3 Tips For Writing Your First Mag Story

Happy hump day, Edsters!

Some big news this week – I have a byline in the magazine!

Last week I blogged about a story I was doing research for. I’m going to get a small research credit for that, but this week something even better developed. My own story and a real byline. I can’t even fully believe it.

Admittedly, this story is not the most exciting thing ever. It’s a small, front-of-the-book item, barely more than 40 words. But still, it means my name and my writing is going to be read by people all over the country, and I couldn’t be more excited.

It was an interesting experience, too. I’m used to writing longer pieces – for me, 500 words is pretty short, never mind 50. I had to figure out a way to shrink three 30-minute interviews into three sentences, which was more of a challenge than I thought it would be. Here are a few things I’ve learned about writing short-form for mags: