Product Review: Christian Writers' Market Guide

Most writers have heard of the Writer's Market and wouldn't dream of starting a new year without the latest issue on their desktop. Several writers I know request one for Christmas every year because they are a bit spendy, but a great asset to every writer.

The Christian Writers' Market Guide, compiled by Sally Stuart, a writer from Aloha, Oregon, is the Christian's tool for reaching his or her chosen market. It is similar to the Writer's Market, but is limited to information on Christian publications. I consider it one of the better writing tools I invest in each year.

The Christian Writers' Market Guide for 2007 boasts more than 600 pages of helpful information covering resources for writers, book and periodical publishers with detailed information about their specific requirements, and specialty markets including greeting card publishers, video markets, and software developers. In addition, it lists a multitude of helps for writers such as information on writers' conferences, workshops, writers' groups, editorial services, Christian agents, and writing contests.

Writers can go to the topic index in this guide and find all the publications that publish the type of Christian articles they are interested in writing. When they find one that sounds promising, they look it up to find out exactly what the publication requires of its authors. Each listing contains a wealth of information including such things as the address of the publication, the name of the editor, the type of things they buy (articles, short stories, poetry, fillers, etc.), required word length, payment, whether or not they buy reprints, what rights they purchase, whether they accept e-mail queries, etc. This market guide is a gold mine for authors.

To top all this off, a CD-Rom with contacts for 1200 markets is included in the 2007 Christian Writers' Market Guide. That alone is worth the price of the book, which, by the way is still under $35 a year, which is very good for such a high quality reference tool. If you request it, you can be added to the automatic mailing list and will receive your copy of the market guide every year without having to remember to order it. An invoice that you can pay by mail is included with the book.

Sally Stuart has written 34 books herself, and has sold more than a thousand articles and columns. She also writes for the Christian Communicator, and The Advanced Christian Writer, and is a frequent speaker at Christian writers' conferences. She is also a wife, mother and grandmother.

If you are interested in writing for the Christian market, which is growing larger all the time, and if you aren't already using the Christian Writer's Market Guide, you owe it to yourself to invest in a copy. I can almost guarantee that once you've tried it, you won't ever be without it again.