Editing for anthologies and magazines is a strange game. A true editor is knowledgeable, fast, crisp and ruthless. “We regret that we cannot offer your story a place. Thanks. Goodbye.” A true editor has a single-minded vision of what they want, and a rule of iron. A dozen submissions processed with a steely glance and the press of a key.
I’m the Other Guy/Girl. I’m relatively slow and painstaking, unless confronted with clear genius; I read and re-read submissions, in case I missed something. I wonder if my original concept could be diverted slightly for a particularly fine piece of writing. I know the horrors of Being A Writer, and I shift between wanting to send interesting borderline stuff back immediately, and waiting to see if I might squeeze it in somehow (answer: send it back asap with a positive note – another market might want it). I occasionally suggest developmental rewrites, when I should say No, not enough time.
Which means that I please a small cadre of people, and probably annoy a much larger one. It makes me a Half-Blood Editor. But I have been thinking about this a lot recently, having just completed another anthology. And had I been editing fiction for twenty years or more (though I have edited an awful lot of non-fiction over the decades), I might be well placed to make some acute observations. Instead, after a few years of hacking away at it, I end up with a few idle reflections…
By the way, if you’re a hardened, experienced writer, the following will probably be of no use to you whatsoever. But I’ve typed it out now, so tough – I have deadlines as well, you know? Sheesh!
WHY REJECTIONS HAPPEN
Because they didn’t want your story. But apart from that, what’s going on? Many markets reject more than 95% of what comes to them (or even 99%). As an immediate example, Occult Detective Quarterly takes maybe ten stories out of every two hundred plus submissions. Is there any sense to this slaughter?
Unsuccessful submissions tend to fall into set categories, and the following account for almost all of the rejections I send out:
1) THE TOTAL WIPEOUT
Wrong place for this story, and should never have been sent. Does no one read the guidelines? This is a hugely puzzling and too common situation, as if someone has a story, and just sends it randomly to any SFF/Horror market. If you can’t see specifics in the publisher’s guidelines, fair enough, but even then, glance at the magazine or previous anthologies from that publisher, and get a feel for what they like. You don’t have to mindlessly follow a formula, but at least throw them something which might be in their ball park.
Also, wipeout on length – you should query them in advance if you’re going to break the word count boundaries to any significant degree. They may have a look; they may not. If you’ve worked with them before, they may be more amenable (I am, because I’m soft in the head), but don’t assume stuff.
And also also – they weren’t open anyway.
2) TOO SOON A HARVEST
Writer hasn’t fully grasped the craft of writing yet. You need to read more, reflect and practice. You might well get there, but it’s too soon. There’s an easy way to tell, if you’re honest with yourself – compare your story to those published in a few popular and/or well-reviewed journals or anthologies, and ask yourself if you are at least matching that general level of competence.
Look at the flow of dialogue and pacing in other people’s work, and touches like speech attribution, density of qualifiers, paragraph formation and so on. Consider the feelings you have after reading those stories. Go on, tell yourself the truth, and get your pen/keyboard ready for some more work. Get a grip on the craft, and then you can decide what you want to take from it, and what you want to abandon consciously. Surprisingly few apprentice carpenters manage to construct a polished oak desk with exquisite detail and rosewood marquetry in their first year.
There is, sadly, a subset here – writers who are so convinced they’ve grasped it all, they’re not open to critiques or development. And they argue. Not cool.
3) ALMOST FORMED FANTASTICALS
Not technically ready for consumption. That’s the story, not the writer. There are lots of terrific unpolished tales which require more time and attention, and another edit, which should have been beta-read again or re-examined a month later, and rewritten. I get plenty of these, some with wonderful concepts or approaches, and it’s a shame to see promise without quite enough delivery. Maybe they’ve been rushed to hit a deadline, but in general, few editors have the time or will to spend hours ‘fixing’ things at a serious level.
Ask yourself if it’s ready to face the world. It may be a fine bird, but it should be pretty much oven-ready, really, not still needing a bit of plucking and stuffing (insert tofu or chestnut roast equivalent for this last line, as desired).
4) NEITHER ALPHA NOR RUNT
Good, but is it good enough? There are only ever so many slots available. Your writing itself may be jolly decent, but if it has a fairly standard trope delivered in fairly standard fashion… well, it’ll be seen as perfectly competent, but maybe not innovative or affecting enough to earn a place against strong competition.
A hard category of rejections, because editorial taste may swing either way, and as each market is different, you may place some of these eventually. These are the ones you either have to improve, or peddle again and again in hope.
5) DOESN’T FIT THIS TIME
Not a lot you can do about this one. There’s a feel or a shape to what the editor’s trying to do, and they’ll have their own notions of which stories would fit together – they may be looking for an overall mood for what they’re assembling, or they may be seeking a range of styles. It’s common to have too many similar submissions – be that to do with style or content – and have to pick only one for practical reasons.
