Helping Minorities Find Their Voices in the Media
By Sarah Van Blaricum


Everyone has something to say. Unfortunately, in our society everyone has not had the same opportunity to be heard. Many ethnic and multicultural writers become frustrated when they fail to find appropriate vehicles for their work. One has to wonder how many great writers are being stifled because they are not the right race, religion, ethnic group or sexual orientation.
Enter Writer's Relief, a unique business that caters to these frustrated authors. "We spend an enormous amount of time researching and targeting appropriate markets for our clients' work, freeing up their time to write. In addition, we work with our clients to prepare their manuscripts to meet industry standards," says Ronnie L. Smith, president and founder of Writer's Relief. "We help fill in the blanks so that writers have more time to write."
For most writers, it is a very difficult task to place their work in appropriate markets. If you are a member of a minority group, the difficulty is compounded. Many writers who had previously had trouble finding their "fit" in print media have been published through their service. "We help writers find their markets," says Smith. "We offer our clients the opportunity to have their words shared on a variety of topics dealing with the current administration and its policies, world leaders, religious tolerances and abuses, and the violation of rights of the underprivileged and traditionally oppressed classes of people around the world."
Smith's team prepares and submits manuscripts for writers of all kinds. "Most writers are not good at promoting their own work," says Smith. "They're good at creating; we're great at marketing." In addition to helping writers prepare book proposals so they can query agents, Writer's Relief proofreads and submits poetry or short stories/essays to literary journals.
Writer's Relief does extensive journal research to find the perfect fit for each client so good writers of every race and creed have a chance to be heard. "We help writers find their markets," Smith says. Their extensive database is able to match each writer with magazines who give voice to often-voiceless writers through familiarity with markets specific to these often-neglected topics.
Literary journals have a 99 percent rejection rate, but Writer's Relief's track record defies the odds. "You often have to make 100 submissions before you get one 'yes,'" says Smith. "Each rejection brings you closer to acceptance." Out of their 300 current writer clients, Writer's Relief has gotten 268 of them published.
Writer's Relief was founded eleven years ago by Ronnie L. Smith, who created the business after a crippling bout with vertigo. As she slowly recovered through physical and occupational therapy, a friend asked her to submit the friend's poetry to magazines. "I'd literally crawl to the computer," Smith says. Much to her friend's delight, the poems were published in highly-respected journals.
Other clients followed, and a business was born. Soon, Smith moved from her mother's garage to larger offices. Today she has hundreds of clients and ten employees, ranging in age from 20 to 82. "Our business is unusual in that we all still like to come to work every day and so do our dogs," Smith says.
In addition to maintaining a worker-friendly job environment, Smith is proud of the work they do. "It makes me happy to give media voices to people who have none," says Smith, who is fearless when choosing to take on clients. "Their work has a very particular voice," she says. Writers who have a lot to say but have not been able to find an outlet for a creative voice have a friend and mentor in Writer's Relief.
For more information or to set up an interview with Ronnie L. Smith, please contact Sarah Van Blaricum at 727-443-7115, ext. 207 or at sarah@event-management.com
To learn more visit www.wrelief.com.

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Editor: Akhtar M. Faruqui
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