Burgett_travel_writing

Fatal wee errors that show you're an amateur

Let's get some very important but rather minor things straight. You won't be considered a serious writer by editors at magazines and newspapers (or in the larger world either) if you are posing as a professional writer but still making amateur errors.

There's the hyphen (-), for example. It should do what hyphens do, like-sisters-in-law, and NOTHING MORE. It isn't a dash, or a finger after a number, or anything else. Its role is vital but not expansive.

The dash in writing is an em dash (see insert, symbols, special on your PC). Alas, I can't show you here or in an email, in which case (and ONLY THERE) it must be seen as two hyphens--like this. Note, no spaces before or after an em dash (except in England and some newspapers in the U.S.). Sometimes your computer will convert the double hyphen into an em dash, but not often or always. Use dashes less frequently than you want, in pairs around parenthetical phrases or to offset a closing to a sentence. Usually they connote humor.

When typewriters abounded so did double spaces between sentences. Now you use one space, without exception. Academics are the worst offenders, and it's a telltale sign to the editor that, if you double too, you aren't properly weaned from school yet.

Avoid semicolons. One or two may be one or two too many, unless you really understand them and the punctuation that surrounds them.

Use full colons sparingly too. They aren't substitutes for a period after a number. They usually indicate a list of items to follow, like "There are four things to do during a rainy recess:" after which four things to do are listed, directly after the colon or numbered below. But the words "like" or "such as" are ways to insert variety in your copy. "There are four things to do during a rainy recess, like ___, ___, ___, and _____."

Those are the ones that are most often used incorrectly. You won't burn in hell (or anywhere) if you err, but you won't be paid much money to write either. That's because those who know the rules and follow them are the ones deciding who sees print, like the editors. They choose professionally written copy almost every time.

Gordon Burgett    

Is your article salable?

A few days back I was asked, in response to an earlier post "When do you write travel in first person?", to elaborate on how one can use the deductive method to see if your article is salable, and where. (The writer first saw this concept in my book, The Travel Writer's Guide, where I recommended the Readers Guide to Periodical Literature in the library as the first place to find out which paying publications used similar articles.)

Alas, his library no longer subscribed to the RGPL! So what's next, if you want to see who else wants copy about your topic, on the assumption that if they were interested once, they and other magazines that appeal to the same general audience will look fondly on something similar, but better, updated, a new slant, new revealed research, a new combination with another topic also of interes to that readership.

Three ways I now try to find potentially eager and generous buyers.

The first is still the RGPL, which may be in another, nearby library. Or it is far more likely to be in your own library's digital periodicals review--hiding in the computer bank they now subscribe to. Just ask the librarian how you can find articles in major magazines. Then list the publications where those about your topic appear, then hit the current Writer's Market to see other publications listed in the same category. (Use the earlier RGPLs, bound and around for probably 100 years, to see what was written about the topic in, say, 1956 or 1909.) The library's digital periodical guide may only go back five or ten years.

Our good friend Google.com has largely replaced the RGPL to find out what's currently available about almost anything. Hiding inside its references are clues to where your topic is best or most often reported. Find the publications cited there and you have a second way of seeing who is buying (and, one hopes, paying) for that topic.

But there's a hidden world out there usually revealed with one question to the reference librarian: What resource tools not here can I access through your library? Bingo. You usually have several, sometimes 20-30 places where topic digging is faster and better, like Nexus-Lexus or other places that make data, text, and references immediately accessible. I can do this through my Marin County system, and if that weren't available, I could do it through three of the four universities I attended (when we wrote with quills). They give me magic numbers and codes and the whole world opens up--free!

Incidentally, I seldom actually go to the library itself other than to take out a thriller-killer or pick up a book delivered there by interlibrary loan. I can use their catalog from my office. More magic numbers and codes! 

There's much more about the feasibility study in my book, and it's a critical set of steps in my seminars (which can be heard in my audio CD "How to Sell 75% of Your Travel Writing"). I also have a report that's available digitally called "Finding Topics for General and Travel Articles." It is more of a case study that explores the deductive process with an actual example. 

I hope this answers the reader's much appreciated question.

Gordon Burgett

   

 

Digital travel writing courses?

I was reading a Travelwriters.com blog that asked the title question above, and in the 67 or so responses I saw my book kindly referred to about five times as a very helpful tool. So I responded as well, and feel it fair to share the words with you, if you are interested. This was my reply:

"I saw my book kindly referred to in this thread so, first, thanks, and second, while I like the idea of digital help for travel writers (many digital instructors use my book), I think that lots of travel writers simply need to know what the process is that best uses their time/funds and is most likely to help create a core article that sells. Then they can multiply that income by reselling that core, reframed, again and again. In other words, if they can write like or better than what they read on the pages where they want to appear, mostly they need to know how to lay out a trip; what to do before, during, and after that trip; how to balance magazine and newspaper/newsletter pieces, and how to create a solid fact base before going that frees up lots of time once they are there. That's what The Travel Writer's Guide is all about, in book or CD form. (Please excuse the self plug!) For the better or more confident writers, it might be worth trying first before spending lots of money on online courses--or in conjunction with them. But if nothing I said makes sense, rush to the nearest computer and register!"

How could I even assume to know what's best for travel writers, especially new ones? I've offered "Writing Travel Articles That Sell!," a four-hour seminar based on the book's contents for almost 30 years now, to a guesstimate of 27,000+ attendees, and it gives me a great opportunity to see what parts of their preparation or skills they most need to have strengthened. Most can either write well enough to see print or never will get to that level (a wee minority), but what bewilders 100% of them is the labyrinthine process of selling to editors, and how to set up the trip and research to have something to sell profitably. So that's why I wrote my book the way I did, to resee the whole process from a strictly business approach, and to tell them that, if their writing is also in need of help, they should read three articles a day and use the analytical guide the book contains to pull the articles apart to see precisely how they are written--then write that way! No magic, no inside pull with the editor, nothing but old-fashioned understandable words that the reader wants to read.