A few weeks back I got an email I always love seeing: one from D’ette Corona at Chicken Soup for the Soul.
Dear Courtney Lynn
Your story “Happy Cells Are Healthy Cells, A Mantra to Live By” has made it to the first phase of our selection round for Chicken Soup for the Soul: Think Positive, Live Happy. Only a small percent of the submitted stories have made it this far.
Insert happy dance here:
At this phase they ask you to fill out a permission form and return it to them. That way they have their ducks in a row when it’s time to publish. (In this case, the on-sale date is scheduled for September 24, 2019.)
Golden Advice: Know Your Market
Any acceptance is exciting, but Chicken Soup ones are particularly sweet.
I remember trying for years (more like almost two decades) to crack Chicken Soup for the Soul, and then…one day it happened.
I think because one of the most important pieces of advice (that I used to ignore) when I first started writing was: “Know your market.”
There’s also another idiom about writing what you know, and loving what you write.
I hadn’t read but maybe one or two Chicken Soup stories in my life up until several years ago. Then Woman’s World magazine started publishing them.
I first started buying that magazine because they publish romance and mystery short stories. (Another market I’ve never cracked –although I haven’t tried in years either. Maybe it’s time to give it a go again?)
Anyway, I found so much hope, goodness, humor, and joy from reading the Chicken Soup stories in WW.
But at the same time I was learning what makes a good one and didn’t realize it until that first acceptance came.
Lucky 7 for the Big 10?
If it got accepted, it might be my most rewarding yet.
You see, “7” is my lucky number. This would be my seventh acceptance and the seventh Chicken Soup book I’d be in. (Technically my six acceptances were for five books, but I’ve been in six because one book included two of my stories and one story was reprinted in another book.)
The second story I got accepted, “Kitty Bites,” was inspired by my cancer, and another one dealt with it too, but this one most definitely does. In a major way.
It’s also one of the most honest things I’ve ever written.
Writing Evolved
I mean, all my essays are truthful, but this one came from a place I’ve never tapped before. Maybe “more personal” is what I mean rather than “most honest.”
Anyway, having cancer sucked. It made me face my very worst fears. It was terrifying, painful, humiliating, and just plain gross on several occasions.
But to this day I still feel it’s one of the best things that ever happened to me.
For one, it gave me a lot to write about.
But it also woke me up to the fact I was having a near life experience.
These past 10 years have been a sort of rebirth. As well as a growth spurt. Mentally and emotionally. I’m finally owning my authentic self.
She’s a hot mess, but you know what? I love me. I wasn’t always able to say that.
Also, I think we’re all messy on the inside. The Chicken Soup books have helped me realize that. Not only as I explore book topics in my own writing, but read what others write.
So fingers crossed “Happy Cells” makes the final cut. Because not only will it nab me some mula, but I get 10 contributor copies, which means I can keep –and read– one for my own personal pleasure. Would save me from having to buy a copy. Which I would, because I want to read how other people overcome challenges to Think Positive, Live Happy too.