Authors shouldn't whine about fast rejection times
The Dark is a online magazine of horror and dark fantasy which, in the last three years, has received a number of accolades and reprints in "year's best" anthologies. Edited by Sean Wallace and Silvia Moreno-Garcia, the magazine is open to more experimental stories and new authors, which results in issues of The Dark often pushing the boundaries of both the genre and literary fiction.
The Dark is also known for fast response times on most submissions, often within 24 hours. Sean and assistant editor Jack Fisher divide up the slush pile and give each story a first read.
You'd think authors would be happy with fast response times because it means they can submit their stories somewhere else. But it turns out some authors hate a quick no. They'd rather the band-aid be pulled off bit by bit over months and years instead of a quick yank.
One reason for this is authors have been conditioned to expect long response times for short fiction, partly because many literary magazines like Tin House and Granta are notorious for letting submissions hang in limbo. This not only hurts authors but shows a lack of respect toward our work. When a literary magazine takes a year to decide on your story, don't pretend your submission spent all that time being read and analyzed. It likely received the same amount of attention as a submission rejected in only a few hours.
Before anyone screams, yes, there are exceptions. If your story is under active consideration or is a finalist for a magazine, expect longer waits. If a magazine says they take up to three months to consider stories (which many print magazines still require and I'm okay with), both expect and accept it. Part of this comes down to knowing a market before you submit. This knowledge can be easily gained through places like the Submission Grinder.
All of which makes the recent responses Sean Wallace received after a couple of prompt rejections all the more jarring.
A few days ago Sean quoted one author's response on Facebook:
“Yeah, okay. Just so you understand, there is no way I believe you have read that last one I sent you in this amount of time . . . and now, I don’t believe you read the first one, either. That’s okay. It’s not like that makes you exceptional or anything. I dream of an exceptional editor. I’ll spare you further submssions, since clearly you’re not bothering to read the ones I send.”
Followed a day or so later by a response from a different author.
"Wow, that’s quick! Thanks for giving it the due consideration it so obviously required. Luckily, these things require almost no effort to write ’em, so a curt dismissal is all the remuneration any writer needs. Oh, and maybe a hearty go f*#& yourself—or is that just too redundant?—author”
I get it. Rejection hurts. I've received a ton of rejections in my time and will keep receiving them until I die. But I would never respond like that to an editor.
First, you burned yourself with an editor who might buy one of your stories in the future. Second, you insulted an editor who respected your work enough to NOT sit on it for months even though the magazine won't ever be buying your story.
Third, the first person misspelled "submission" in their response. Which I'm sure really made that author look great in Sean's eyes.
It's not hard for submission editors to both read every submitted story and stay on top of their slush pile. As Sean has said, "If we get ten stories a day, and each slush editor takes five, spread out throughout the day, then the chances are fairly high that any given submission can be processed, rejected or moved into a maybe folder, within minutes. And the system is set up to do automatic rejections with a quick click of a button. As such, there is no inherent malice in a fast response these days. The issue, really, is that some magazines and markets have been traditionally so slow in the past that it established expectations and that is in of itself problematic."
Total agreement.
Note to authors: The editors of professional magazines work for their readers, not their writers. While it's nice when editors give specific feedback on a story, that rarely happens. If you want feedback on your writing enroll in a writing program or take part in a critique group. Don't expect it from editors.
In this day and age the way editors show respect to authors is by not wasting our time by holding submissions which won't work for their publications. That's what Sean Wallace and everyone at The Dark does and I praise them for it.
"Blood Grains Speak Through Memories" selected for Year’s Best Science Fiction & Fantasy, 2017 Edition
My novelette "Blood Grains Speak Through Memories," which appeared in the March 2016 science-fantasy double issue of Beneath Ceaseless Skies, has been selected for The Year’s Best Science Fiction & Fantasy, 2017 Edition, edited by Rich Horton.
Many thanks to Rich Horton for picking the story for his anthology.
Below is the anthology's table of contents. Looks like an excellent line-up of stories and authors, one I'm proud to be a part of.
The anthology will be released in 2017.
- “Seven Ways of Looking at the Sun-Worshippers of Yul-Katan” by Maggie Clark, Analog
- “All that Robot Shit” by Rich Larson, Asimov’s
- “Project Empathy” by Dominica Phetteplace, Asimov’s
- “Lazy Dog Out” by Suzanne Palmer, Asimov’s
- “The Visitor from Taured” by Ian R. MacLeod, Asimov’s
- “Openness” by Alexander Weinstein, Beloit Fiction Journal
- “In Skander, for a Boy” by Chaz Brenchley, Beneath Ceaseless Skies
- “Laws of Night and Silk” by Seth Dickinson, Beneath Ceaseless Skies
- “Blood Grains Speak Through Memories” by Jason Sanford, Beneath Ceaseless Skies
- “Rager in Space” by Charlie Jane Anders, Bridging Infinity
- “Ozymandias” by Karin Lowachee, Bridging Infinity
- “The Bridge of Dreams” by Gregory Feeley, Clarkesworld
- “Everyone from Themis Sends Letters Home” by Genevieve Valentine, Clarkesworld
- “Things with Beards” by Sam J. Miller, Clarkesworld
- “Innumerable Glimmering Lights” by Rich Larson, Clockwork Phoenix 5
- “Between Nine and Eleven” by Adam Roberts, Crises and Conflicts
- “Red of Tooth and Cog” by Cat Rambo, F&SF
- “The Vanishing Kind” by Lavie Tidhar, F&SF
- “A Fine Balance” by Charlotte Ashley, F&SF
- “Empty Planets” by Rahul Kanakia, Interzone
- “Fifty Shades of Grays” by Steven Barnes, Lightspeed
- “I’ve Come to Marry the Princess” by Helena Bell, Lightspeed
- “RedKing” by Craig deLancey, Lightspeed
- “A Non-Hero’s Guide to The Road of Monsters” by A.T. Greenblatt,
- Mothershipship Zeta
- “Dress Rehearsal” by Adrian Tchaikovsky, Now We Are Ten
- “The Plague Givers” by Kameron Hurley, Patreon
- “Gorse Daughter, Sparrow Son” by Alena Indigo Anne Sullivan, Strange Horizons
- “The Magical Properties of Unicorn Ivory” by Carlos Hernandez, The
- Assimilated Cuban’s Guide to Quantum Santeria
- “Something Happened Here, But We’re Not Quite Sure What It Was” by
- Paul McAuley, Tor.com
- “That Game We Played During the War” by Carrie Vaughn, Tor.com
Review of "The Super Ultra Duchess of Fedora Forest" by Charlie Jane Anders
Name a favorite fairy tale. Odds are you'll pick a Disneyfied tale, perhaps one of those princess stories all cleaned up and ready to lie to generations of kids. Or maybe you'll pick a tale recorded by the Grimms. Perhaps a nice helping of Hansel and Grethel with some Little Red Riding Hood on the side.
