I stopped submitting stories, but the Christmas Cats Anthology got me hooked again. I sent a story out to F&SF and got my usual 6 day “no grab” message. I sent another out to ASIM and now I am checking their slush page every hour. About 50 days ago, I sent something to Aberrant Dreams, which I believe was a stupid mistake. I queried at 45 days and I have heard nothing. Their fall zine comes out on 10/1 and if they don’t contact me by then, I will pull the story. It’s not likely that they’ll publish it at this late date, and I’m not waiting around for their January issue to hear I’ve been rejected.
The problem is that there is no market where I can send a Murray Leinster style story except SamsDot. I like publishing there, but I want to move beyond a $4 per story market. The money doesn’t mean that much in itself, but as a measure of the worth of a story it sucks.
I haven’t sent Tyree or J anything in months. God in a Bottle is fun, but a little weak. The Telling (at Aberrant Dreams) and Note to Self (at ASIM) are just the kind of story that they’d like.
I sent Flare Bound to Escape Pod. They read stories for ipods (my idea). I have to start sending out other stuff for reprints.
I started writing the introduction to my first anthology. I’m calling it Channelling Murray Leinster.
Follow through:
I withdrew The Telling from Aberrant Dreams and sent it out to Idomancer. I don’t think it’s a fit, though. I was mostly upset with them for not answering my query.
I got Note to Self back from ASIM with their usual mixed review. One reviewer loves it, one hates it and one nit-picks the typos. I rewrote it while I was waiting for ASIM, and I have some new ideas and will do another rewrite. I don’t know who to send it to next. I hate to submit a time travel story anywhere. I have the feeling that editors get alot of them. It’s a good story, though and I may send it to SDO.
God in a Bottle is being rewritten as a YA story and will be renamed to The Quantum Genie. I have to google the title, though. It seems like it might be taken.