Well, the first year of 2023 is in the books, and it wasn’t exactly a barn-burner. More on that in a bit.
I didn’t exactly hit the ground running in 2023, and six submissions is somewhat disappointing. I need around nine per month to reach my annual goal of one-hundred submissions. To tell you the truth, I took a bit of a break in January, and I needed it. Burnout is a real thing, and sometimes you gotta step back and take a breath. With that done, I’m feeling better and ready to get back to work in February. Interesting thing about these submissions is that all six are for two stories. Quick rejections and resubs plus sim-subs can boost your numbers quickly. š
Five rejections in January.
So, four of the five rejections were just standard form letters. The wait on a few of those was mildly irritating, but that’s part of the gig. The one personal rejection, though, is a tough one. You see, it’s not for a short story; it’s for a novel.
Dear Aeryn,
Thank you so much for letting me read your manuscript, [title], and please excuse the regrettable delay in getting back to you.
It’s an interesting manuscript, and there’s a lot to like in it, including some fine writing. You have a very good style. Unfortunately, due to the high volume of submissions that [publisher] receives, I’m forced to be extremely selective when it comes to acquisitions.Ā And so I won’t be able to make an offer for your work.
I’m sorry I don’t have better news for you, but I wish you the best of luck in placing your work with the right house.Ā
If you write something else in the future, I’d be glad to see it.Ā In the meantime, thanks again for thinking of [publisher].
It’s a nice, thoughtful rejection, but needless to say, there’s a difference between getting a rejection for a 1,000-word flash piece and a 90,000-word novel. One you barely notice, and the other can be a bit of gut punch. Still, like any rejection, you have to roll up your sleeves and get back to work. In this case, I’ll be reading through the novel again to see of there’s anything I want or need to change, and then I’ll send it out again.
January was a pretty good month for publications, and I published two piece of flash and one bit of freelance fiction. The two flash pieces are some of my favorite I’ve written, and I think “Coffee Fiend”, published at Factor Four Magazine, is up there with my best. Anyway, you can check out both flash pieces by clicking the links below.
And that was January. How was your month?
Well, 2022 is in the books, and, as usual, I’ve put together a quick roundup of my writing endeavors and results for the past year.
My goal is always 100 submissions per year, and I clearly fell short of that. I just kind of ran out of steam in late November. I also ran out of good stories to submit, which is something I need to address very soon. Still, overall, I’m satisfied with my numbers. My acceptance percentage is solid at over 15% (the second, higher number is the percentage if you don’t count the withdrawals and no responses). I wish I’d sent more subs, of course, and if you just go by the numbers, I might have netted another acceptance or two if I had.
So, I had a total of 93,716 words published or accepted to be published in 2022. That’s a novel’s-worth of words, so not too shabby. The Total Words Written is really a guess, as it includes things like blog posts, microfiction, unfinished projects, and finished but unaccepted/unpublished projects. It’s probably a bit more than that 150k, but I’m being conservative. I’m a little disappointed with this output, as I think I should have published a bit more. There are lots of reasons why that didn’t happen, and ones I hope to rectify in the new year.
I had some good publications in 2023, but the best of the bunch is my baseball horror novellaĀ Effectively Wild.Ā You can be a pal, click the cover below, and get yourself a copy. š
In addition to the novella, I published a fair amount of flash fiction, much of it free to read on the interwebs. Here are three of my favorites and the links to check them out.
Well, you can’t have a year-end writing review without talking about goals for the coming year, but I’ll be brief. Here are a few of the things I’d like to get done in 2023.
Those last two WILL happen, and the other three are certainly doable. Of course, there are other things I’d like to get done, but most of that is marketing related and, frankly, pretty boring, so I’ll end here and say I’m optimistic about 2023. š
And that, friends, was my 2022. I’d love to here how your writing year went. Tell me all about it in the comments.
Recently, I sent my 700th short story submission. That number spans a period of ten years since I started tracking them religiously (hah!) on Duotrope. Whenever I hit a big milestone like this, I like to break down all numbers, get WAY too analytical and then inflict the result on my readers. So, here we go. š
First, here are the basic stats for the 703 submission I’ve sent since April 16, 2012.
I’m closing in on 100 acceptances, which is pretty good. The rejections numbers are about what you’d figure for that many submissions, and my acceptance percentage comes out to just over 17% (not counting non-responses, withdrawals, and pending subs). I can live with that.
Lets get a little more granular and look at the number of markets I’ve submitted to and the number of stories I’ve sent.
That’s a lot of stories and a lot of publishers. Most of those stories have either been accepted or retired, though there’s still a few crusty old tales making the rounds. I’ve sent a ton of stories toĀ The Molotov Cocktail, but they’ve accepted a ton of stories. They even published my collection of flash fiction Night Walk,Ā which, if you’re so inclined, you can buy here. “Set in Stone” is my number one loser. It’s racked up plenty of close-but-no-cigar rejections but never quite made the cut. It has been put out to pasture now where it can live out the remainder of its days in peace and quiet with the all my other also-rans.
