Back at the end of August, I blogged about how I was going to do a writing challenge in September to produce more short stories to fill out my publishing queue. At the time, I had a couple of stories that looked like they were going to be picked up by one of the major… Continue reading Bowing Out
Tag: submitting
Short Story: The Body Tax
This was a fun one to write, even if it did go a little dark at first. The idea for it came from this article about a couple in San Francisco who received an outrageously huge warning fine ($1,500) for parking their car in their own driveway. In the comments to the article, I wrote:… Continue reading Short Story: The Body Tax
Refining my short story strategy
I’ve blogged several times about my short story strategy. To restate it briefly, I’ve found that it works best to self-publish all of my short story singles for free, and to take them down when I have enough of them (+40k words, usually about 10 stories) to bundle into a collection. I earn more this… Continue reading Refining my short story strategy
Navigating Woke SF, Part 4: Götterdämmerung
Governor Andrew Cuomo announced his resignation today, after his sexual harrassment scandal that has seen an overwhelming number of women come forward. As tempted as I am to dive into the politics of this story, I bring it up only to provide context for this: Yeah, I’m cringing too. For the last several years—arguably, since… Continue reading Navigating Woke SF, Part 4: Götterdämmerung
What I would do if I were starting out now
In a word, short stories. Write a bunch of short stories. One or two a week if possible. Keep that up for a year or two, tapering off at the end to transition into novels. But keep writing short stories even after novels have become the main focus. Make a serious effort while writing short… Continue reading What I would do if I were starting out now
What’s up with Asimov’s?
Way back in June, I submitted a short story to Asimov’s. Normally, it takes them four to six weeks to come back with a response. However, it’s been almost five months and I haven’t heard anything. I’m not the only one, either. According to The Submission Grinder, their slushpile is backed up to the end of… Continue reading What’s up with Asimov’s?
A short rant about simultaneous submissions
TL;DR: If you run a short story magazine and it takes you longer than six weeks to respond to submissions, you should allow simultaneous submissions as a courtesy to your writers. A simultaneous submission is when the writer sends the same story to multiple markets at the same time, instead of going down the list one-by-one and… Continue reading A short rant about simultaneous submissions
Yay for short stories!
So for the past three weeks while waiting for my first readers to get back to me with their comments on Strangers in Flight, I’ve been working on short stories. It’s a great way to stay busy and productive between projects, and feels really gratifying too because it only takes a week or two to… Continue reading Yay for short stories!
Thoughts on traditional vs. indie publishing
In case you didn’t know, the publishing industry is in the throes of a major revolution. With the growing popularity of e-books and the collapse of distribution channels and chain bookstores such as Borders, traditional business models are proving simply untenable. I’ve been perusing several internet sources to make sense of all the craziness, among… Continue reading Thoughts on traditional vs. indie publishing
Sick (blegh!), submitting, and thoughts on self-publishing
Sorry I haven’t been posting much recently; I came down with a nasty fever this week, and I’ve spent the last two days recovering. It really sucks, because my two temp jobs just finished, and I was hoping to get into another writing routine. The jobs were sucking up all my time, though it was… Continue reading Sick (blegh!), submitting, and thoughts on self-publishing