American FreeLancer
The Magazine of the Houston Writers House
Circulation
February
1500
25, 2015
            
CONTEST
WINNERS
NOVELS
FIRST PLACE: MARK POPLE, HOUSTON  SOUTH OF THE CALGARY CURVE
SECOND PLACE: LENA ROACH, LAKE CHARLES  SHADOWS OF THE PAST
THIRD PLACE: TOM GLENN, MARYLAND  THE LAST ANNAMESE
FOURTH PLACE: DIANE WILSON, OKLAHOMA CITY  LUCI MEETS HER MATCH
HONORABLE MENTION: DENNIS PAPP, SANDRA DIGIOVANNI, IAN MCLEAN, TOM BROWNSCOMBE,
BOBBI ANDREWS, DIANE MANNING, JOE FULLEN, BOB GREGORY, DEANE GREMMEL
SHORT STORIES
FIRST PLACE: TIM TALBERT, SAN ANTIONIO  DELLACHAISE
SECOND PLACE: SANDRA DIGIOVANNI, SUGAR LAND  ZACK AND MNOMIE
THIRD PLACE: DENNIS PAPP, TRENTON NJ  TRANSPARENT BOB
FOURTH PLACE: TOM BROWNSCOMBE, MISSOURI CITY  NIGHT DREAMS
HONORABLE MENTION: TOM BROWNSCOMBE, MARGE LELVIS, MONICA BERRY, LYNDA MILLER
POEMS
FIRST PLACE: SANDRA DIGIOVANNI, SUGAR LAND  MY OWN SILVER LINING
SECOND PLACE: MARGE LELVIS, HOUSTON  AS HER FRIEND
THIRD PLACE: LENA ROACH, LAKE CHARLES  FINALE
FOURTH PLACE: BARBARA LYNN, HOUSTON  DALLAS SOLUTION
HONORABLE MENTION: MARION YOUNG, ELSA ANGELL, JIM MURTHA,
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(JUDGES WILL REMAIN ANONYMOUS, BUT ROGER WANTS TO ASSURE YOU THAT
HE HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH THE CHOICES)
MEMBER’S NEW BOOKS
MARY ANN PEREZ McNULTY
Overview
Somewhere between stealing cold cuts from stray cats and watching a stranger leave her mother’s bed after
breaking in through their bedroom window, Mary figured out that her family was dirt poor. Worse than her
empty stomach, she was hungry for acceptance and love. She thought she found it when her baby sister was
born and she became her “mommy”, taking care of her needs as best she could at the age of seven. Then she
had to say goodbye over a small white casket.
Mary’s grandparents, first generation immigrants from Puerto Rico, took her in and gave her a glimpse of
faith and stability. For a brief, shining spell, she had a real home —until they decided that Mama needed her.
They may have been right, but Mama needed more than a little girl could give and Mary lost her way again.
Just out of Juvy Hall, Mary found a knight in shining armor to take her away. She became a teenage bride to
a man twice her age—a man as deeply enslaved to booze as every “step -dad” she’d had as a child. She loved
him anyway, even wearing the bruises he gave her, even when she tried to leave him to give their children a
better life. Despite her fear and loneliness, she never imagined it would take a gunshot in the middle of the
night to teach her c ourage. She was even more surprised when rediscovered faith paved the path to
forgiveness after so many years of pain.
Running in Heels is a memoir of the grit and grace that carried a young girl through the shadows of her
mother’s choices and on through a n abusive marriage. Mary A. Pérez narrates an incredible story of survival
in the face of hopelessness, and learning to forgive against all odds.
A story of coming of age, and coming into grace.
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American FreeLancer, The Magazine of the Houston Writers House Feb 1, 2015
TENSION
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IS YOUR FRIEND
By Bet Pichardo
You need more tension in your life, right? Like a wart on the side of your nose, you say. But, I’m here to tell
you that tension is your friend if you aspire to write a book a reader cannot put down. By now, everybody
knows the story of JK Rowling writing Harry Potter in medis res of a nasty divorce, desperate for a few pennies
to feed herself and her child, riding the train each day to a lousy job, and pouring her feelings longhand onto the
pages of a notebook that turned into her famous books. She had tension in her life. She put it in her story and
look what happened. We have tension in our lives. Let’s do the same thing. Why not? She puts her knickers on
one leg at a time same as the rest of us, right?
The good news is that if we have feelings and emotions we’ve got a head start. We already know how our body
reacts, when somebody cuts us off in traffic, a spouse asks for a divorce, an old friend betrays, or the phone
rings at three a.m.. So let’s spill our guts into the feeling of our characters and watch our writing take on new
depths. And new heights! If we can do this and do it well we might even have a breakout novel on our hands. At
least that’s the theory of Donald Maass whose high-tension workshop I attended recently in Austin.