Now let’s dig even further and examine how the numbers reveal the trials and tribulations of being a short fiction writer.
Here are the top five markets I’ve subbed most to where I’ve had at least ONE acceptance.
Clearly, The Molotov Cocktail and The Arcanist dig my work, and my hit rate is 26% and 32% respectively. Flame Tree Press and Factor Four Magazine are in that 10% to 15% range of pro markets that I’ve actually cracked. I’ve only managed to sell a single piece to New Myths, though I’ve gotten close a couple of other times. I guess I should go back to that one story and see what I did right.
Okay, now the bad news. Here are the top five markets I’ve subbed most to WITHOUT an acceptance. Read ’em and weep.
If you write and submit short genre fiction, you’re gonna be familiar with these markets. Of the five, I’ve gotten closest with Flash Fiction Online, making their final round of deliberations three times. I’ve made it out of the slush pile at Apex a handful of times but no further. I’ve received some nice personal rejections from F&SF, but I don’t think I’ve come very close to publication based on Duotrope stats for acceptance response times. I’ve only received form rejections from The Dark and Daily Science Fiction. I’m going to keep trying with all these markets except Daily Science Fiction, as they are, sadly, going on indefinite hiatus. I think I have a good chance of cracking Flash Fiction Online one of these days. The others? Who knows. I’ll just have to keep submitting and find out.
Now lets look at number for individual stories. First, here are my most subbed stories that I eventually sold.
Although “Paper Cut” and “The Scars You Keep” have the same number of submissions, the latter was accepted on its 19th submission and the former on its 16th. I’ve sent “Paper Cut” out as a reprint a few times. The same goes for “Caroline”, which I sold on the 13th attempt and then sold again as a reprint on the 18th. Both “The Downer” and “Hell to Pay – Installment Plans Available!” are recent sales, and what you see is the actual number of submissions it took me to sell each piece. One thing I should point out is that all these are short stories in the 3,000 to 5,000 word range, and they all received multiple final-round rejections before I eventually sold them. ItĀ always takes me longer (more subs) to sell short stories, whereas I sell flash fiction in the first three to five attempts. I have no idea why. Regardless of how many submissions were needed, I was happy to find a home for these pieces.
And now for the list of luckless losers. Here are the stories with the most submissions WITHOUT an acceptance.
I mentioned “Set in Stone” earlier, but it is the king of not for us’s and we’re gonna pass’s in my list of stories. It and “After Birth” have been retired. The latter was never ready for prime time, and I think the idea is one I no longer want to explore. The other three stories are of more recent vintage, and two of them, “Coffin Shopping” and “Time Has No Memory” are currently out on submission. I’ll submit “When Gods Walk” again at some point when another suitable market appears. Of the five, “Time Has No Memory” is the best, in my opinion, and it’s come close with a number of pro markets. I have a lot of faith in that one, and I think I’ll sell it eventually. Maybe even to the market it’s currently under consideration with. š
Well, that’s a quick look 700 submissions. There’s a lot more data I could dump on you, but I think I’ll refrain for the moment. š
Have you hit any major submission or publishing milestones lately? I’d love to hear about it in the comments.
November was a very slow month in submission land, but it wasn’t a total bust.
Pretty terrible submission numbers despite the acceptance. November was a rough month in a lot of ways, and I got a little off track with submissions, focusing more on other aspects of my writing. Anyway, I’m sitting at 79 total submissions for the year, and it is highly unlikely I hit 100 for 2022. That’s okay, though. A dozen acceptances has made the year a decent one, and if I can hit 90 subs with another acceptance or two, I’ll call 2022 a marginal victory. Here are more overall yearly statistics via Duotrope.
That acceptance percentage is right where I want it to be. I’ve always said that if you can hit a 10% acceptance rate, you’re doing okay. Anything over that is gravy. Now, this graphic illustrates a problem, and it’s a simple one. If I were to submit more, I’d get more acceptances. Let’s say I doubled the number of subs, but my acceptance percentage stayed the same (which I think it would), I’d be looking at 25 acceptances for the year. That’s pretty damn good, and it’s doable I think. Oh, one quick note. It’s actually 79 subs because one of my submissions in 2022 is to a market, Diabolical Plots,Ā that is not in the Duotrope database.
Just two rejections in November.
Just a couple of garden-variety form rejections last month. Absolutely nothing interesting to show you.
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, then you know that Twitter is experiencing some, uh, difficulties. As such, I am expanding my social media presence to other platforms. If you’d like to follow me elsewhere, here are the best places to do it.
FB Author Page: I’ve started a Facebook author page where I post about my writing. It’s different than what you’d find on the blog here, but I do update daily with microfiction and discussions about writing in general.
