Today’s RNRHS is from author Margaret Ethridge, who is an incredible writer of women’s fiction–everything from steamy paranormal romance like “Paramour” to stories about what happens after “I Do” like “Contentment”. We became buddies on Twitter through the writing thing, but recently discovered a mutual love of Duran Duran. Like me, Margaret is a child of the 80s, and from the sound of it, we had very similar teenage tastes and inclinations.  I find the most iconic to be that she wasn’t afraid to rock the JT fedora.  I, too, rocked one from time to time, usually with a vintage men’s suit coat, sleeves pushed up to the elbows of course.  There may have been black leggings and a short skirt.  There may have been blue eyeliner.  There may be photographic evidence on Facebook. Hard to say.  Regardless, I love discovering that memories can be shared with new friends as well as old. That’s pretty cool.

Margaret Ethridge

Central Catholic High School, Bloomington, IL, Class of ’86  Currently: By day I count bottles (and cases) of booze. I’m the Inventory Control Manager for a wholesale liquor distributor. At night I write stories of love and lust. With kissing. My mother asked where I learned all those words…I told her Wikipedia.

Band and/or song that reminds you the most of high school: Duran Duran! I was a complete Duranie in high school. So much so that I was a bit of an outcast. My school was preppy and conservative. The bleach-blond bangs, capezio shoes, and fedora may have been a bit much for them.

Favorite piece of music memorabilia (poster, t-shirt, etc.) in high school: Well, my entire room was wallpapered with Duran Duran, Adam Ant, and INXS posters. At one point, I managed to cover every square inch of paint with posters and pictures from teen magazines. I did have a brown fedora, just like John Taylor’s from the Rio era. I also loved my Adam Ant Goody Two Shoes tour t-shirt.

Band that you hated that everyone else at school seemed to love: Van Halen – the David Lee Roth years. I despised Jump. The entire 1984 album still makes me cringe. I able to tolerate Van Halen a little more when Sammy Hagar stepped in, but it wasn’t a marked improvement.

Best show or concert you saw in high school: The obvious answer would be Duran Duran. I saw them at the Rosemont Horizon outside of Chicago on the Seven and the Ragged Tiger tour. I screamed and cried the entire time. Actually, my favorite concert in high school was my first concert: INXS opening for Adam Ant. It was fabulous!

Margaret is the author of Contentment, which has a sequel due to be released in January of 2012. You can learn more about Margaret at her website margaretethridge.com.

It’s been a year since I began querying with my first novel, Bring Me Back. I don’t blog much about the query process (trying to get a literary agent). The need to bitch is great and it’s a disaster waiting to happen for an unpublished author to go around spouting her opinions of the gatekeepers. The temptation has been there though. A bunch of times. I got around it by sitting on my hands and waiting for the mood to pass. Here are the rules I learned to live by while querying over the last year. If I help one writer, my work is done.  P.S. There’s good (ahem, awesome) news at the end.

#1 Learn to get real comfortable with rejection.

The people who say that they sent out four queries and just happened to land an agent the first week are not only freaks of nature, they are highly annoying. Bully for them, but there’s nothing like one of those stories to make me want to cozy up to some railroad tracks. Seek rejection. Become one of the downtrodden, let the publishing world beat you up. Then, when you’re Kathryn Stockett, you can brag about your 67 rejections (which is nothing, but more on that later) and your fellow writers will hold you as a shiny example of the system working. It helps you grow a thicker skin and man, do you need some crocodile scales. The entire publishing world is based on rejection. The sooner you learn to live with it, the better.

#2 Play with the other kids in the sandbox.

You need support through this process and an understanding spouse or cat can only get you so far. They have no concept of what it’s like to spend countless hours obsessing over a query letter that you decide days later should be lining the hamster cage. It’s also not fair to talk endlessly about it and you will have a compulsion to do that. Find people who understand what you’re going through, either in your own backyard or online. If you can find people who write in the same genre or have compatible writing styles, all the better. They can pick you up on the days when you’re ready to pack it in and in turn, you can do the same for them.

#3 Criticism is a gift. It just doesn’t feel like it.

This goes with #1, but it has to do with the writing.  (Something else to learn: rejection doesn’t always have to do with the writing.) Your primary goal should be to get better as a writer. Getting published is gravy. To improve, you’re going to need to let someone put your words under the microscope. You should trust this person. This person should be smart and ideally also a writer. This person should not be your mom or anyone you have ever had sex with. This person should not have an agenda beyond helping you. I have an incredible critique partner whom I met online. I can say with 100% certainty that I would not have accomplished everything I have in the last year without her. She and I rip each other’s work to shreds. We are often snarky. We criticize openly. We still adore each other at the end of the day. That’s the way to do it.