Consider, for a moment, your three all time favorite books. As writers, we are readers first, so picking just three
will be difficult. But, go grab them off your bookshelf, while I wait. Now lay them out in front of you and ask
yourself. What was it about each of these books that intrigued me enough to buy it and treasure it? Was it the
front cover art? The jacket blurb? The big-name author endorsement on the back cover? Probably not.
According to Don Maass, answer is simple.
It’s the tension in every line. Tension in every line? In every single line! But what about descriptive narrative?
and exposition, you ask? How do you put tension into those elements of story?
The following is a list of story elements and how to wrestle the highest mount of tension from each.
DIALOG: Conflicting points of view create tension. We sometimes see “café talk” in dialog. This is
writing we skim. Characters chat about the weather or some other banal conversational filler. Who cares?
Nobody.
Example of conflict in dialog:
He turned, his ears tips bright red. He pointed to himself. “And you think it’s my fault you were late?”
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“I tried to do a good thing,” she shot back, her jaw tight. “If Juan Carlos and Maria hadn’t been late—
”
“So now it’s their fault? Come on, Bloth. . .grow up.”
“Grow up? How could you say that to me, Del?” Through grief and anger, all she wanted was for him
to take her into his arms and let her cry. Her knees were knocking.
So the character has to defend her actions, but inside she desperately needs his comforting arms.
Conflict.
ACTION: Tension comes not from well written shoot’em up special effects, but from the reaction by the
character to the action. When you write reactions, you write from your own inner well of emotions. They are
human emotions, they are universal, and they will grab your reader. A beautifully written page of thrown
punches and broken furniture is nothing without somebody showing us how they feel about what’s happening.
EXPOSITION: Again, tension comes from conflicting emotions between either the characters or conflicting
emotions within the point of view character:
Example: She was happy and scared to death to meet him in the fancy restaurant after what she’d done.
Would he hate her? So there is curiosity about what she’d done and why she would be happy, but scared. Why
was she conflicted? The reader wants to know. Turns the page.
BACKSTORY The past creates present conflict. Backstory should never be a slogging account of what
happened before. It must ring with conflict forcing the reader back into the present moment with fascination
about how it will all resolve.
PROLOGUE: The purpose of prologue should be to create doubt, aka, tension. Consider this first line of
prologue in a book by Reef Carl Coleman.
Nothing is so sad as an empty amusement park.
This lovely bit of tight writing sets up a beautiful dichotomy and doubt in the reader’s mind. Amusement
parks aren’t sad places. Unless they’re empty. So why is it empty? Doubt. Conflict. Turn the page.
And if you think that tension can only come from characters, listen up pilgrims.
LANDSCAPE: Show the conflicting emotions of the point of view character by mirroring them in a landscape.
Example: A character sits on a park bench after learning good news that brings a dilemma into her life.
Forced to choose between staying in a bad job near the love of her life and relocating to the other side of the
world for the chance of a lifetime opportunity, she remembers how her best friend looks at her boyfriend. What
to do? What to do?
As she sits on the bench pondering her choices, she might look out at the scene before her, see rolling
grassy hills, flowers, an impossibly blue sky, and fruit trees heavy with luscious offerings, ready for harvest.
But the internal conflict she’s dealing with might always have her notice that under those fruit trees are mounds
of rotting fruit.
WEATHER: The storm is always inside the character, not in the sky and it has to do with something he
is struggling to bring into balance.
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TRAVEL: What intrigues is not the road but the traveler’s reaction to it and the conflict it creates.
In the end, tension always and only exists inside the observer and there is always tension in contrast.
Opposing feelings, direct opposition, conflicting emotions guarantee tension and equal a book a reader probably
won't be able to put down.
[Bet Pichardo remains one of the best voice I know for explaining what we mean by conflict. She is a former meber of HWG and now
lives in Austin. We run her article at least once each year. It’s the same word for word, but seems like each year it gets better and
better!]
Nothing So Boring as a Straight Line
By CHRIS ROGERS
Girl meets boy, girl falls for boy, girl marries boy – boring. Girl meets boy, girl turns up
dead, boy arrested for murder - boring. Whether we write sweet or gritty, a story needs lots of
twists, with a little sweet in the grit and a little grit in the sweet.
The same goes for paintings. Although Pareto’s principle: the 80/20 rule, or the Law of the
Vital Few (which I prefer), is often misused, I think it holds pretty darn true in art and in
literature.
