Q. I’ve just collected my fourth rejection slip. The people and events I write about are powerful and true, they happened to me. Why can’t editors see that? “Many a rose is born but to blush unseen, and waste its fragrance on the soft desert air.”  Afraid that describes you?  If you’ve ever read song lyrics without the music, you know how dull and trivial they can seem. Add the music, powerful emotions sweep us away. Even accomplished writers are often surprised when readers find their stuff flat, but the wounded rejoinder, “That really happened!” has no fictional meaning at all. Except this: it is the cry of someone writing out of her/his own full heart. The trouble is, s/he hears the music but hasn’t succeeded in finding the kind of prose that allows us to hear it too. Playback from a dozen classmates every week is invaluable for making sure you’re getting that music out from between your ears and down onto the page.

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