As for the use of “none” I am a little red-faced. It is one of those words that so easily trips one up, especially with the pressure of trying to post an article on this blog every day. Still no excuse for sloppy writing.

For the pedants reading this, the indefinite pronoun “none” can be either singular or plural, depending on the context. I wrote “None (meaning not one) was successful.” However, I was writing about several items, so I should have written “None (meaning not any) were successful.”

I certainly hope “Ads” is not being just an armchair critic hiding behind a pseudonym; they’re a dime a dozen. At least I’m having a go, getting my writing out there in competitions, in magazines and on my blogs. I know I’m not perfect – just a keen writer having a go.

“Had some bad news in the mail yesterday. I received the results of a literary competition run by and Australian magazine. I had submitted three poems and three short stories. None was successful. ”

Overlooking the obvious typo “and” instead of “an” if your sentences are constructed like this “None was successful.” I’m not surprised. None were successful maybe??? English 101 I would have thought!

Thank you for visiting my blog and for leaving a comment. Yes – I know what you mean, having tried the same merry-go-round you seem to be on. It is most frustrating.

I still have three unpublished novels and a number of texts for children’s picture books in my files – plus a growing number of ideas for more books. I will get them finished sometime in the next year or so and I will continue to try to break into the difficult world of print publishing.

In the meantime I am getting a great deal of satisfaction from writing my three blogs. I know I am getting read by hundreds of people on a daily basis (over 100,000 visitors this year already). I am also beginning to see some small financial rewards from this writing. Like the number of readers, the income is steadily increasing every month.