Hello. I haven't posted in a very long time. For the past year and a half or more I've been sending stories to publications and have made over 100 submissions. I've had only two small stories published and 1 non-fiction essay. I would've had a few more, but I had to withdraw from some established acceptances and that's what I need to talk about here. I've been experiencing a lot of anxiety not only because of how long it takes to get acceptances with magazines, but also that I don't want to have my stories in the vast majority of magazines in the fantasy/weird fiction/horror sphere. It seems I disagree with the sorts of people involved and, sometimes, the types of stories these magazines. This may sound strange given that I write in the same vein, but I just want my work to stand by itself and don't want to be connected with particular political viewpoints especially. I already regret one of the stories that I have published in print because of the magazine's style and ethos, but this is more because I've moved away from certain themes. After spending so much time and effort sending to magazines I've decided tentatively to make a self-published short story collection, however I realise there are many problems with this. The issue is that it's not black and white because I'm still sending nonfiction to places. It really depends on my view of the magazine and the editors involved. There are very few places, but I realise that even the magazines that I respect will have contributors I don't want to be associated with. I feel like I want to be an island but that this is not tenable. In truth, I had always been worried about magazines, but I saw them as the only true route because "anyone can self publish." Self-publishing is perhaps even more difficult and won't really allow me to make a name for myself. I feel like I don't have any outlet whatsoever for my writing now and this is incredibly frustrating and panic inducing because it's what I want to do in life. I have hundreds of pages worth of text and suffer from a lot of what I call creation neuroticism. I need to get my work out there. Do I just accept that it is the nature of publications and writing in general, to be mixed in with other people and their opinions and beliefs? In a more general sense it's almost absurd to me that I have to be dependant on other people to have my work be seen, but it seems to be the only way to really progress as a writer. I simply don't know what to do and feel terrible most days. I could develop some old stories and write new ones to go towards my self published short story collection, but it's difficult when it seems almost pointless because no one will read it. I love writing, but I've been procrastinating because of other people. It's all external. Magazines: takes months to get accepted/forced to be in places with editors with whom I disagree/no choice about cover art/lumped in with bad stories Self pub: no one will read my work Edit - I should be struggling writing my stories because that'd be normal. The issues here affect the whole endeavour.
You have all the same outlets as the rest of us. Not submitting to a magazine because you disagree with what you perceive to be their political stance seems a little silly to me. Hell, I'd write for the Huffington Post as long as the checks clear. If writing is really what you 'want to do in life', do it. You'll never be able to choose your readers, anyway.
Thanks for the swift response. I suppose I feel torn because if I self publish, my work will stand for itself and I value this almost more than publishing in magazines. It's not so much about being able to choose my readers, it's being lumped in with the stances of the magazine editors and the sorts of people who would potentially share a Table of Contents. I realise I sound like a narcissistic person, but I really just don't want anything to do with certain prevailing political views. Also, I just don't like how little control there is with magazines. Once I felt better about putting my work on other people's platforms because I was able to disconnect my work from other people's work and their views, but now it seems that all that matters to me is letting my stories speak for themselves and not being tied to a particular group. It's not even some pretentious artistic choice. It's honestly more about the people involved. Judgmental? Perhaps. It's frustrating as I could be making progress by either continuing to submit stories or by developing my work to be put into this hypothetical collection. But there's too much uncertainty.
If the theme of the magazine is "speculative fiction" and my story fits the theme AND gets picked to be published in it... i dont care how the other writers interpreted the theme. I dont care about the way the author before or after my story told their stories or their character's viewpoints. i'm not saying they arent good. im saying we are all different writers with different interpretations and viewpoints that play into the writing of our pieces. its an art. some readers may like mine over theirs and vice versa. to each their own. Even if you choose a publication that aligns with your religious or political beliefs.... you will still get people who have their own interpretation of that religion or politics. (for example, there is a catholic publication that i entertained. my story was science fiction with religious elements. so MY interpretation written from MY experiences going to catholic school and having a catholic upbringing). people are human. no one viewpoint is the same. there is diversity even amongst people of the same backgrounds. another note: you cant control the reader. if you self publish your stories, you still arent going to control your reader. what if a reader interprets your work OPOSITE of what you intended?
I appreciate your response. At this stage I feel I need to give some examples and to be more specific. I was recently accepted to a magazine and later found out that the website had explicit BDSM photography. I'm not a prude, but I wouldn't want my story to be associated with a place like that at all. Another example is that I got accepted to a magazine only to discover some interviews about identity politics. A lot of the magazines that feature fantasy/weird/horror are run by people I frankly don't want anything to do with and so, no, I don't feel like I have the same outlets as everyone else. Once upon a time I really wouldn't have cared, but I'm realising that I don't even fit in with the people who are traditionally outsiders, i.e. people who write fantasy, Weird and horror. I genuinely feel like I have nowhere and no one to turn to. I don't want to be overly sentimental about this and I wish I could just submit as normal. I feel like self pub is the way to go, but I'd need to be okay with having very few readers. I need to figure out what I value more, readers or integrity...
i guess im one of those people who does research about the publication before i submit. i've never discounted a magazine or journal because of the art, but I do get what you are saying. In college, my classmate and i got accepted into the same publication (totally a surprise for us. we didnt know we'd submitted to the same one until after we got our copies and we saw the others names in it). he was a bit unhappy because his poem about the love of nature was paired with an erotic portrait. he was embarrassed because his topic wasnt about eroticism, let alone PEOPLE. but on the other side.... he cant control the reader or editor's interpretation. the piece could have been a metaphor. there were erotic elements to it that could have influenced their decision to pair it with the piece they did. he might have MEANT for it to be about nature (and nature is very broad), but how they read it was something else entirely. Kind of like the paper I wrote about Shakespeare's "Dark Lady" sonnets. I interpreted the poems to be about a his forbidden love or infatuation with a woman of african descent. my professor was SO mad because he didnt interpret the poems that way and said i was letting my "political beliefs" get in the way. i'm not a political person. i stay out of debates and arguments and all of that unless my job calls for it (and lately it has and i've been so stressed and so drained by it) but in all honestly, it was MY OWN interpretation of it and he shouldnt have been trying to push his own interpretations onto me. again, research. Some magazines and journals cycle through themes. some will surprise readers with themes (as someone who had been an editor of their college publication, it happens quite a bit. if we notice that a vast majority of pieces are coming in that fall into a certain theme or category and these pieces are really good, we adapt and give the issue a theme). Other times, magazines will put out the theme or topic of the issue FIRST. do your research. if the issue's theme isnt something you agree with... dont submit to it. wait for the next issue's theme. During the George Floyd protests, a lot of magazine themes or topics were about Black Lives Matter, Race, and Solidarity. I had nothing that fit at the time, so I didnt submit to those publications if you do your research and find that the publication as a whole stands for X.... dont submit to it. move on. you are creating a puddle out of an ocean. you dont have to like everyone. you dont even have to like every little thing about a single person. its not about you liking the editor personally or not. its professionally. if you take everything personally, then you will never be professional and build professional relationships... which also goes for writing. I personally dont read Amish fiction. its boring to me. some were ok (i tried it because it was the trend), but its not a genre i'd read. well, we booked a prominent Amish/Inspirational fiction author. in order to be professional, i read her books so that I would have talking points. if i booked authors that i LIKED and personally stood behind, then my pool would be very small and i'd be missing out on opportunities (such as her giving a good review to her agency about my professionalism, and that agency wanting to work with us again and offering us author with discounted speaker fees).
Don't submit to the periodicals whose politics you can't accept. It's a trade-off. In my past, I never had that problem. Most of the periodicals that published my stuff were just hungry for content, and they ran it just the way I wrote it. Those were trade journals. The "serious" magazine I wrote for assigned an editor to me, and his input always made the final result better. But I was writing technical non-fiction, not fiction. I respectfully suggest that you swallow your pride for a while longer, submit to the publications you can tolerate, and get a few more stories published. Then, if you take the leap into self-publishing, your web site can mention that you have been published in [___], [___], and [___] magazines.
I have yet to find a single magazine that isn't in some way affiliated with leftist identity politics. Either the editors have blue hair and talk about wanting "queers to destroy fantasy" or the contributors are leftists with woke bios. See, now, I really didn't intend to get so specific (I'm aware of the WF rules) but I'm getting frustrated. I've submitted many times over the past year and a half and I've not seen a magazine I really respect. I somewhat regret the ones I'm in as well. Honestly I can't deal with even having people I disagree with and find objectionable so I think I'll have to go the self pub route. I don't see the value of just having more publications on my website if they link me to magazines that are affiliated with what I'd consider to be ridiculous views. I care far more about my own image than just getting more credits under my name and that's irritating as it makes things a lot more difficult. The Deadlands: leftist editors wearing weed baseball caps and having lip piercings Apex Magazine: interviews about queerness in fiction and obsessing over labels Nightmare Magazine: entire series about minority groups destroying certain genres Pyre Magazine: BDSM photos Just some examples. Even when it's not the editors its the stories themselves, e.g. a story in The Dark magazine featuring text messages and people taking "dick pics" in the shower. I want nothing to do with this. The nature of publication, I'm realising, goes against what I think is best for me... J.T., I do my research. I can't reasonably go through every single bit of content a magazine has ever put out. Also, the trouble is that magazines could put anything on their site at any time that I disagree with.
