Tuesday, February 9, 2010

The story of a successful short fiction submission


Yes, today is Tuesday, so I should be posting about last night's Grub Street class. However, on Sunday night I got some excellent news that must preempt our regularly scheduled programming.

I am delighted to announce that I will have a (very) short fiction piece published in Boston Literary Magazine's upcoming Spring 2010 issue! Many, many thanks to editor Robin Stratton.

Walking on Eggshells is a drabble inspired in part by a writing exercise given in my Grub Street class last week (KL and Sue... thank you), and it should be online around mid-March or so. I will, of course, provide a link when the issue is live, and I highly recommend that you peruse the current issue and archives; I am delighted to be in this literary company.

So, how did I find BLM? First, I ran a search on Duotrope for markets that were seeking literary (genre) flash fiction (length) and accepted e-mail submissions (sub type). And yes, that returned an intimidating 735 primary matches. But I started clicking around anyway. I clicked on magazines with cool names. I clicked on magazines I knew from previous internet searches. When I found magazines with content that I liked, I carefully reviewed the sections at the bottom of these listings, entitled "Work submitted here was also submitted to..." and "Users accepted here also had work accepted by..." I treated these like recommendations and clicked through all of those. In all cases I clicked on the website as well as the Duotrope summary listing page.

I told my husband that it was like going on blind dates or speed dating.* Some markets were clearly bad matches at first glance: for example, I cannot abide websites with talking animation on the front page, and I wouldn't want my work associated with them (the date with bad hygiene you don't even want to be seen with). Some seemed promising, but ultimately had content that didn't move me (the "good on paper" date with no chemistry). Some markets with good content were temporarily closed to submissions (the hot date who will be going away on business for several months). Others had incompatible length requirements for the pieces I have in progress, or were otherwise not a fit for me (the date who has incompatible views on religion or number of kids). Some just seemed too unattainable (the date who's so sought-after that he/she can actually hold out for a super model brain surgeon... you know who you are, Ploughshares. Some day you will be mine, One Story.)

At some point, I stumbled across a magazine that was labeled as being among the "Most Personable Fiction Markets." That sounded promising, and I clicked that link. Apparently, "54 markets have a personal rejection to form rejection ratio of at least 90%" -- they provide actual feedback with their rejections. I clicked on some more titles that appealed to me, and saw that Boston Literary was also in Duotrope's 25 Swiftest Fiction Markets, with an average response time of under seven days. Immediate gratification AND an explanation if I was rejected? An excellent combination. I went to the website.

INSTANT CHEMISTRY. The website was aesthetically pleasing, and the fiction was breathtaking. Sometimes you recognize intellectually that a short story is well-crafted, but it doesn't really get to you emotionally; these stories were going right for my gut. I devoured the current issue. The Headache in the Cellar (flash fiction). A New Tattoo, Health Kick, Memoirs of Icarus, Pool of Narcissus, and Test Day (quick fiction). And then, The Drabble and The Dribble, stories of exactly 100 or 50 words, respectively. I'd never heard of these categories before (indeed, I thought they were categories belonging exclusively to this magazine), and I thought they were marvelous.

I immediately opened up a document and started drafting a short piece based on an idea I'd gotten in class a few days earlier. When the first revision put me at 100 words exactly without my even trying, I knew it was meant to be.

Yes, I did continue to revise after that. (There's fate, and then there's just being sloppy.) Several versions later, I once again hit 100 words without having to count words as part of my edits (I ran the word count function periodically and then revised merely with an eye to going higher or lower, but without actually trying to add or remove an exact number of words). I then reviewed the submission guidelines once more, and sent the story off.

I'm thrilled that the editor of Boston Literary also felt it was a match, but in some ways I'm not totally surprised. Writers and editors talk about literary "voice" all the time... the fiction in the magazine's current issue (and, as I later discovered, the archives as well) "spoke" to me. Maybe it was a mutual fit because we have the same kind of voice.

I'm sure I will submit to Boston Literary again -- it is now my goal to write a successful "dribble". But they say there's more than one Mr. or Mrs. "Right" for everyone. I'm going to keep playing the field. I'm going to see what other matches are out there for me.

DO YOU HAVE A "MR/S. RIGHT" AGENT, EDITOR, OR PUBLISHER YOU HOPE TO WIN ONE DAY?

* Husband: "When were you on a blind date?"
Me: "Never. It's a metaphor. You are SO missing the point, honey."

20 comments:

  1. Wow! That's awesome!

    Congrats on the submission and thanks for sharing the blow-by-blow. It provides great insights.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Awesome news Carrie! I have a great match with the editor of FootPrints a small mag over here in Australia. She eats up most of what I send her and I have been pub'ed with her a number of times. But I too am playing the field. Post if you find any more links to submissions and you want to share. I'd eat that up too. :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Congratulations Carrie! That is such good news. Look forward to reading it.

    ReplyDelete
  4. A well-deserved achievement! Keep going.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Congratulations! That's awesome!

    I've had a couple of success stories thanks to markets I found through Duotrope. It's a great resource.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Yay! Congrats, and I can't wait to read your Drabble.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Awesome! Congratulations!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Congratulations! Can't wait to read it. I love sotrires that go for the gut.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Congratulations on your publication! And it was fun reading about your process of finding a match.

    Duotrope: hero for writers every where!

    I have two short stories that I have target markets for, but am too chicken to submit (the perfect date I am afraid to ask out.)

    ReplyDelete
  10. Congrats on your publication, and thanks especially for the heads-up about the super-short froms "Drabble" and "Dribble".

    ReplyDelete
  11. Major kudos! And thanks for describing the step by step process. AND for the Duotrope link. I don't know why I didn't know about them. (Probably because short form fiction is so hard for me) but what a great service! Boston Literary is a great litzine. Congrats!

    ReplyDelete
  12. I would like to hereby encourage everyone reading these comments to head over to Yat-Yee's blog and tell her to ask that sexy market out on a date. SUBMIT THE STORIES!

    :-)

    ReplyDelete
  13. Thanks, Carrie. Choosing the outfits to wear (going over the mss again), accessing the phone number (going to the website), picking up my courage to call (um, picking up my courage to send.)

    ReplyDelete
  14. Congrats, Carrie! And like Jon Paul said, thanks for the "blow-by-blow"—you've inspired me! (Now if only I could find the time to write something short!)

    ReplyDelete
  15. Woo-hoo! That is indeed fantastic news! And I loved reading the steps you took to get there.

    ReplyDelete
  16. CONGRATULATIONS!

    Thanks for the tip on Duotrope. I checked it out based on your other post, and it's a zillions times easier to use than Writers' Market Online.

    ReplyDelete
  17. Congrats! Now I'm interested in trying my hand at dribbles and drabbles. Hmm...

    ReplyDelete
  18. Carrie,

    When can we see this posted on BLM? I can't wait to direct folks to it (I've already gushed about it on my blog!).

    Congrats again!
    KL

    ReplyDelete
  19. Mid-March, if all goes according to plan!

    ReplyDelete