Reading, Writing Short Stories & Managing Rejections

Diving Back Into the Waters

Getting to work writing short stories these past few months and submitting to publishers which also includes managing rejections. I look over the acceptance percentages on Submissions Grinder to calm my rejection anxiety which, to be honest, I’ve grown rather accustomed to as a creative person.

From the Top…

I always start with the hardest SF/F magazines to get into first. My thinking is this, if the magazines that are easiest to get into reject the piece, then I’m done playing, game over. So to prolong the fun and the agony of rejection, I start at the top. That way I get a multitude of highs followed by dejecting lows all the way down. At least my story lives and dies a little longer before completely rolling over.

As writers, looking at a 1%-5% acceptance rate, we know the odds are stacked against us. But, it’s a passion and I enjoy the challenge. It’s not a complete waste of time because I’m happy working at it, I enjoy writing and the fun of submitting, and I’m learning a great deal.

If you can hold on to that attitude or something similarly positive, you’ll accomplish much.

Just recently, I saw where a writer submitted 50 times to Clarkesworld and finally was accepted.

And…you have to tier your rejections in this business. Some rejections are better than others, ha. If you’ve received personalized rejections then that’s the best rejection you can hope for. But even if you get the coveted words try us again in the future, then you know you’re on the right track.

I have received a few try us again/hope to read something new from you soon rejections, which means I’m getting close. But no cookie. Hey, in this business, you’re allowed to count the eggs that at least touch your basket as they fall…

Managing Rejections

Some of the rejection emails I’ve received showed ‘managing editor’ or ‘editor’, but there are different interpretations for this; some say it’s still a basic form rejection regardless of who is listed as the email sender. I’m not so sure of that. They say personalized is when the editor mentions something specific about the piece you’ve submitted.

Others say a personalized rejection is any email from the editor(s) that has a personal ‘submit again’ or ‘looking forward to reading more of your work soon’.

I like the following interpretation:

Treasure your personal rejections. Even if they’re just a sentence long. Personal rejections mean someone’s read your work, deemed it worth commenting on, and taken the time to let you know what they think. A personal rejection is a GEM in a pile of rejection-rocks. In most cases, you’re likely to get some useful feedback with a personal rejection – maybe the editor liked your writing but wasn’t so sure about the story, or maybe they didn’t want this particular submission but request that you send them something else. Or maybe they want to offer you some personalised critique to help you improve your writing.

Writer’s HQ

The Stats So Far: I’m Counting the Act of Submitting as Progress:)

I’ve submitted 4 stories to 12 markets. They were Science Fiction, Creative Non-fiction and Literary fiction magazines.

If I use the above interpretation, I’ve had 5 personal rejections and the remaining 7 were form rejections coming from ‘teams’ or first readers. The stats on ‘personal rejections given’ by various magazines are between 3.9% and 14.93%. The magazines to which I’ve submitted range from Smokelong to Black Static to Clarkesworld.

I am particularly pleased that these 5 rejections came from the editor or managing editor and requested to see more of my work. It gives me some hope and motivation:) I’ve also received a few middle tier rejections that came from ‘the team’ or something similar but they included “We look forward to reading further submissions from you.”

If you’ve received emails like this, you’re on the right track:)

So there seems to be a tiered progress for submissions:

  1. a blanket form rejection with no invitation to see more work
  2. a middle tier that ‘requests to see more work’ but doesn’t make it to the editor’s desk
  3. a personalized rejection from the managing editor or the editor-in-chief that extends an invitation to submit more work
  4. and then one other upper tier variation from the editor that includes a personal comment about the work, how to improve it or what they like about it

It’s the Jacob’s Ladder to Acceptance Heaven I guess, lol!

Summertime

It’s a new week! I have been dreaming of a vacation on the beach, it’s been awhile….and it’s been a terribly long year. So I may have to travel south for a bit this summer. But for now, gonna keep working~

Have a wonderful weekend everyone, many blessings <3

Looking Into Deep Space

It’s fascinating the things I find myself peering into when writing this Science Fiction Ghost Story. I am relaxing into the process now that I am seeing the fruit of my labors. Writing a novel which entails deep space exploration has been a challenging and enlightening endeavor. Writing a novel is the process of turning chaos into prose – nearly impossible really. But I’ve decided to relax and enjoy the things I love while I write. One of which is space.

This planet scientists call ‘Poltergeist’. It’s a super creepy Pulsar planet documented PSR B1257+12 c, and is an extrasolar planet approximately 2,300 light-years away”….

