Is this the appropriate place to write short stories?

You see, I am an inexperienced writer, and also limited in computer science and typing. I have these things to say . I am in my 60s in bad health and it seems time to get these stories that my friends and I wrote at my small farm in Sonoma Valley,while AIDS was wiping out the Gay population of SF. We were a wild bunch. I think I'll call the collection Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves. ( with apologies to Cher)

If you simply want to post stuff for critique and feedback, then this is a great venue for that sort of thing. But if you hope to publish these stories, you may be limiting your options by posting here first.

Since this is a publicly viewable forum, some potential publishers might consider the posting of your stories here to be "first publication." If those publishers themselves demand first publication rights, you'll have undercut yourself.

There are some online writing forums that require (sometimes free) registration and membership; this restricts the viewing of your work and generally preserves the right of first publication.


But if you simply want feedback, then by all means post!

and don't want them to end up being thrown out by some uncaring relatives, when I croak

Or are they all in hardcopy?

If the former, it would be a pretty simple matter to copy-and-paste into a post here, and lots of people would be happy to talk you through it, if it's giving you trouble.

If you have them in hardcopy, you'd probably be best off to type them into Word or some other format. That way, you'd have them electronically for your own sake, and you could still copy-and-paste to post them here.

Soooo , I will begin typing them into word as you suggested, then I can release them in chapters, while I try to develop a unifying thread, rather than trying to do it at one time.

then add them to your du journal or start a blog/website just for your stories

or read them and film a picture of something as you read, (so you'd be doing a voice over of the story with a picture of a photograph or whatever) and throw it up on youtube.com (i have no idea how to put anything on youtube--but maybe you do) and they'll be there as long as youtube exits (with your voice). you could call it: STORY TIME WITH MITCH! "and now for my latest work: gypsies, tramps & thieves, chapter one, holyshitsmolie--(insert the name of your story there)"

you could also pass the stories around to people you are still in touch with that were part of the experience so you could take them down memory lane and share some memories--good and bad.

there is also a website (lulu.com) http://www.lulu.com/ where you can typeset your stories online into a book format and order copies of it.

my friend did that--he put together a book for his family, interviewing and transcribing hours with his parents, breaking it into chapters, adding old family photos--everyone (parents, siblings, nieces & nephews) got a hardcover of it. it turned out great. no one in his family is ever going to throw it away--it's an heirloom.

anyway--just a few ideas. good luck with your endeavor.

Depends on how much I put into it , I will be posting soon

:hi: :popcorn: