01 Oct 2003
Rejection #7: from Mars Dust for "Comfort in Numbers". This time, however, I found a far more personalized letter in the envelope. Not a critique, but reasoning. It amounted to two things: the story is too short, and I fell victim to the classic blunder of telling rather than showing. All relative, of course, but  this is the second rejection for this story, so I'm going to consider a rewrite.

22 Sep 2003
Received Rejection #6 today from Realms of Fantasy for "Dragons in the Attic." Form letter, of course, with a list of potential reasons. One of these was highlighted to let me know that someone did, in fact, read the story.  "A story which simply did not "stand out." Yeah baby, twist that knife. Ooh, just a little more. Is there anything crueler you can say to a writer? It's one thing to be told something sucks - at least that means that it provoked some kind of reaction - but being told the respondent doesn't care one way or the other doesn't make for a pleasant rejection experience, even if it is true. Especially if it is true.

28 Aug 2003
And to follow up last night's wonderful e-mail, Rejection Number 5 arrived from Weird Tales. "The Art of Night" seems not to fit their editorial needs by means of inadequate resolution - none, actually, and they said so, but I meant it that way so it's my own fault. Perhaps it might find a better fit somewhere else. Oh, and the print was too small. I think it's about the same size as that of their rejection letter, though a different font. Point noted.

27 Aug 2003
Acceptance Number One! Received a notification by e-mail tonight that "Interview With a Modern Vampire" is scheduled to appear in the September 2003 issue (#31) of Planet Relish E-zine, an online genre humour magazine that I'm rather fond of. This and the personalized rejection from On Spec last month lend me hope that I might be decent a writer after all.

19 Aug 2003
Checked a couple of web sites today to discover that I didn't win either the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest this year or the Somewhere in America Short Short Fiction Contest this quarter. I did find it odd that neither sent an e-mail notification of the winners to those who submitted - doesn't seem like it would be that hard to arrange, though it might be a rather huge list in the case of the BLFC.  I'm not counting contests as rejections or (in the event of) acceptances in the official totals, by the way, so the rejection total stands at four.

31 Jul 2003
Whoo-hoo!  Rejection Number 4 arrived by mail today from On Spec.  Some personalized comments attached to the form letter, which is rather cool. Taken together, they add up to "good writing, needs more character development, and clones are a bit passé now". I'm going to take that as a positive overall comment, although the lack of character development is basically intentional (as well as descriptive detail - the story is very bare bones in style), but perhaps I should reconsider that.
Currently eight outstanding submissions and somewhere between eleven and fifteen stories that I need to find homes for, including "Mikey". Really should get on that. 

10 Jul 2003
Two out by e-mail today, both flash fiction of the exactly 100 words variety.  "The Doorbell Rang" went to the quarterly (?) Somewhere in America contest and garnered an auto-responder acknowledgement in a couple of minutes. "Do You Ever Wonder" went to Vestal Review, earning me Rejection Number 3 in four minutes less than two hours.  Granted, it doesn't take long to read 100 words and decide whether it works for your publication.

07 Jul 2003
A 40 day response from Analog. Very quick. Unfortunately it was a rejection. For those keeping score, that's two so far. And currently eight outstanding submissions.

02 Jul 2003
In the post today: "Comfort in Numbers" finally goes back out, to MarsDust; "Dragons in the Attic" heads for Realms of Fantasy; "The Art of Night" goes to Weird Tales. Electronically, "Interview With a Modern Vampire" went by e-mail to Planet Relish, a genre humour e-zine I recently discovered (and enjoy).

28 May 2003
Monday, the US postage stamps I finally remembered to order (to avoid wasting money on International Reply Coupons) arrived. Today, two stories went into the mail to US markets: "Delivery" to Analog and "The Prince of Mediocrity" to Asimov's. That makes five outstanding submissions.  I still have things to decide where to send them, "Comfort in Numbers" in particular. Some market research may be in order.

11 Apr 2003
"Mikey" went in the mail to On Spec today, in time for the afternoon pickup.  If Canada Post is running at peak efficiency, it'll be in the post box on the other end within four days.  Their listed response, however, looks like 2-3 months after any given editorial deadline which, in this case is 31 May, so we're probably looking at a response some time in August.  Still need to figure out where to send "Comfort in Numbers" and there are several others ready to go, too. Note to self, order some US postage.

09 Apr 2003
"Dragon Gold" went out to Black Gate today by e-mail.  Their guidelines list probably response times as 4-6 months.  Could be a while.

05 Apr 2003
Last night and this afternoon, a couple of quick notes from Scott Rice, the overseer of the BLFC. The first wondered how where Napanee was in relation to Wingham, the home town of Alice Munroe.  Upon learning that they were something around 250 miles apart, he commented that it was unfortunately not within commuting distance and asked if anyone yet had written mournful tales about Napanee. Seems nice.

04 Apr 2003
Heard back from Claude Lalumière, the editor of Open Space.  Lightning fast, a very pleasant rejection. We'll call label this Rejection Number One and keep an accurate count.  Need to figure out who the story goes to next.
Also sent out, again by e-mail, my entry for this year's Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest (henceforth known as the BLFC because it takes too long to type). It's particularly hideous, if I do say so myself. I'll post it on the writing home page if it doesn't make it into the winner's circle for the contest.  Judging happens in June.
Several final (maybe) edits under way - I hope to get a few more stories out this week. It's time I did something with all of the ones that I've "finished" in the past that I can make something decent out of.

03 Apr 2003
Submitted "Comfort in Numbers" (working title was "I Think I'm a Clone Now" - I decided that the title gave things away a little bit early) to the upcoming Open Space anthology (to be launched at TorCon 3 later this year), open to Canadian residents only, just a few hours in advance of the deadline. Learned about it just yesterday and thought, "Hmmm. I'm Canadian. I have a story I'm nearly finished polishing. Maybe I should send it in. Perhaps it will fit. Holy crap, the deadline is tomorrow!" Twenty-four hours later, voila! I'm going to call this my first real submission (since my last one was six years ago or so and a very sad piece of work it was).