To Do list
2007-07-09 | Filed under Writing |
I have many important things on my To Do list. And so, in my typical fashion, I will concentrate for the moment upon some of the unimportant things. Much easier to deal with, and I can fool myself that the pleasure of checking them off will inspire me to tackle other, more important tasks.
I used to be very good about sending submissions out, usually very soon after they were completed, and there was seldom a long turn-around between rejection and resubmission. I’ve gotten out of that habit. I have half a dozen completed stories sitting on my hard drive right now (some bounced from one or two markets, others never sent out at all). They’ve been sitting there for years. Literally. Years, plural.
That’s no good. By the end of the week (defined as Sunday), I’m going to foist them off on appropriate editors. And plan for the next market to try after rejections.
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In the same boat. Why does sending them out–a lot of it online now–take so much energy?
I never used to think of it as being a pain. Get the rejection, read over the story again, in some instances make changes I was excited about and otherwise leave it alone…so yeah, it was never instant turn around, but I used to at least manage prompt.
It’s especially weird because my market knowledge lapsed. Six months is a long time in the small press world; a year or two is an eternity. On the one hand I got to feel all curmudgeonly about these new kids (especially the ones who announce they’re going to “try something new,” which bears a surprising resemblance to stuff that’s been going on for at least ten years). On the other, it’s always fun to find new markets.
Strangely enough, email submissions take me longer than snailmail ones. The reason is that the guidelines for electronic submissions are usually much more detailed, and rarely organized in a way where I can just glance at the page and know exactly how to follow directions.
Right, and the fact that “standard manuscript format” isn’t standard for a lot of pubs. I’ve gotten to the point where I have my “master” file that’s standard, and then I’ll have separate files if I’m submitting to markets that want a blank line between paragraphs, text-only formats or HTML.
During periods when I was asking for standard manuscript format, I had a lot of authors send in something else. I don’t much care so long as I can read it, and I’ve always counted formatting as part of production; but I’d expected the standard to be the default format for more authors.
Oh, that’s true Stephen. I never thought of it but formatting for online zines is time-consuming. Print journals normally just request 12 Times Roman.. On the other hand, I’ve had stories at print journals for a year. Zines are usually fairly quick.
How exciting. Good luck!
Yes, well, my goal of getting six things out resulted in my getting two things out. Which is better than nothing.