Instagram: I’m learning how to use IG as an effective tool for writers. It’s a work in progress, but I’m starting to get the hang of it.
I may look into some other social media platforms like Mastodon and Hive, but the two above plus whatever Twitter is at the moment are sufficient.
And that was November. How was your month?
October was another solid month. Details below.
Although I didn’t send as many submissions as I would have liked, I still managed to nab a couple of acceptances. Two publications (one BIG one) and only two rejections made this a pretty excellent month. I’m at 76 total submissions for the year, which puts me behind pace for my goal of 100. I’d need 12 subs per month In November and December to pull that off. At my current rate and work load, I think I’ll end up closer to 90, and I’m fine with that.
Just two rejections in October.
The only rejection of note was the personal rejection. It came with some feedback that I chose to ignore, and I sold the story on the next submission. This is not to say the editors of the market that rejected the story were wrong or that their feedback was not well thought out. It was the correct feedback for their market and their editorial tastes. Had I made the changes suggested, it would have changed the central theme of the piece, and I didn’t feel that was necessary. The next editor liked the story, and a sale was made. So, the lesson here is that feedback is great, but it has to align with the story you want to tell. It’s okay and, in my opinion, vital to ignore feedback that doesn’t.
Two publications last month. The first was my baseball horror novellaĀ Effectively WildĀ and the second was a flash piece titled “The Death of Me” published byĀ The Arcanist.Ā Links to both below.
And that was October. How was your month?
Before I embarked on the perilous journey of speculative fiction author, my primary writing gig was in the tabletop RPG and tabletop miniature game industries. Though writing material for roleplaying games is a different animal than writing fiction, there are certainly parallels, and I absolutely still use lessons I learned there in my fiction. The best and most useful type of RPG writing I did for that purpose was designing adventures for Dungeons & Dragons, so here are three things I learned from that experience.
1) Outline, Outline, Outline.Ā My first adventure attempts were free-form, and I found that a difficult way to write them. When I started outlining, it became so much easier. A D&D adventure is still a story, with three acts, and each of those acts contains a number of scenes that move the story along. In an adventure, those scenes are NPC encounters and combat scenarios, but they serve the same purpose as far as storytelling goes. They drive the players along a story path. Now, of course, in an adventure, the players are telling part of the story, too, so itās a collaborative effort, but the bare bones of the story, the outline, is still an incredibly useful tool for the author to map out the story path the players will follow.
Now, when I write fiction, I approach my outlines in a very similar fashion. I use a three-act structure, and each of those acts contains various scenes and story beats that keep me on track when Iām writing. My fiction outlines are longer and more detailed than my adventure outlines were, but they serve the same purpose. I need to build the skeleton of the story before I can flesh it out, and without that structure, I tend to lose my way. Fast.
2) Memorable Characters. As I said above, an adventure is a story, and stories need strong, memorable characters. In an adventure, the players are the star characters. They are the protagonists, but if you want to keep them engaged, you need to introduce NPCs or secondary characters that make an impression. This is often a character who starts the adventure for the players and other NPCs they must interact with , but the most important character in the adventure, in my opinion, is the villain or antagonist. That character, whether they be an evil wizard or a rampaging monster needs to be memorable, it needs to motivate the players to take action and to move along that story path.
When youāre writing fiction, you need memorable character, too. Your protagonist has to be interesting, of course, but those secondary characters need to pull their weight, too. My adventure writing days definitely taught me a lot about that, and I think the biggest lesson was that bit about motivation. In the adventure, you motivate the players to take action. In fiction, you need to motivate the reader to keep turning those pages.
3) Brevity. In a Dungeons & Dragons adventure, you have to get a lot across to the players and dungeon master in a short space. This can be something like read-aloud text that describes a location to the actions and reactions of nonplayer characters and monsters. You also need to give background to the dungeon master, such as the history of the location where the adventure takes place or the backstory for the villain or the monsters that will challenge the players. The DM needs to be able to quickly and confidently relate this information to players, and you, as the writer have to work it in along with all of the mechanical information needed to run the actual game. So, brevity is key, but all of these details stillĀ need to be compelling and drive the players through the story.
Brevity is also important in fiction, especially the style of fiction I tend to write. I want to get across a character’s description and personality or set the scene in an important location in as few words as possible so I can do what I do best: dialogue and action. However, just like in a D&D adventure, those little details need to be interesting and compelling AND they need to convey important information. If I fail to do that, I’m gonna lose the reader before I get to the meat of the story.Ā This kind of brevity generally more important in the short fiction I write, especially flash fiction, but I tend to be brief with these elements in my long form fiction as well. That said, It might not be as pivotal to other authors.
So, that’s what I’ve learned from my adventure-writing days. Thoughts about my lessons learned? I’d love to hear them in the comments.
If you’re curious about the adventures I’ve written, here are some of my best, in my humble opinion.