#4 Whatever you do, don’t stop writing.

It makes you better. It keeps you sane. It helps you see the future rather than always looking back. It gives you something else to think about other than the last piece of pie sitting in the fridge. I wrote two novellas in the last year and am nearing completion on my second novel. I have learned a lot. I have been productive while crying over unreturned emails and the occasional literary agent who wants to know if you were a tree, what kind of tree would you be?

#5 The road less traveled has fewer people on it.

If you think that all you need to do to land an agent is send out queries, I hate to be the person to tell you that you have spinach in your teeth, but, hey, you have spinach in your teeth. If you’re going to compete with every other yahoo out there who managed to string together some half-decent words, you’re going to need to find your own road and psst, that’s not the road everyone else is on.  Look for the small publisher who’s seeking writing like yours. Talk to the brand new agent at the writer’s conference while everyone else is standing in line waiting for the hot-shot with the swagger and suspiciously thick hair. Write a sincere fan letter to a writer you love, even if they’ve never published a book that sold a lot. E-pub a novella or some short stories to get your name out there.

In parting, I thought I could share my query statistics, but that makes my left eye twitch when I think about it. Let’s just say that I stopped shy of sending 100 queries. I had a lot of rejections. I had a lot of non-responders. I had some manuscript requests that later turned into rejections. I had some amazing referrals that also, well, yeah, that too. In the end, I’m still trying to find the right place for my novel and that’s okay. It’s my baby.  You wouldn’t have a baby and let some random person babysit.

Alas, this story is not all about despair and my sometimes grumpy disposition! I’m happy to announce that I signed my first publishing contract for a novel I co-authored with my critique partner. It’s coming out through indie publisher Ellora’s Cave either late in 2011 or early 2012.

There are opportunities out there. You have to look for them. You have to be open to them. If you don’t take them, someone else will.

This is a re-post of Celia Rivenbark’s hilarious Rock ‘n’ Roll High School post from last spring. Since then, her incredible 6th book, “You Don’t Swear Much For a Fat Girl” has come out and rocked the NYT Bestseller list. She will be doing a reading and signing this Saturday, September 24th at 11AM at McIntyre’s Books at Fearrington Village between Chapel Hill and Pittsboro. If you’ve never been to one of her readings and like to laugh, you best get your behind there and do it on the early side. The place will be packed.

Celia Rivenbark

Wallace-Rose Hill High School, Duplin County, NC, Class of ’74, Currently: Syndicated humor columnist and author of six books including “Bless Your Heart, Tramp,” “We’re Just Like You, Only Prettier,” and “You Can’t Drink All Day if you Don’t Start in the Morning.

Band that reminds me of high school: Derek & the Dominos/Layla. I bought the album for fifty cents from the cutest boy in high school because he was starving and wanted to buy two ice cream sandwiches. I had wanted the album forever but it was too pricey for me. Paul Dixon, wherever you are, thanks for a sweet deal for us both. Best. Album. Ever. Honorable mention: Traffic’s Low Spark of High-Heeled Boys. Delicious. Still listen to it at least once a week when I’m ridin’ around.

Favorite music memorabilia: I had a black and orange glow-in-the dark poster of Janis Joplin. It was oversized and dominated the space over my bed for my entire high school years. I didn’t have a black light but imagined it would’ve looked even more awesome if I’d had one. Second favorite: A poster of Richard Nixon smoking a huge joint. He had bloodshot eyes and it said “Peace with honor” underneath. My parents were liberals so they loved both of these posters, btw.

Band I hated that others loved: That’s easy; Bread. When I first heard “Baby I’m A Want You,” I vomited. WTF does “I’m-A” mean? Nobody talks like that. My friends thought Bread was a soulful band. I thought they were a-holes.

Best concert during high school: Humble Pie and King Crimson, Dorton Arena, Raleigh, N.C, circa 1970. Unbelievable. My boyfriend at the time conned his dad into taking about eight of us in his big-ass station wagon. A few in the party dropped some microdot in the bathroom as soon as we got there. I heard this made the concert more intense but I would have no personal knowledge of that of course. My ears rang for weeks and I couldn’t have been happier.

Best makeout song: Steppenwolf’s “Magic Carpet Ride.” Epic is all I can say about that.