Eighty percent of the emotional impact should come from twenty percent of the entirety. At
least, that’s my target. Sometimes 70/30 is a better split. Sometimes 75/25. Never 50/50.
Paradise Cursed , the paranormal novel in my computer at present, is 80% spooky
happenings with a love story thrown in and 20% heart -galloping scary (at least, that’s my
intention). No one remembers an entirety, and a story or painting that has too much going on
all over is not much better than one with nothing going on.
It’s the 80% area respite that makes the 20% impact all the more engaging. That significant
20% has to be emotionally evocative.
So how many twists are optimum? If we apply the 80/20 rule, that would be five. There may be
many more changes – setting, POV, weather, characters added or deleted, etc – but only five
significant twists.
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On my easel at present are two paintings I’m struggling to complete, and this morning I
reminded myself to check out the Law of the Vital Few.





Which few elements are making the biggest impact?
Which few do I want to make the biggest impact?
Where are they?
How am I obscuring them?
How can I enhance them?
Anytime we start a new art or writing project, the Law of the Vital Few is good to remember.
Anytime we get stuck on a project, the questions above are important to ask. And after it’s
finished, when you are so close to the material that you can’t see whether the emotional
impact is working the way you intended, a good thing to ask someone you trust is, “What part
do you find most engaging?”
ARE CONTESTS IMPORTANT?
It all comes down to a demonstration that someone other than your family members and best friends has seen
promise and potential in your work. (Agent)
Seeing a critical mass of accolades in a cover letter—including contests—shows that a writer is ambitious and
diligent. The biggest benefit of winning a contest is surely getting notices by literary agents. (Editor)
If I see that a writer has won ten amazing contests, I am instantly intrigued. (Agent)
I certainly take writing contest into consideration when reviewing queries. (Agent)
Participating in contests is a great way for authors to get honest feedback about their work because friends
won’t do that. Contests force authors to take a critical look at their content, to tighten and polish their writing. In
2011, I received a score equivalent to a big fat F on my first contest entry. Since I suffer from the “My Baby is
Beautiful” syndrome, the score perplexed me until I studied the score sheet to see where my mistakes were.
There were plenty! I read and reread the judge’s comments, took to heart everything on the scoring sheet and
then started my novel over with the first sentence. (Author)
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 NOVELS BY GENRE 
FIVE CHANCES TO PLACE FIRST:
MYSTERY/THRILLER
SCI-FI/FANTASY
HISTORICAL OR CONTEMPORARY WOMAN’S FICTION/ROMANCE,
MIDDLE SCHOOL NOVELS
YOUNG ADULT NOVELS
(FIVE DIFFERENT JUDGES, ALL SPECIALISTS IN EACH GENRE)
FIRST TEN PAGES YOUR NOVEL PLUS ONE COVER PAGE
NO SYNOPSIS REQUIRED
One cover page listing titles of each entry
PRIZES: $100 FOR BEST IN EACH GENRE,
$300 FOR THE CRÈME DE LA CRÈME: BEST ENTRY AMONG GENRE FIRST
PLACE WINNERS, TOTAL TOP PRIZE: $300.
NO LIMIT ON # OF ENTRIES. YOU MAY REWORK YOUR ENTRY IN THE DECEMBER CONTEST
AND ENTER IT UNDER A SPECIFIC CATEGORY IN THE GENRE CONTEST.
[FIRST PRIZE WINNERS IN 2014 CONTEST ARE EXEMPTED]
UNPUBLISHED NOVELS ONLY.
YOU MAY BE PUBLISHED, BUT YOUR ENTRY SHOULD NOT BE.
ENTRIES PERMITTED BY E-MAIL OR SNAIL MAIL. MAY BE SENT NOW!
DEADLINE: MARCH 30
ALL ENTRIES ARE THE SAME PRICE: $15 PER
Rules for the contest: A single cover letter that includes your name, address, phone#, email address, titles
of all entries with genre.
1. Cover letter that includes your name, address, phone #, e-mail address, titles of all entries. One copy of
cover letter. State genre in cover letter.
2. No names on any MS pages. Title, copyright symbol okay. Use ALT0169 for symbol: ©
In header, state Genre. Helpful if you add page numbers.
3. Double space, Times Roman Font 11 or 12 pt. Furnish one copy of each entry.
4. Use e-mail or snail mail for entries. Do not print on back of pages.
5. Payment by check or PayPal. If check, mail to Houston Writers House, 12523 Folkcrest Way, Stafford
TX 77477
OTHER CONTESTS
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Don’t Miss This!
