Being Brenda Lyne

The hardest part of being a writer is being so, so proud of your work and realizing that not everybody feels the same way you do. 
No question.
I've been participating in short story competitions just to keep me writing and keep me fresh. It's a fun exercise, but it's rather frustrating to keep submitting what I believe to be fabulous stories -- and they don't make the cut.
Case in point: this 250-word piece of flash fiction awesomeness. It didn't make the top ten in a competition, but I think it's one of my better pieces. It was inspired by a short story I wrote in a writing class last fall. Thought I'd share it with you.
Prompt: Fantasy/fairy tale that had to include the action of delivering a letter, and the word "parched."
Enjoy!
----‐----- Obituary of a TyrantDracorian, LuciusPassed into eternal damnation on the eighth day of the sixth month, aged eighty-five years. He was preceded in death by his reluctant wife, Queen Alexandra of Azuria. He is sur…

I'm a marketer. While my experience may lie more on the traditional side, I have a decent basic understanding of social media and its importance in the marketing mix -- especially for those brands that sell direct to consumer. I get the different audiences that use the different platforms: LinkedIn for business, Instagram for the more visual set, Facebook for the groups that skew older, and Twitter for...well, just about everyone.

I've been working on building my author platform on Twitter and Facebook for the better part of a year. Facebook I get; I'm a prolific user in my personal life, and have great engagement. Probably I have my kids to thank for that. :) Twitter, though...I cannot figure Twitter out.

I abandoned my personal account a while ago because I couldn't get any traction, and because it was becoming a toxically political place. But I heard at a conference that Twitter is the first place agents are going to go looking for an author; so I reluctantly set up…

I have many sayings in life, but one of my favorites is this:
No 18-year-old knows what they want to do for the rest of their life.
I recognize that there are always going to be exceptions to the rule. But, generally speaking, expecting a fresh-out-of-high-school college freshman to choose a major -- and therefore decide what they want to be when they grow up -- is an awful lot to ask.
I was one of those rare ones who knew from about the age of fifteen what I wanted to be when I grew up: I wanted to be a writer. Specifically, a fiction novelist. I wanted to follow in the footsteps of my hero, Stephen King -- and make a living writing and telling stories.
A noble goal, to be sure. But, because I was only 18 and completely clueless, I didn't have the foggiest idea how to make that happen. I didn't know where to find the resources that could help me. Plus, an English degree didn't seem super...well, practical. I looked at the profession of "writing" on a spectrum: o…

I mentioned in a previous post that the hardest part about the publishing process is the waiting. Especially for someone like me, who was not blessed with a plethora of patience. I realized that I didn't tell you what I'm waiting on!
It's exciting, Being Brenda Lyne. And also excruciating.
I have a couple irons in the fire at the moment. The first is this: two weekends ago I attended the Wordsmith Conference, hosted by the Loft Literary Center. When I registered for the conference several months prior (back in like July) I decided to pay extra for a consultation with an agent. I figured what the heck, maybe I'll learn something.

Between the time I signed up and conference time, I finished the CHARLIE'S MIRROR manuscript and started querying agents. I debated sending one to the agent I'd signed up to meet with at the conference, then decided what the heck. So I did that, back in early October. She came back about two weeks later with a standard rejection email. Tha…

Hi friends! Welcome to Being Brenda Lyne, where you can follow me as I navigate this crazy journey from aspiring to published author. I'm in test mode here as I figure out what blogging capabilities I have, so I thought I'd kick us off with the answer to a question I get fairly regularly: 
How did you come up with the pen name Brenda Lyne?
(That's pronounced "Lynn," by the way.)
It's actually a pretty cute story. But I have to preface it with this: I'm not opposed to putting my real name on my books, but my given name is hard for people. It's rare for someone who doesn't know me to spell or pronounce my last name correctly. So, when you come right down to it, I'm doing my readers and fans a big favor by using a pen name instead.
Anyway.
When I was in the second grade, back in the early 1980s, we had a project where each little eight-year-old in the class received his/her very own egg to take care of. The assignment was simple: take care of the egg …