John Woodington The official site for the author.

SlushPile Hell is FunnyPosted by John Woodington on July 30th, 2010

It’s Friday, so I had to find something to laugh at.  And I did.  I discovered the wonder of SlushPile Hell, which is a blog with the funniest, grossest, worstest things found in the query letter slush pile of this particular literary agent.

Funnier still, they held a contest for people to send in fake/humorous title to THE WORST CHILDREN’S BOOK…EVER.  And for your Friday enjoyment, I have re-posted the list below:

Our WINNER was:  @MJsRetweet:  Daddy Has an Itch. Mommy Smells Like Fish: A Child’s Rhyming Guide to STD’s  Congrats to @MJsRetweet!

And here are the rest of the Top 25 WORST CHILDREN’S BOOKS…EVER, in no particular order:

@SmolderingInk:  The Best Things to Drink Are under the Sink

@LynetteCurtis: Toy Story 3: Buzz Gets a Woody

@harleymaywrites:  Is Angelina My Mommy?

@C_Spaghetti:  Where the Wild Thongs Are

@Janet_Reid:  The Smith & Wesson Coloring Book for Kids

@AVgrl:  Ashley Has Two Daddies, and They’re Both Going to Burn in Hell

@KateHaggard:  Dismemberment Donny Needs A Hand

@SarahEGlenn:  The Secret Pot Garden

@Smolderingink: Princess Poledancer And The Twirly Tassle Gang

@Prettyandi:  Santa Clause, The Tooth Fairy & The Easter Bunny: Just The Beginning of a Lifetime of Lies

@Shelltex:  Math Will Make You Ugly

@Juniperjenny:  The Magical World beneath the Tarp on the Pool

@Thericeman: All Alone with the Internet: A Choose Your Own Adventure Story

@MJsRetweet: The Fog in the Looking Glass (and Other Ways to Find Out if Grandma’s Still with Us)

@alc417: A Buzzing in the Night: Why Your Wii Control’s Batteries Are Gone

@FrozenGlitter: It’s Not that Grandpa Doesn’t Love You, He Just Loves Drinking More

@jjdebenedictis: You Don’t Need to Think When You’re Pretty

@KarlShoemaker:  Furious George Gets Cut Off on the Freeway

@Tobywneal:  Why Do Grandma’s Boobies Touch Her Waist? (And Other Questions Not to Ask Out Loud)

@SarahEGlenn: You’re Not There, God. It’s Me, Christopher Hitchens

@GeneDoucette:  Rachel Has Seven Mommies: A Children’s Guide to the Book of Mormon

@Saraheolson: Things We Can’t Afford because Your Father Left Us

@EliasSerulle:  One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Mercury Poisoning

@LynneKelly:  Frog And Toad Are Friends with Benefits

How hard am I laughing?  So hard that I think I pinched my kidney.  Good weekend.

The King of KongPosted by John Woodington on July 27th, 2010

Just a quick post to say I took some time out of writing (writer slang for slacked off/avoided/procrastinated) to watch an awesome documentary called The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters.  I had been told to watch this movie by a friend, and dangit if he wasn’t right.

The King of Kong details the life of Steve Wiebe, a guy who gets laid off from work and decides to fill his time by attempting to break the world record score at Donkey Kong, a classic arcade game.  The documentary pits him against an awesome antagonist in Billy Mitchell, one of the most self-centered, egotistical men I’ve ever seen living.  Wiebe comes off as a genuinely nice guy who loves his family and eagerly anticipates healthy competition.  Billy Mitchell comes off looking like an eviler version of Darth Vader.  Way eviler. 

I couldn’t stop watching.  Check that.  I had to stop watching every 9+ minutes in order to click to the next installment of it on YouTube.  Annoying, but better than paying $30 some dollars on Amazon for the DVD.  Maybe for Christmas…

That’s my plug to all of you people who need to give me a Christmas gift in 5 months.  Never to early to start looking.

Writing Formula – One Scene to Improve Your NovelPosted by John Woodington on July 19th, 2010

Sunday morning was one of those times when things just come together.  Remember how I had come up with a foolproof formula for generating light bulb ideas?  Well, apparently the cosmos aligned again Sunday morning, as I was able to crank out the turning point in my novel, a brief scene that will lead me down a larger toward a much better story.  The elements needed for this opportune moment are as follows:

• One bowl of generic honey nut cheerios
• One and a half cups of Dunkin’ Donuts’ original flavor coffee (with sugar and cream)
• One banana
• A good amount of natural light from the west-facing windows
• Laptop
• Story open on laptop
• Remembering the review a writer friend gave on how to make the story better

Combine these elements and Bam!(copyright, Emeril) you’ve got  the perfect setup to write a one-and-a-half-page scene that changes the shape of your novel into something better than it was.

Note: The banana can be substituted for an apple, but not an orange, or anything that requires the removal of a peel to access the fruit itself.  That takes up too much time and kills the formula.  Truth.