So your story may be pretty darned good, but if it’s the tenth one set in the States in the same period, or the seventh with the same general character type as protagonist… etc. You may have written a dark mood piece, and the overall project has too much darkness already, or a lighter story which would stand out like an extra thumb. Good on its own, but not here.
6) THE EDITOR’S A PICKY BASTARD
Tropes, themes, styles and more which don’t float the editor’s boat. Some markets actually list these in their guidelines, so you have no excuses. And they’re hugely variable. I know markets which do not like First Person narratives, and ones which will never take a vampire tale, however good. Markets which adore nuanced, liminal work, and markets which want a cracking action-filled story and hate things which end with a question as to what just happened.
I’m much quicker when it comes to tropes and themes I just don’t like when I’m editing. The decision here is quite simple. Is it technically good enough, or unusual enough, that a decent swathe of readers might want to see it?
I’m not a believer in editing to create the perfect mirror of my own tastes. My job is to put together a range of well-crafted stories which will intrigue, interest, delight or worry a wide range of those who might buy the end result. It’s not to show off Stuff I Like, and look cool (not that there’s much chance of that).
But I do have areas which irritate my bristles, naturally. Whilst there’s always a writer who can breathe new life into old ideas, or find a genius twist and re-interpretation, in general, I’m quite averse to some things, such as:
- Modern zombies. Fast ones just kill; slow ones get in the way when you’re shopping. I’m really short on sympathy for these, unless the twist is terrific.
- Werewolves. A really difficult trope to freshen. Plus, fleas.
- Nice elves and faeries. Go back to elf-shot, sickness and treachery.
- Brooding vampires. When did the cloak industry get so big? Who sews these things? And will they please stop siring conflicted and resentful things all over the place.
- Teenage warlocks and witches, just coming into their power. Isn’t adolescence bad (or annoying) enough on its own? I’d rather read about an unemployed 42 year old in a failed marriage who suddenly finds out they’re The Answer.
Every editor has their Oh God, Not That Again areas. Each of the above can grip, but usually doesn’t, not for me. I’ve made exceptions, where I simply enjoyed the story enough to excuse them, but that doesn’t happen often.
If you wondered, the last, small and sad category of rejections is not Doesn’t Fit This Time as such, it’s “Great story, but we genuinely haven’t any room left, and the book/magazine is already too large”. That’s a deal-breaker, whatever anyone wants on either side. I hate doing those, though at least I can have some confidence they’ll get picked up by someone else.
The horror of being the Half-Blood Editor is that it makes you want to re-check all your own old submissions, including the ones which were published. You have your eye in, and you start to spot what you did wrong, or could have handled better. Which you might call a Valuable Learning Experience, once you have conquered the cold, shivery feeling that hits you initially.
Have I written bad stories? Not especially – I strive for adequacy, not immortality. Could some of them have been better, and might those which ended in rejections have broken through to acceptance if I’d spent a little more time, a little more thought? Oh, yes…
And I’m my own line editor and developmental editor, so there’s no one to blame.
Bugger.
Whilst greydogtales isn’t even qualified to tell a fisherman what a fish is, we do rattle on about aspects of writing now and then. Here are some other dubious articles of ours:
http://greydogtales.com/blog/so-you-want-to-submit-a-story-again/
http://greydogtales.com/blog/so-you-want-to-submit-a-story/
http://greydogtales.com/blog/haunted-author-want-write-character/
http://greydogtales.com/blog/cynical-editor-diversities-disturbances/
And do see Tim Waggoner’s excellent take on weathering the storms as a writer, which we mentioned last time:
http://greydogtales.com/blog/tim-waggoner-is-on-your-lawn/
John Linwood Grant’s latest anthology, HELL’S EMPIRE, is out now on Amazon.
HELL’S EMPIRE: Tales of the Incursion. Being an account of the Incursion of the Inferno into Victoria’s Britain, as Hell seeks a foothold on Earth.
“Each local victory was matched by utter defeat elsewhere. Faith and resolve strengthened in some, but weakened in many others, who saw no end to this fight except death or servitude. Clergy faltered and died; supply lines failed. Surviving towns and cities struggled with refugees, becoming unwilling enclaves of resistance rather than mighty fortresses against the brimstone.
“Many waited with hope for returning troop-ships, particularly from South Africa, but with the loss of HMS Camforth off the Isle of Wight, that hope was dashed. Witnesses in Ventnor saw the brave vessel torn open as it hove in sight, grasped by tendrils of a monstrous size which carried weeping sores upon their mottled length. Hell was determined that there would be no relief…”
A unique anthology of two Thrones at war, told in fourteen tales of horror, victory, and defeat. 300 pages of brand new stories, from Ulthar Press.
IN A COUPLE OF DAYS: Something which doesn’t blather on about the editing or writing process, thank the gods. And remember that you can always sign up to greydogtales.com, so that you are forewarned…