Name your favorite fairy tale and odds are you won't pick "The Mouse, the Bird, and the Sausage." Yet this is exactly what Charlie Jane Anders does in her fun and oh-so-relevant "The Super Ultra Duchess of Fedora Forest," one of the many new fairy tales in The Starlit Wood, edited by Dominik Parisien and Navah Wolfe.
Anders' story is set in a future fantasy world were instead of an internet of things humanity creates a consciousness of things, giving every object and animal in our world a sense of self along with intelligence before we vanish from existence. The result is a world where mice, birds, and yes, sausages, strive to understand their roles and purposes in life.
"The Super Ultra Duchess of Fedora Forest" is a fun, humorous read with a deadly seriousness beneath the laughs, with this fairy tale of three friends finding their way in the world interspaced with explorations of identity and self governance. I suspect even people who are not fans of fairy tales will love Anders' story.
I highly recommend "The Super Ultra Duchess of Fedora Forest" and have added it to my continually updated Nebula Award recommended reading list. I also looking forward to reading more stories in this fascinating anthology.
Stay Crazy by Erica L. Satifka
What do you get if Philip K. Dick worked a crap job at Walmart while simultaneously being treated for mental illness and talking to interdimensional beings? You'd get the year's best debut SF novel, Stay Crazy by Erica L. Satifka.
Stay Crazy is the story of Emmeline, a young woman with paranoid schizophrenia who works a dead-end job at Savertown USA, the cost-cutting big box store which sucks the soul out of everything it touches. Emmeline sees her job as a step toward getting her life back together after a recent mental breakdown. But when a strange being from another dimension begins talking to Emmeline through the RFID chips in the store's merchandise — warning of a pending global apocalypse — she must find a way to both save the world while not suffering another breakdown.
Stay Crazy mixes a fast-paced science fiction plot with deft social criticism, characters you'll love, and laugh-out-loud humor. The novel is also an excellent exploration of neurodiversity and how there are multiple ways to see both your own life and the world around us.
I highly recommend people read this novel, which is the best debut novel I've read this year. Erica Satifka is a highly talented writer which a rich imagination and I look forward to reading her next novel.
My World Fantasy Convention schedule and info
I'm attending the World Fantasy Convention from October 27 to 30 in Columbus, Ohio. I'm both covering the convention for the media like I did at Worldcon (follow me at @jasonsanford to see my coverage) and taking part in two panels.
I'll also be giving away signed limited edition copies of my novelette "Blood Grains Speak Through Memories," published earlier this year by Beneath Ceaseless Skies. If you see me feel free to ask for one.
My panels:
Friday at 1 pm, DELAWARE CD
Fantasy Emerging from Crisis. Are there trends in fiction that can be tied to global crises? E.g., certain kinds of fantasy emerged from the instability that led up to WWI. The Lord of the Rings is a clear response to the Great War. Are there directions we can anticipate with near-future environmental conflicts (water wars), destabilizing natural disasters, rising seas, income inequality issues, etc. perhaps leading to more political works (especially considering the popularity of Game of Thrones)? 9/11 produced Lavie Tidhar’s World Fantasy Award winning Osama and also inspired stories by Lucius Shepard, Richard Bowes, Jack Ketchum, and others. Fantasy inevitably arises from the zeitgeist. It can also come right out of the headlines. Chris Phillips, Jason Sanford (m), Gary K. Wolfe, Chrisopher Husberg, Caroline Yoachim
Saturday at 9 pm, DELAWARE CD
Strange Drugs. Opium and the like have always had a romantic allure. How about imaginary drugs? Alice in Wonderland? Clark Ashton Smith? How does the fantasy pharmacopeia differ from the real thing? What kind of drug do you take to see into the future or enter another world? Brady McReynolds, Jason Sanford, Anya Martin, Alvaro Zinos-Amaro, E.J. Stevens (m)
I considered not attending this year's con because of all the controversy surrounding World Fantasy. However, the con is local to me and I already had a ticket. More importantly, the convention also responded to criticism by vastly improving their program. And, as always, the main attraction of any con is seeing all the people I like and admire in the genre community.
So we'll see how the con goes. And I'm definitely looking forward to seeing everyone.