Visit Celia’s website at celiarivenbark.com.

I’m happy to share very good (SQUEE) writing news today. My amazing, stupendous, superstar critique partner, Karen Stivali’s, first published novella, “Always You” comes out today.  “Always You” is a great story about the value of being friends before you fall in love and discovering that the person you’re meant to be with is sometimes right under your nose.  Karen is an incredible writer, which is the reason I am her critique partner (aside from the fact that we share a brain, but that’s a different blog post), and “Always You” delivers on every level.  It’s funny and sweet and steamy, the perfect read for a long weekend, which coincidentally happens to be upon us right now.  I can’t say this loudly enough–I urge you to BUY IT. You will not be disappointed.

This is by no means the last you will hear of Karen–she has been on a literary tear lately, signing four publishing contracts in the last few months.  Her debut novel, “Meant To Be”, will be released next year and the sequel has already been contracted.  The fourth contract is for a short novel that she and I co-authored, but I can’t share that good news until all of the paperwork is complete.  I assure you that I will be sharing the hell out of that good news when I’m able.

Visit Karen’s website at karenstivali.com.

Looking at music through the lens of youth is a funny thing. Whatever you liked can make you seem like a goof or a genius, depending on the band, and a lot of that comes down to sheer luck. Like everything that may or may not have gone your way as a kid, you can blame it on your parents if you want. My parents played me The Beatles and The Stones and Cheap Trick when I was a kid and I loved it all. Very cool. But then my Dad went and bought me the Shaun Cassidy record I wanted for my birthday. Clearly, he had no regard for what I might be training my ears to like. He didn’t stop there, buying the Rick Springfield album for me the following year. Yep, he allowed me to go right off the rails. In his defense, he was being a good dad. In my defense, there were hormones at play. And yes, before some of you cry foul, I still heart Rick and “Love Is Alright Tonight” is on my iPod. Cool? Probably not.  Did I love it? Hell, yes.

David Menconi

Cherry Creek High School, Denver, CO, Class of 1979, Currently: music critic/arts reporter for the News & Observer in Raleigh, NC (at least until the next round of downsizing).

Band and/or song that reminds you the most of high school: Eagles, “New Kid in Town.” After freshman year, my family moved from Texas to Denver in the summer of 1976; and it seemed as if every radio station up there had “Hotel California” in constant rotation (seriously, it’s like they were all playing the same eight-track tape over and over). I went from a small high school of a few hundred students to a gigantic one with more than 3,000, and I don’t think I ever got over that new-kid feeling. Hearing this always makes me feel like I’m 15 and scared and walking into the cafeteria. Anything by Boston would be a close second, followed by “Frampton Comes Alive”; also the Moody Blues, just cuz I listened to them a lot back then (hearing them now always reminds me of driving up to the mountains for day skiing).

Favorite piece of music memorabilia (poster, t-shirt, etc.) in high school: Well, there was the obligatory Farah Fawcett poster every adolescent boy in America had circa 1976, but that’s not music. Probably a Bad Company T-shirt, although I never saw them live (then or now). I just liked the shirt.

Band you hated that everyone else at school seemed to love: Regrettably, I had a serious jones back then for wimpy singer/songwriters (er, Dan Fogelberg — *blush*). So I didn’t much dig hard rock in high school. Once I was in college, I got over that in a hurry. But I had very little use for anything loud, including the Aerosmiths and Led Zeppelins of the world; both of which I love now. Father forgive me, for I was deeply, deeply clueless during my high-school years.

Best show or concert you saw in high school: Hard to say because I didn’t really go to that many shows until college. First “concert” I ever saw was the Cowsills at a car show when I was 10 years old, and my parents took me to the Carpenters about 2-3 years later. First show I went to sans parents was Rolling Stones in Boulder during high school, but I was appallingly nerdy/clean-cut and it was too freaky a scene for me to really enjoy it. Oddly enough, the show that stands out the most from that period was Bill Cosby in about 1978-79. Pretty hilarious, and I find myself busting out some of his routines about “brain-damaged children” on my own kids.

Optional bonus question: Best high school make-out song: Aerosmith, “Dream On.” Not that I ever actually made out to it; but from middle-school on, every cotillion, prom, party or whatever else I went to always had this as The Obligatory Slow Song. To any & every girl who had to suffer through my awkward dance “moves”: I’m sorry.

David Menconi is the author of the novel Off the Record. You can learn more about him at davidmenconi.com.

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