Great writing touches that part of us that’s tied
up in our aspirations, dreams, successes and losses. I aspire
to touch all who read my words. - Steven B. Beach
My website bio presents a predicament. As any writer knows,
we write our own bios, and we usually do so in third person
– because openly paying tribute to oneself seems shallow
and self serving. But since this site is aimed at editors
and writers, I’ll forego that, since writing my bio
here in third person would seem, well, shallow and self serving.
I attended Old Dominion University for my first formal training
as a writer before moving on to Duke University. My professor
at Duke said the hardest part of being a magazine writer is
making the first sale. So you might imagine my surprise when
I sold a magazine article (The Fateful Sting) on my first attempt,
and the first op-ed piece
I sent to a newspaper (Journalism Ethics)
was syndicated and published as the lead op-ed in an even
larger newspaper.
During this time I wrote and delivered a series of lectures
in the field of metaphysics for the Association for Research
and Enlightenment based in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Then,
with the exception of an allergy article I wrote for the award
winning website
HowStuffWorks.com, I spent the following nine years designing and building
a one of a kind custom home – almost single handedly
– before turning my attention back to writing.
Since 2002 I have:
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Been published in the best selling Chicken
Soup for the Soul book series. |
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Reached Editor at Large status with Paraglider magazine,
with a position on the masthead second only to the founding
editor. |
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Become a literary critic for the Winston Salem Journal
newspaper. |
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Become a photojournalist. |
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Sold an assortment of articles, stories and photographs
to a variety of publications. |
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Written copy in the form of website content. |
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Won first place in Inscription magazine’s international
writing contest targeting professional writers. |
And honor of honors, shortly after people unbeknownst to me used my
words as an epigraph for a business Web page, my quote was picked up by
an assortment of quotation Websites. Click here
to see my favorite.
I’m also happy to say that my words are presently displayed on the
personal Websites of three authors whose books I reviewed.
Clinton McKinzie
Linwood Barclay.com
Blake Crouch
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