TWITTER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

All right, peeps, today I wanted to tackle my version of the joys (and oys too) that the World Wide Web can bestow upon all of us, specifically through the Twitterverse.

TWITTER IS AWESOME.

There. I said it.

I admit, I was a skeptic at first, and it took me a LONG time to succumb to Twittermania. When I signed up for it, Terrell Owens was coming to visit the Bengals, so I signed up to specifically follow him and Chad Ochocinco Johnson Whatever. And then I found some agents. And then some writers. And then some friends. And then I was addicted.

Twitter holds an interesting power, an allure that can't really be identified in 140 characters or less. Agents, authors, fellow writers, sports figures, actors, directors, musicians, they're all on it. Except for Chris Evans *dammit*. It's like Facebook, but without all the annoying games.

Here are the reasons I love Twitter. They may be few, but they are epic.

1. Twitter makes one a better writer.
   
   Believe it or not, Twitter can help you improve your writing. Why? Because it forces you to choose your words carefully. And for ramblers like me, it forces you to filter your thoughts down to the most important aspects of your message. Vaguely coherently and with mondo abbreviations... But still. It's the principle of the thing. Twitter makes you more conscious of word choice. You learn to eliminate useless words (like "very," which is the most useless word in the English language) . You focus. Your writing becomes tighter. Trust me. What I took from Twitter helped me get rid of about 4000 pesky words.
   
   
2. Twitter makes one bolder.
   
   This one is probably the more important one for me. I'm a weenie. I do not like to speak unless spoken to. But on Twitter? I'm a chatty Cathy. Agents, authors, whoever. I'll tweet you. Aaaaaand if you tweet back, that's just even more fun. I've had actual conversations with awesome authors (not just OMG I LOVE YOU *SQUEEEEEEE*) I would never have had a chance to speak to otherwise. Colleen Lindsay tweeted me back once LOL. It's fun. And it helps to get a little name recognition. One agent I follow said she'd be more likely to read pages if she recognized your name from various social networking media (mostly Twitter). So? You're not losing anything by joining Twitter. Except perhaps valuable writing time... Hmm...
   
   
3. Agents/Authors use Twitter to pass along valuable info.
   
   There are quite a few agents, like Ginger Clark, who will tell you what they're looking for via Twitter. Where they are on queries. What they're reading now that they love. And one wonderful agent even shared her story about how it feels to be rejected by a writer. Yes, agents blog. But agents tweet a lot more. And they share valuable links, as do authors. And what's cool is that a lot of them will answer questions. I had a conversation with Sara Megibow concerning what she was looking for in SF right now. Did my stuff fit? Nope. But for anyone who wrote a space opera style SF, she's totally up your alley. She even shared books that she liked. Did my stuff fit? Not even close. I write hard SF, not space opera. But if you do? QUERY HER. She's SOOOO nice. *Also, I got re-reassurance from Joanna Volpe that synopses can be boring. So, huzzah!*

If these reasons aren't enough to at least make you think about joining Twitter, then I just don't know what to tell you. However, if you're on the glorious tweeting machine.. what are your reasons for using it?

Also, we have 50 followers!!!!!!!!!!!! You know what this means, right? CONTEST.

SO! All you have to do is leave a comment answering my Twitter question on this post by 11:59 PM Monday the 14th. No exceptions this time since I'm not as poor right now (LOL). On Tuesday I'll pick my winner. And depending on what restaurant you choose, you might get a chicken dinner. *OK that was bad. I promise not to do anything like that again. Maybe.*

Whew!

First off, welcome to mysterious follower #14! I say mysterious because my blogger is not showing me my followers (now my "peeps"). So, Mysterious #14, I hope that you and everyone else will find something of worth on here.

OK, on to my regularly scheduled posting.

Lots of excitement going on! So many of my QT peeps are making their ways through the muck known as querying to reach the golden land of REPRESENTATION! That, my friends, is incredibly exciting, and also incredibly inspiring for those of us still trudging through the query swamp. Congrats again to Em, Jessica, and everyone else who got some sort of deal. Can't wait to read those books!

All right, peeps. For the writers following me, I wanted to point you in the direction of one of the best ways I've found to learn about upcoming contests:

C. Hope Clark's newsletters. To sign up, go to her blog and subscribe. That easy!

Some of you might be wondering why bother to enter contests. I did too, to be quite honest. But I ant to be able to have some credits to my name when approaching agents/publishers, and entering contests is one of the best ways to accomplish that. Being held up against dozens, possibly hundreds, of other writers and coming out at least top 3 is a pretty big deal. Some contests publish anthologies containing the winning entries. Some pay cash prizes. The important thing is that you're putting yourself out there. In a way, it's like marketing yourself.

And it helps with confidence, too. Even if you don't win, you still put your best foot forward. Most people don't have the courage to do that.

For instance, I entered my query in a contest on the disgruntled bear blog for the chance to win a 30 page critique from Ms. Bear herself. For the voting, my query was stacked against 10 others, and in the end, my query received 5 votes out of 332 (that's about .02%, just for reference). As I followed the voting, and as it became more and more clear that I was NOT winning, I consistently re-evaluated myself, my writing, my reason for subjecting myself to failure over and over again, and I eventually settled on the fact that 5 people would want to read MY book. Even though I felt that the other entrants were more talented (Jennifer, mentioned above, was one of them) or that they had much better stories, at least 5 people whom I have never met wanted to read my book over theirs. And now I feel pretty damn good about the whole thing.

You see, the one thing that separates Authors and Writers is perseverance. And IMHO, entering contests builds that. As long as your perspective remains positive.

So, go, my writers. Enter contests. Get your name into the world somehow. If you win or not, you're still working to get your foot in the door. And as always, I wish you success, regardless of your endeavors.

Lex