About Trying to Write for Magazines

I used to send article queries out to magazines. I would spend hours every day composing nothing but the best queries, following all the rules, and only after perusing every resource I could get my hands on for article ideas that this magazine or that one might be interested in publishing. I spent many months doing these things. Occasionally editors would even send letters to me in return asking for more queries. But over time, I came to the conclusion that I either did not know enough about magazine publishing, or I did not have enough education to be able to impress the editors I wanted to impress, or I simply was not creative enough to come up with new ideas every single day.

I am a freelance ghostwriter, and my favorite gigs are the novels and memoirs people ask me to write. Once I have negotiated with my client what he should pay me, I sit down with his story ideas, and poke and prod his characters until they sit up and talk to me. You see, they need to wake up enough to tell me what it is they want and how they want to get it. And then I write, while working with my client to make sure I’m composing the story he wants. This sort of writing is always a joy to do.

But still, I would like to work the magazine market. Every so often I look at it and think that I’m nearly ready to do that. I surely have oodles of articles scattered across the Internet, some of which could be used as samples of my work. I have been spending 90 percent of my waking hours for the last five or more years writing and reading, and then writing and reading some more, and I have learned how to string a few sentences together to keep my readers and clients happy.

Yeah, perhaps I can look at all those magazine listings again, without getting that sinking feeling of defeat before I even begin. After all, I sit down to write another article almost every day. So, is it time to make another grab for courage and send out the queries again?

Perhaps this poking around among magazine listings is due to some sort of seasonal affect. One of these days I will get another book contract, and I will be too busy to consider writing more queries to magazine editors.