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Brown, Bob: Who Will Publish My Short Story? Writers’
Journal; Nov/Dec 2007, Page 23.
Who Will Publish My Short Story?
Find The Perfect Magazine For Your Story
Bob Brown
Dueling Partners was
destined to be my best ever Short Story, or so I thought. I knew my story was
long (13,381 words), but it is so good, how could any literary magazine turn it
down? Nearly all of them, I found out. It would be an easy call for the magazine
editor; one glance at my word count and my beautiful manuscript would be tossed
into the recycle bin without him even reading the title.
Thus
began my quest to find magazines that wanted long stories. I eventually found
several, but only after banging away on my computer for several days. Intensive
searching of the Internet soon overwhelmed my tiny brain cells and they mired up
knee-deep in guidelines information. To eliminate confusion, I constructed a
chart to organize my list of magazines. Since most of my stories are much
shorter than Dueling Partners, I also listed
magazines that accepted stories of many different lengths. My list of over 300
magazines grew faster than Jack’s Beanstalk. It occurred to me that many Short
Story authors would find my chart as useful as I have, so I gave the chart the
title of Submissions
Guidelines and put it on my Web site. See:
www.inventwrite.com/Guidelines.htm
Using
the chart is simple. When you have finished your story, scan the Size Limit column
for magazines that will accept your story’s word length. Next check the Submission Dates column to make
sure the magazine’s time window is open for reading your story (Your story
will not be read if you ignore their time window). Finally, tap the word
“Guidelines” in the Web
site column for complete submission details. These details can be
very skimpy or several pages long. Caution: Editors are looking for any excuse
to reduce their reading load, so follow all instructions to the letter.
Submission Guidelines is
for authors of Short Stories; however many literary magazines also accept poems,
essays, and reviews. Not included in the list are specialty magazines. For
example, you won’t find magazines of poems only, or magazines that only read a
specific genre (science fiction, pornographic, etc.), or magazines that only
accept stories from certain authors (women, high school students, residents of
Kankakee, etc.).
After
reading over 300 Submission Guidelines, certain conclusions were obvious to me.
·
Authors who ignore guidelines are not likely to be
accepted.
·
Competition is tough. Only 1 to 2% of the stories
received are ever printed.
·
It is not uncommon for authors to submit their
stories to 20 magazines before being accepted.
·
Simultaneous submissions are usually permitted if
you tell the editor in a cover letter that your story is being sent to other
magazines—and promise to inform them if your story is accepted elsewhere. Most
editors recognize how hard it is for an author to wait to hear from one magazine
before they resubmit their story to another magazine. Typical response time from
each magazine may be six months. Do the arithmetic, six months times twenty
submissions, or 10 years for each story. I’m a patient guy, but I’m also 80
years old. Have a heart. Not allowing simultaneous submissions should be against
the law (my opinion).
·
Many editors strongly suggest that you read one of
their issues before submitting a story. Of course this will help you find the
best magazine for your story, but it is simply not practical. Sample copies of
their magazine vary from $5.00 to $17.00. Assuming you send your story to twenty
magazines, you could spend several hundred dollars and seriously delay ever
seeing your story in print. A few magazines have several of their typical
stories on their Web sites; more magazines should follow this practice. They
might miss selling a few sample copies to authors, but it could also cut down on
their reading load since authors would know whether their story is a good fit
before submitting it.
·
Many editors let you submit your story by email. I
expect this method of submitting stories will become more widespread in the
future. Submitting by email is quick, reduces response time, and saves the
author printing and mailing expenses.
·
A Short Story author must write for pleasure,
because precious few magazines pay any money. You’re fortunate if you get one
or two copies of the magazine when it is issued. Many editors commented that
they would like to pay authors, but their budgets are too tight.
·
New magazines replace dying magazines at a fairly
high rate.
Writing
Short Stories may be the very best way to hone your skills before starting the
Great American Novel. Short stories aren’t likely to pay your rent—or in
many cases even earn you the price of a cup of coffee—but few endeavors bring
more pleasure. And nothing, absolutely nothing, beats seeing your story in a
print.
REPRINT
Brown, Bob: Who Will Publish My Short Story? Writers’
Journal; Nov/Dec 2007, Page 23.
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