I wouldn't, both because I strongly disagree with it and because nothing that I'd be likely to write would make it past their editorial board. I'm not going to lie for a paycheck, which is why I don't write non-fiction.
Okay, I understand your position and I give you full marks for not wishing to compromise yourself by being even remotely linked to or associated with publications with whose political stance you disagree. I certainly have empathy for anyone who is willing to take a potential financial "hit" rather than sell out. I've been down that road, more than once. Having established that -- if you can't find periodicals with acceptable politics who like your work and will publish it, then you are left by default with self-publishing. The key to success in self-publishing is self-promotion. I like to think that I'm a decent (not great) writer, but I know that I lack any ability for self-promotion. As a consequence, writing is still a sideline for me rather than my primary occupation. A long time ago I took a week-long training seminar with a guy who, as a sideline to the subject of the course, mentioned that the key to effective self-promotion is to never expend time and energy on anything you can't cross-market three ways. In his case, he went around the country giving weekend seminars. He was a self-published author, and he had an extensive line of meditation tapes (this was before CDs had taken over the market). At his seminars, he sold books and tapes. The books had a back page advertising the tapes and an insert with the current seminar schedule. The tapes had inserts with the books and the seminars. And if you attended a seminar or bought a book or tape, you were on his mailing list and every siz months he'd send a new catalog with listing of all the books and tapes, and the seminar schedule for the next six months. If you're doing short stories, you'll need a web site that is set up to sell directly rather than just link to your books on Amazon. You can sell your stories as digital content with download, so you won't have to spend time physically putting books into envelopes and taking them to the post office, and you should also probably look into making your stories available as audio books. However you approach it, you have had some stories published, so you can legitimately and honestly say that you are the published author of [title], [title], and [title]. You don't necessarily have to say what publication(s) they appeared in. Review your contracts with the magazines where you were published. You may still own rights to sell the stories on your own, at least in digital and audio form if not in print.
Hey, do you want to keep it real or do you want to get paid/recognized/accoladed (is that even a verb?). If you want to keep it real, the rest doesn't matter. Shit or get off the pot.
Really you're creating a mountain out of a mole hill... i understand why someone with right leaning politics wouldn't want their work published in an overtly left wing magazine.... but there's a big difference between a publication being overtly left wing, and the editor having a lip ring or funny looking hair. (a lot of journalists across the political spectrum are kind of funny looking) and who cares if a publication has a story you disagree with (I wasn't aware that taking dick pics or sending text messages was a particularly left wing occupation by the by...) most publications have a range of stories To be frank and I'm sorry if this sounds harsh - it feels like you are creating a paradigm where "All magazines are left leaning" is the reason you can't get published rather than it being something in your control like the quality of the work, or the way in which you write your submission letters. (Eta if you're looking for magazines with a conservative family values there's an entire market strand in writing for christian magazines, rather than focusing on fantasy magazines per se... for example the Windhover which is not only christian but based in Texas... the chances of it being affiliated to leftist identity politics are relatively slight)
@Teladan , Ruminate Magazine (and their recently added The Waking) is another one. Wide topics, though spiritual leaning
The responsibilities of a writer are pretty simple. Entertain, or inform. Produce a product that the publisher can sell to their customers and make a profit. Don't pretend to know the publisher's customers better than he does. Remember, every time you submit a story, it, has to be so compelling to get someone to part with their money, the whole purpose of earning a living writing. No one cares what you think or stand for, if you're incapable of giving them 'the customer' what they want first. If you want to write to fill some void in your life, share your stuff on the forum. If you want to get paid, you need to produce a product someone is willing to pay for. Writing is still a business, not a place to get your ego stroked If it's not a business for you, then treat it like the hobby, like it is for the 97 percent of the people who still enjoy just writing. Writing on demand with a deadline, with an editor to please, is a tough way to make money.
