Carolyn See, author of the book, Making a Literary Life ~ Advice for Writers and Other Dreamers*, recommends that her students of writing send "one charming note, five days a week, to an author, an editor, a journalist, a poet, a sculptor...someone whose professional work or reputation you admire...

"Life is a matter of courtship and wooing, flirting and chatting. If you don't know a soul in the literary world, you can choose to stay home and sulk until the cows come home. You can write stuff and look at it and agonize and worry and wait five years and send something out to a periodical where they've never heard of you and a bored clerk or intern will send it right back with a printed rejection slip."

Carolyn See suggests that by reaching out to people in the field, you can make your own literary life ~ an intriguing idea. Certainly, under any circumstances a complimentary handwritten note is probably a good idea. Five days a week could be taxing and impractical given our Canadian postal rates.

~ *Random House Publishing Group, 2002.