Other wonderful mysteries of deep space are lurking within the coffers of the web. If I’m going to traverse the galaxy, I figure I better understand our own Local Group first. Vast and various are the Lord’s magnificent displays…

NASA’s Cassini spacecraft has captured Saturn’s rings backlit by the sun and our planet Earth and its moon in the same frame. We look like another star from 898 million miles away.

Take a look at our vast Milky Way and beyond to our closest neighboring galaxy, Andromeda. Let’s take a weekend trip, what do ya say? Pack a light picnic; the particle accelerating spacecraft is outback…

I have nearly completed the second draft which fleshed out the story and characters bringing the theme into greater form. My third writing will be adding the voice and writing the novel. I’m excited!

Hope everyone is enjoying Spring. When my mind and pen are not among the stars, I am enjoying the green grass and bird songs of the season…

Have a beautiful week lovely people, and don’t forget to look up and admire the great expanse above our heads~

If you want an excellent book on the writing process, Stephen King’s On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft is a good start.

Write. Just write. That’s all…

Here we go again. Distractions. Always the same, something not right about my position in front for the TV, or about the fact that I’m in the living room with the TV beckoning to me as I try and grind out a few words onto this digital paper. So many new words introduced to the English language in the last decade alone. Hard to keep up. 

Jump up. Grab the dangerous wiry thing that the kitten is threatening to swallow which will surely get lodged somewhere in her intestinal tract if it’s not retrieved. 

This is not easy. 

The words are easy the thoughts too but not the composing. Not the broader picture of telling the story, laying it out, leaving mystery without being too vague and boring. Creating suspense or humor or whatever one tries to conjure up to help themselves believe they’re doing something important or productive with their time.

I have a lot of rust to get off. Shake it, scrape it, whatever it takes but get it out of the cogs. It’s holding everything up. The problem is not with starting. Not with me. At least not most of the time. It’s sticking with it. I have no time. Being a writer is a very glamorous thought; and deceptive. Anyone who writes is a writer. Same as anyone who talks is a talker or lies is a liar. 

It’s always something. It’s hard to write if you don’t read much. Got no words, no understanding of descriptions apart from boring verbs. Something more is needed. Insight; shedding light on a thing. Oh forget it; a better way to communicate. Something better is needed. 

It’s storming tonight. I hear, here, hare the rain pinging on the abandoned metal pipe vents of this nineteen-sixties home.  Hoping the lights don’t go out.  And that my cats aren’t tearing away at the furniture in the back room.

I just don’t want trouble period. Who does? I want mornings to sleep into. And coffee to leisurely wake up with on the porch.

I don’t cook now precisely because I am too tired and have no time.  And though a woman may catch her game, she will certainly starve if she doesn’t take the time to roast it. 

Let’s go get dessert; ice cream? No, actually just brush my teeth so I can go to bed. Why can’t teeth be like eardrums? I don’t have to brush my eardrums before bed. Albeit, I’m not sticking skittles into my ears to digest, never mind…

Perhaps I should keep the notebook near just in case a dream or sleep-thought is a good one and I need to wrap the butterfly net over it quickly in the dark before it gets away.

Sleeping is good. Still rusty and need to do something to shake the consequences of sedentary thought out of my ears and eyes and well, off my life. I just want to get up to feed the kittens. They are really hungry tonight.  Ravenous is a better word I think. I should have used ravenous. 

I should read more.

And the fact that my nose feels like a block of clay. It’s the middle of winter and it was 79 degrees yesterday and 30 something right now. So I just asked Siri to open the weather app.

Silence.

And she should be on standby listening to me so I don’t have to press the button each time. Or key or whatever.  Dear Jesus.  Fix her already. 

I don’t know what to do next. And now I’m hungry. Anyway, I need a plan. Do I need to start thinking about what type of book I want to write? 

Storyline

Characters

Plots 

And foibles 

I just don’t know

Still rusty. 

I can think back on little sparks of ideas that seemed so good and I never wrote them down, never captured them or if I did, I don’t know where the slips of paper I scratched disappeared to. Perhaps buried or crushed or thrown away; lost forever. Those ideas and thoughts were in my mind; so vivid and true. 

Now they are gone. Unbelievable. 

And I’m hungry. Why didn’t I go to the grocery store last week. Oversight. Now I have to eat canned spaghetti sauce over cooked noodles. So bland and boring. But I’m hungry and didn’t go to the grocery store. 

This time, I didn’t even hunt my game.

Featured Image by Jess Bailey