Pile Police: Are they after you?

Spring cleaning? If the Pile Police paid you a visit, could your writing corner get you landed on an upcoming episode of Buried Alive?

Arrest yourself from bad habits—and improve your chances of publication—with these easy methods. Freedom and success comes with a painless, quick system that won’t take a month of being held up on rainy Saturdays to get going.

1. Writer Magazines, conference notes, and other stacks of “helpful” information
Save only the most useful advice by removing it from the magazine and putting it where it will truly be handy and helpful. See Binders below!

2. Binders – Gather several binders, ideally with pockets. Shop your house first. Mine are not fancy. I stole them from a box filled with my husband’s grad school work. He’ll never miss them.

3. What goes inside?
Devote a binder to specific purposes and manuscripts. Marketing and Promotion Ideas. Tracking School Visits. Great Writer Advice. Each novel-length project gets its own. Lump magazine articles together in a fat binder. Short stories or picture books share, too. If you have a lot of short pieces, perhaps label those by year.
Even if documents are stored in computer files, I print hard copies occasionally. This saved me once during a computer crash. The manuscript copy goes in the binder. Came across contact info for the perfect agent for your novel that isn’t ready to submit for another year? Save it in the binder. Great lines scribbled in a hurry on a menu? Brochure from visiting the story’s real-life setting? Use a hole puncher or slip them in a pocket. Plop in the bits and pieces that will help your writing succeed. When you are ready to spend time on a particular project, you will have everything to get up to speed without wasting time searching.

4. Rejection Letters:
Make this binder fun, as it contains pain, agony and pieces of your heart. I labeled mine: The Someday I will be Sorry Club

5: Other resources
For paperless tracking of submissions to agents and publishers, try online resources like Query Tracker. It’s a great place to gather research on industry needs without adding the clutter of research to your desk.

Now that you’re more organized, you’re free to write, write, write!