Compost

I have been (gently) nagged. Thanks, Val.

This blog has been sitting with the shutters closed and dust sheets over the furniture while I relearned how to self-edit and finally sent a couple of stories out into…

Into what, exactly?

One of the rejection-tracking websites calls it ‘The Black Hole’ – but that’s too solid. Black holes are there, affecting the physical universe, swallowing matter and leaking out Hawking radiation. But send out a piece of creative work and it’s just gone, in some kind of limbo – without form and void. Right now I’d feel more confident of a response if I’d rolled the MS up, stuck it in a bottle and thrown it into the ebbing tide. I can’t even do that now, I’d fall foul of No Simultaneous Submissions rule.

That’s strange isn’t it? It would make sense if Editors were heartless megalomaniacs who insisted on their right to ignore your manuscript for six months before consigning it to the compost heap, all the while owning some kind of right to prohibit someone else having any kind of composting rights.

Editors can’t be like that, right?

There are always the Competitions. At least they have deadlines, so you know when to give up. But competitions are so well-built, the outer defences – those volunteer readers - secure against anything innovative and original, the final judge(s) impregnable to anything but the most original and innovative. Anyone figured it out yet?

So back to the magazines – serious ones, no vanity publish-all websites. I’ve got a story that, on and off, I’ve spent (too) many hours on since its first conception two and a half years. Now, to my satisfaction, it is finished, ready to be sent out into the world.

Let’s say I send it to Shimmer – a good magazine, one which I’ve enjoyed reading. Guidelines include Standard Manuscript Format (pain) and No Simultaneous Submissions. They’re in the USA, so I have to figure out how to get it there with the right international postage on a SAE to get the rejection slip back to me. (Just because I want to be published in print does not mean I’m a LUDDITE. Not all the time.)

Duotrope lists Shimmers's average response time as an incredibly quick 12 days per rejection. So let’s have a look at the other markets otherswho submitted to Shimmer tried. Stick to things I’ve read… in no particular order…

GUD (Greatest Uncommon Denominator) – 20 average days per rejection.

Abyss&Apex – 36 days.

Strange Horizons – 42 days.

Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet – 212 days.

Imagine I strike it incredibly lucky. That carefully nurtured story has only needed 5 submissions to find a loving and accepting market . It’s only taken 322 days.

Wait – it takes a bit longer to receive an acceptance than a rejection. Plus there’s handling and posting and messing about. May even a minor rewrite.

Let’s call it an even year.

So, feeling optimistic, here’s to sitting here in January 2011 telling you about the marvellous, overnight success of a new short story.