Product Description

This is a must-have book for any new writer and a welcome addition to the library of established writers who are hoping to 'up their game'. Have you ever wondered why your short stories are rejected? What is the secret of selling your work? How do you make sure your characters are memorable, your plots realistic and your twists both satisfying and unpredictable? Della Galton answers these and many more questions using a format that will already be familiar to writers: What? Why? When? How? Where? and, Who?

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #18721 in Books
• Published on: 2008-10-20
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 244 pages

About the Author
Della Galton has been selling short stories for twenty years. She sells between 90 and 100 short stories a year to markets in the UK and abroad. She also teaches creative writing and is a popular speaker at writers' conferences across the UK. Dozens of her students have achieved success in the very competitive field of magazine fiction.Della is also the author of two published novels, Passing Shadows and Helter Skelter.

Customer Reviews

Worth Every Penny
I have had some small success with short stories already - and I learned a great deal from this book. Della Galton doesn't just tell, she shows. So she tells you to research the market - and then shows you several ways to do so. She covers lots of topics such as writing with humour, finding a good title, and stories of different types (crime, ghost, twist etc). With each topic, she takes pains to explain how you can tackle it and improve your writing. Her years of experience as a teacher of creative writing, and as a prolific and excellent short story writer, shine through in this book.

Yet Ms Galton is not at all arrogant. She uses her own mistakes for illustration, pokes fun at herself, and uses excerpts of others' stories, and tips and ideas from other short story writers, as well as her own. All this makes her book a delightful as well as an instructive read. I'd recommend this book to anyone who wants to write and sell short stories. Unless you're a very experienced short story writer yourself, I'm sure you will find some useful pointers and ideas here. And even if you are a very experienced short story writer, you might well find it useful for revision. Highly recommended.

The Queen of the womags tells you how it's done
Della Galton is not called the Queen of the Womags (amongst those of us who strive for even half her success) for nothing, and in this book she shares all her secrets with us. It's written in a very approachable, no nonsense style. The fact is, as Della tells us, if you want to make money from writing, then you have to treat it as a business. But that doesn't mean you can just knock out any old thing. It takes practice and skill, and the ability to put together a story that resonates with editors.

She uses extracts from her own stories and others to show you how it's done, and other writers add their own tips for success. When you see the extracts from Della's work, you understand why she's done so well. She is in a class of her own, which makes her sharing her knowledge with us all the more wonderful.

I tried the first exercise and got a short story out of it straight away.

This book is a great addition to any writer's toolbox.

Motivational as well as informative
I loved this book because it covers all aspects of short story writing and gave me comprehensive advice on pitching and selling my stories. As I read the section on why most stories are rejected I realised that I'd made many of the same mistakes. Now I'm inspired to tackle this market again!