News & Magazine Writing, Getting Published, Marketing Products

Magazine Writing That Sells

Name: Magazine Writing That Sells
Author: Don McKinney
ISBN: 9780898796421

by Don McKinney

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Overview

You're about to embark on an article-writing adventure. In this book, Don McKinney - editor, freelance writer, instructor - helps you work toward a higher quality of writing, to better your chances of placing articles with a higher quality of magazine. You'll begin with the idea. Article ideas are everywhere - but often buried, like mountains under molehills. McKinney helps you unearth yours and advises you in matching it to a magazine. And he shows you how to sell your article - before writing it - by creating a query letter sure to catch an editor by the imagination and intellect. Once you've got the nod, you'll talk to people and dig up information. Keeping the interview on track; the tape-or-notebook question; probing sensitive areas - McKinney helps you make these conversations count. He also ushers you into the library and to reference publications that will put you on the trail to facts you need. And he gives you an overview of computer databases and what's available on-line and on CD-ROM. Talk about saving time. And then, ready with the fruits of your research, armed with supporting comments, it's time to write. This book helps you by taking you into the very core of good wordsmithing. You'll learn about:. Leads - the four basic functions your opening should serve, and four general categories of effective leads. You'll see how to grab your reader and yank him into your story. And how others, including E.B. White, Dave Barry and Frank DeFord, have done that. Endings - how to close your piece so that it rings in the reader's mind. You'll analyze ten types of finishes that McKinney identifies. Listen to the resonance in the samples of work by Shana Alexander, Saul Pett, John McPhee, Rex Reed and others. Structure - how to pound and knead and shape the agglomeration of information you've collected into a well-told tale. You'll learn about four types of article structure. And you'll see how, once you've got your story's elements in their proper places, to sn

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Editorials

Library Journal

Almost anyone can come up with a subject and gather material, but very few can put that material all together and make it sparkle. This is the premise of McKinney, a writing teacher and former magazine editor. To rectify the situation, McKinney deflates some of the common writing wisdom and advises "to forget everything you ever learned about the `craft of writing' and...just write." He then illustrates how to capture a lively interview, select between important and trivial details, and get an editor's attention. Worth the price of the book alone is the chapter "53 Ways To Be a More Effective Freelancer," tips mostly culled from elsewhere in the book and compiled into a convenient list. He concludes with "How To Get Started," which sums up the advice and expectations of top magazine editors. Recommended as one of the more original how-to writing books on the market.-Cathy Sabol, Northern Virginia Community Coll., Manassas

Caroline Andrew

Sell your article with queries that grab an editor's attention and write leads that scream "Read me." McKinney, former editor of the "Saturday Evening Post" and "McCall's", has filled this guide with advice all aspiring freelance writers should read. Different perspectives on and examples of queries, leads, story enders, and more abound in this friendly handbook designed to help novice writers through each step of the entire process of writing and marketing magazine articles. While all the advice is solid and helpful, some outstanding features include the annotated bibliography, listing such classic titles as William Zinsser's "On Writing Well", "The Orwell Reader", "The Essays of E. B. White", Woody Allen's "Getting Even"; a compilation of the most essential items discussed in the book, "Fifty-Three Ways to Be a More Effective Freelancer"; and a detailed guide to sources available in any large library, including information on computer searches and CD-ROM indexes.