To be fair, if you're posting spec-fic in the pro/semi-pro mags then you need a recognized publisher, and they're almost all left leaning. I won't name any names . . . but I've been surprised at just how political some of those guys wound up being. They seemed neutral until you got to know them. Maybe it had to do with the 2016 election, but a lot of them were going nuts back in the day. Sometimes though they're still fair with the story. What I would do is look at the stories that you admire and seek out their publishers. If they took famous author X who writes your style, then they'll take you too. Best-of anthologies are a great source for those. I feel your pain on those political anthologies. I won't even submit with those guys, and I do have stories that would fit. There's just something about them . . . It would be like signing up with telemarketers.
Publishing and the arts generally are a left leaning field... that said a simple google search will bring up a number of conservative publications ... they won't necessarily be in the exact field the OP wants but you need to tailor what you write to the available market. Hypnos would have ticked all the boxes but they ceased publication about a year ago
Of course self pub is a viable option , but collections of short stories are one of the hardest things to sell - it might be better to offer the short stories individually for 99c on kindle.. unless of course you are also worried about amazons politics
It has nothing to do with my submissions. I don't care about that aspect at all other than the fact it takes a long time and can be frustrating. I feel locked out of practically all fiction magazines of the type that would suit my stories because they're either deeply leftist or involve people I want nothing to do with (yes, I'm judgmental when it comes to appearance) and the stories included in each issue. I would love to just continue sending to magazines. I wouldn't even mind the struggle of it all. I've had multiple acceptances so I know I can get more, but it's the people involved that make me just want to do my own thing. I'm not using it as an excuse. I truly would dislike being in these magazines because I wouldn't want someone to think less of me or to think I agreed with the people who run them or write stories for them.
The trouble is that I write fantasy/Weird fiction but the vast majority of people who read this sort of thing and who run the magazines are overwhelmingly American, leftist, woke. Weird fiction is especially transgressive so that doesn't help. I'm not even right wing. I don't even particularly care about a lot of politics. I just don't want to be connected in any way with these sorts. I can't see how anyone thinks my hypothetical story and the magazine are not connected because I clearly must have known where I was sending my work and so must naturally like or support these people...
Its hard to believe you are not political when you bring this up in your responses. I get not being associated with stuff you dont agree with, but to admit that you dont like/agree with something because of these politics is kind of signaling the opposite of: My personal opinion on weird/speculation fiction is that you have to have an open mind to write it. An open mind to possibilities and topics that transcend you. They are "think" pieces. Just because i wrote about a hanged slave returning from the dead to kill his master and then being cursed to live the rest of his life watching the people around him die doesnt mean i agree with murder or have a vendetta against white people, or am trying to be leftist or "woke". Would you want your piece next to mine? Your above responses tell me "no" not because of the quality of my piece, but how you perceive it and possibly me (you do admit to being judgmental, and i will interpret that to mean what i want)
I guess I'm confused about your "extreme anxiety." Also, confused as to why you've sent over 100 submissions out to places you don't want to publish. It shouldn't matter how long places take to get back to you if in the end you're just going to withdraw your submission anyway. Isn't that just wasting everyone's time?
I have extreme anxiety because I feel like I have no outlet at all for all the writing I've done. I don't want to submit to magazines because of all the reasons I've stated, but I'm also aware that self pub will basically be the same as not having my work out there at all because no one will read it. I also might regret self publishing the short story collection so I'm at a loss for what to do. I submitted around 100 times over the past year and a half (full submissions; I withdrew from only a few) because this viewpoint of mine was yet to click in, I thought of magazines as being the only real serious option and didn't even entertain self pub, and I had yet to experience regret, e.g. BDSM photos magazine and the identity politics magazine incidents. I'd be at a complete standstill if it wasn't for submitting to non fiction journals, which just so happen to have less woke people involved a lot of the time, for example Sci Phi Journal. Edit: if I submit to my best stories to magazines and they get accepted, I can't do the collection, but doing the collection means I might regret it and will never be able to submit my best stories to magazines. Edit 2: This is all irrespective of the fact that even if I find better places to submit my stories, there's still very little chance of getting accepted. This is one of the main reasons, aside from associations issues, that I decided to make a plan to self publish. Edit 3: Every time I consider just doing what everyone else does and submit to magazines I go through alot of the ones I know. Always come up empty handed. Just a quick example: STRANGE HORIZONS. Several mentions of decoloniality and queerness in the masthead. It's inescapable. It's almost beyond words. Wokeness is literally stopping me from continuing my passion.
I mean I get the politics thing, but lip piercings? You don't want to be published in a journal because one of the editors has a lip piercing? I don't know if I can fully enter with you into your sorrows.