The Return from Seton HillPosted by John Woodington on June 28th, 2010

I’ve returned from the Seton Hill writer’s conference, and must say that I’ve had a wonderful time.  Seton Hill is beautiful, the people were wonderful, and the experiences were invaluable.  Basically what happens is you go to this place that looks like Hogwarts castle, write for hours, nerd out with other writers from all across North America, pitch to some really great agents, and then party the night away with everyone and their brother.

Highlights:

1. Receiving humorous daily death threats from Donna Munro, who is one crazy writer and a super nice person.

2. Me telling Jim McCarthy that I toyed with the idea of scaring him by trying to pitch a short story collection to him.

3. Writer Melanie Card telling Jim McCarthy that his pitch schedule included a 30-minute “potty break”, and then never letting her hear the end of it.

4. Me reading my query letter to Janet Reid (aka the Query Shark) and her responding with, “For the Win!”

5. All of the guest speakers telling all of the writers never to self-publish anything ever ever ever, and if you did, never tell anyone, not even your conscious self.

6. Filling this guy (who I call “Therapist”) with too much Scotch and then watching him try judo moves on people:

Which was pretty much awesome.  As you might’ve guessed.

Now all I’ve got to do is send off query letters and some pages to a few people, and then start saving money to go back next year.

Jasper Tilson is Riding the Slow TrainsPosted by John Woodington on April 18th, 2010

My short story “Jasper Tilson” is now published at Slow Trains.  You can read it by clicking the following link:

Jasper Tilson at Slow Trains

I’m really excited to finally see this story in print.  I have to thank Slow Trains for publishing it.  I have to thank Deanna Lepsch and my wife for reviewing it not too long ago, and giving it the last few nudges to get it publication ready.  Finally, I must thank Allyson Loomis and everybody else in my 2006 Creative Writing Seminar at the University of Wisconsin – Eau Claire for reading and critiquing the initial draft.  This story would be sitting in a computer folder right now if not for the help of all of these people.

Thank you.

Inspirations of GreatnessPosted by John Woodington on March 23rd, 2010

Here’s something short and sweet for you.  Every once in a while I stumble upon something that reminds me of what great writing is, and what I strive to write in my own fiction.  I came across this work in McSweeney’s, and it made me laugh so hard I cried.

It is titled “Cowboy Deaths, In Descending Order of Degree of Dignity.”

The Story of “Jasper Tilson”Posted by John Woodington on February 16th, 2010

When I was 21 years old, I came up with an idea for a short story about a young man who’s wife suddenly dies, and who then finds out that he does not have the ability to deal with it properly.  I think it partially came from a fear that I had myself.  I was going to be married a year or so later, and was terrified that something would happen to my then fiance/now wife.  I let the story float around in my head until the spring of 2006, almost a year later.  I was in a writing workshop at college, and I decided that it was the right time to write this story.

The initial problem I had was that I’d lost a page of notes that I’d written about the story, and after searching for days, I finally gave them up as lost, and pressed on with the story as I saw it in my head.  I wrote the first draft of the story, then rewrote, redrafted, reread, rewrote, until, five drafts later, I had something with which I was very proud.  I sent it off to the workshop class for critique.

The reviews from my peers were very positive, and my professor at the time said it was one of the better undergraduate short stories she’d seen.  So I figured that meant it was good enough for a strong publication, and I began sending it out to some of the top short story venues.

Two years later I had amassed a pile of rejections, and had lost hope of this story ever seeing the light of publication.  I decided it needed a reread.  I read through it, and to my surprise, saw that it had one major flaw.  It wasn’t finished.  I mean, I had thought it was finished two years earlier, and the praise of my peers hadn’t helped much in that respect.  But when I read it in 2008, I realized it didn’t have a true ending.  So I wrote one.  And I thought the story was much better for it.

I also messed with the title.  I changed it from its original title, “Jasper Tilson”, to “Intervention”, to “A Friendly Intervention”, and then back to “Jasper Tilson”.  The title changing took place over the course of two years itself.  But finally I had it back to “Jasper Tilson”, which was the right title for the story.  Surely publication would come soon.

Cut to the present day, four years after I’d first begun sending it out to publishers, and forty-six rejections later.  That’s right.  Forty-six (46) rejections.  Valentine’s Day, 2010, I get an email from Slow Trains which reads as follows:

Hi John,

Thank you for your submission to Slow Trains. We would like to publish your story in our spring issue, which will be online in late March.

Please return the information sheet below at your earliest convenience, and then we will send you the galleys link for your approval shortly before the issue is linked.

Thank you for contributing to Slow Trains!

Susannah

So now, after four years, forty-six rejections, multiple titles, multiple drafts, multiple endings, and ceasless submissions, “Jasper Tilson” will be published for all the world to read.  I can’t wait to see it at Slow Trains.  And of course, I’ll link to it here when it is up, which should be next month.