Basic Guidelines: What we look for when reading ms « Thread Started on Sept 3, 2006, 1:28pm »
What we look for when reading manuscripts:
Characters Readers Well Identify With:
Have you ever read a story, that you really loved, and found yourself thinking: “Boy do I know how that feels!” ? That’s we want our readers to say, when the pick up a TMP magazine. Wither it be joy, pain, anger, or saddness, we want to see characters who “feel real” to the reader.
Characters Who Can Return:
We seek enduring characters, heroes and villains, especially those who can be used as returing characters, to appear multiple times in several short shorts. In short we want to see characters that our readers well fall in love with and request to see more of. We also seek writers willing to create repeat stories about the same character.
Here are examples of popular repeat characters found in the print media:
Sherlock Holmes Zorro Batman Nancy Drew Retief Capt. James T. Kirk Dr. Who, Xena The Three Investigators Flash Gordan Robin Hood The Joker Wonder Woman Conan Harry Potter ...and oh so many more!
They are great classic book and short story characters who’ve appeared in several issues of pulp fiction for many years, some beame great TV and movie hits… of that list only two started out in film and went to books later: Capt. James T. Kirk & Xena.
Plots:
Does your story have one? You do know that it should right? Not sure what a plot is. Okay. A plot has a beginning. Later on, it comes to a middle section. Lastly it comes to the end.
The beginning tells us about the character, his goal, and why he must get his goal completed.
The middle tells us how he tried to solve the problem. What did he do to reach his goal?
The end, tells us wither he succeeded or failed, and why.
Originality:
We look for uniquely original stories that shine out through the dark deeps of the slush pile. What make a story uniquie? Well, that you write in your own style, and not try to copy someone else’s style.
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