer’s thorough and revealing portrait of freelancing today and her studied, experienced and clearly presented information.

In Chapters Six through Seventeen, you’ll learn how to find editors’ email addresses and create a forceful personal style of pitching stories.  You’ll also learn about setting and reaching publishing goals, making sure you get paid, getting articles reprinted for more pay and creating spin-off articles as well as how to network with other writers for support and sharing information.  Glatzer’s helpful list of sites online includes: fmwriters.com and oneofus.co.uk for critique help and mediabistro.com/events for information on networking parties and panels near you where you can meet editors and writers.

Glatzer ends her book with information on dealing with taxes from the income you’ll receive writing for money, secrets of the big magazines, extra ways for experienced writers to earn money, information on getting syndicated and a glossary of useful jargon in the freelance industry.

My favorite passages in her ending material is this:

…Another great way to break into major markets is by telling the story that is uniquely yours, a first-person narrative of something remarkable in your life. We all have something worth sharing:  What’s your story?

“Whether it’s your own story or the experiences of a colorful relative,” says freelancer and writing instructor Christina L. Hamlett, “Such narratives still need to address one or more of the three ‘R’ themes inherent in popular fiction:  Reward, Revenge, and Release.  Likewise, the purpose of such stories runs parallel to the three E’s of commercial publishing:  to Entertain, to Educate, and to Enlighten.”

Glatzer adds:

When you sit down to write a piece like this, imagine that a friend has come to you with a problem. It just so happens that you have gone through this problem, and have insights to share about how you did it.  What would you tell your friend?

All’s well that ends well, and, happily, Glatzer drops her need to separate her audience into us and them and really offers some fine instruction.