  
Houston Writers House Workshop:
ANN WEISGARBER
Saturday Feb. 28, 2015
10:30 a.m. till 3:30 p.m.
MONTROSE LIBRARY 4100 MONTROSE BLVD
(Lunch on your own at the Black Labrador or Eatsie in the same block)
LIMITED SEATING
Early Bird: Members: $30 if paid before Feb 21.
$33 IF PAID BY PAYPAL
After FEB. 15: $45
$60 for nonmembers (includes 6 months membership).
Use PayPal or mail check to HWH, 12523 Folkcrest Way, Stafford TX 77477
The First Two Pages – How to Make Them Shine
In this hands-on workshop, you are encouraged to bring the first two pages of your manuscript in
work. Ann will discuss the necessary elements to make the pages shine and will do writing exercises that
directly apply to the students’ manuscripts.
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!
Ann is the author of The Promise and The
Personal History of Rachel DuPree that was nominated for England’s 2009 Orange Prize and for the 2009
Orange Award for New Writers. In the United States, The Personal History of Rachel DuPree won the Stephen
Turner Award for New Fiction and the Langum Prize for American Historical Fiction.
It was shortlisted for the Ohioana Book Award for Fiction and was a Barnes and Noble Discover New Writer.
It has been optioned for film by
actress Viola Davis, star of The Help.
KUDOS FOR ANN AND HER NOVELS:
Ann Weisgarber is a writer's writer--the characters in her books are true to life and credible for the historical
times in which she writes. Her mind's eye is keen to unusual plots and details that bring life to her stories, e.g., a
black woman homesteading in a soddy in South Dakota (The Personal Life of Rachel Dupree). In addition, she
is one of the rare readers who as a critiquer/editor is able to dissect effective structures and styles of writing.
Her comments and suggestions make stories better! When you attend her upcoming workshop, be prepared for
great information and an enjoyable treat. --Barbara A. Andrews, Hetty's Song, the Death of the Skylark
The best novels put you not just in a place and time other than your own, they put your soul inside the soul and
body of another. You live this person's pain, sorrow, fear, confusion, satisfaction, enlightenment, and joys with
them. There is nothing formulaic, forced, or forgettable about this story. It is priceless.- -DRW
Exciting, different. I've recommended this book to everyone I know, and everyone loves it. It starts off in a very
tense situation and continues to grab the reader’s attention. --LS
Surfin’ with Roger
    
  
A BOUTIQUE ORGANZATION DEDICATED TO HELP YOU EDIT YOUR MANUSCRIPT AND
GET IT PUBLISHED.
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American FreeLancer, The Magazine of the Houston Writers House Feb 1, 2015
WANT TO BE A SELECT MEMBER?
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DUES: $40
OUT OF STATE OR MORE THAN 50 MILES FROM HOUSTON: $25
(USE PAYPAL OR PERSONAL CHECK FOR MEMBERSHIP)
If you want to use PayPal, go to our website: www.houstonwritershouse.com
MEMBERSHIP MEANS LOWER PRICES ON WORKSHOPS AND CONTEST ENTRIES
PLUS:  FREE PUBLICITY FOR MEMBERS
YOUR LATEST BOOK WITH YOUR BIO IN OUR NEWSLETTER AND ON OUR
WEBSITE.
ADD A REVIEW IF YOU LIKE
CRITIQUE SESSIONS:
FOUR TIMES PER WEEK & YOU MAY COME TO MORE THAN ONE.
WE OFFER THE BEST SESSIONS IN HOUSTON.
MANY OF OUR MEMBERS ARE PUBLISHED
WE EMPHASIZE CHARACTER & NARRATIVE DEVELOPMENT,
MOTIVATION, MAKING SCENES WORK, GOOD PACING, ET AL.
MONDAY 9:30-12.
TUESDAY 11:00-1 PM
THURSDAY 7 PM-10 PM
SATURDAY: 10 AM-12:30
PERSONAL COACHING:
$100 PER MONTH. Four Sessions, two hours each.
ONLY ONE SLOT IS OPEN AT THIS TIME.
ROGER’S EDITING SERVICE: 1¢ per word. (Members only: Less 20%)
TWENTY YEARS EDITING EXPERIENCE.
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PUBLISHED: 3 BY NEW YORK PUBLISHERS, 1 BY PANTHER CREEK PRESS, AND 2 SELF
PUBLISHED. ASK ME WHAT IS BEST FOR YOU?
DO YOU REALLY WANT AN EDITOR WHO HASN’T BEEN ABLE TO PUBLISH HIS OR HER
OWN WORK?
E-mail for further information: [email protected]
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