Hi all, I am a newcomer to the confusing world of publishers and manuscripts and have only sent off one manuscript so far. My question is how many manuscripts do you send off to be considered at one time? If the average time for them to respond is perhaps 8 weeks (here's hoping) do you then send the same publishers a different story for them to consider a few weeks after the first? When is considered enough time lapsed between submissions or does it not matter? I don't want to bombard the publishers but am realistic that it is very unlikely that my first submission will be taken to print and I have many more waiting in the wings! Thanks in advance.
Where I live we actually submit directly to the publishers, but that's not the case everywhere. I sent 4 the first round, by paper mail (I went there myself actually and delivered them in person, don't trust the mail system ) after that, Like a month after, I sent 5 more, by email this time and finally one last one in paper copy, and then I had pretty much covered the publishers I could imagine at the time. There are others, smaller ones, and maybe located far away that i haven't considered. I don't think there are any "rules" for this, but you can take into consideration how long it'll take for them to get back to you (some of them mention this at their websites), in my case they take a minimum of 3 months to answer, so If I would send one at a time it would take me forever. by the way you didn't mention if you meant novels or short stories, but since you said publishers I figured it was a novel sized story, and that is what I'm talking about too.
It would be better to try sending manuscripts to agents. I have yet to do that, but from my research, as well as the popular opinion on the site, an agent is the way to get into the publishing world. You could always pay a publisher, but then its just you buying your way in, and all they care about is the money, not promoting your story (unless, of course, you pay more). I did that with my first story, and let me tell you, I would rather spend 10 years sending and resending to agents rather than waste my money.
Only send one manuscript at a time. Bombarding one publisher with several manuscripts looks very unprofessional. Of course, you can send the same manuscript to several agents/publishers at once. There don't seem to be very many agents/publishers that don't allow simultaneous submissions. Some publishers have rules on this while others don't. Sometimes their submission guidelines may say to wait a certain period of time after a rejection to submit again. If nothing is stated on their submission guidelines, I would wait a few weeks and spend the time looking over the other manuscript(s) you want to submit. You don't want to seem like you're bombarding them with manuscript after manuscript. This is just an educated guess, however; I'm not aware of any hard and fast rule about this.
Never heard of that! Do you mean as some kind of vanity publishing or what it actually sounds like? where can you do that? not that I would try, I just never heard of that possibility before.
As many as I can as often as I can. Some publishers will accept multiple submissions, some will not - so that limits options. Some publishers have fast return rates some have low - that limits options. I only have seven stories in the marketplace at the moment that are good enough to send - so time taken to write new ones limits options. Go see Duotrope - very handy writing resource. Agents - never pay one. I'll get one when I have a history of small publishing first - saves me spending time hassling agents who would have no reason to take me on board without some kind of credible history, and I can make some money (Ha! 0.01 cent per word), and in the meantime I am fine tuning my craft. I often receive helpful feedback, even through rejection.
first of all, are you referring to submitting short stories to magazine publishers, or book mss to book publishers? if the former, then you can send out as many stories to as many magazines and literary journals as you want... but if they specify no simultaneous submissions, want an exclusive, then you have to wait till one rejects it before sending it to the next one... check each one's submission guidelines carefully, to make sure you don't goof... and agents only rep books, so that's not an issue... if the latter, then you wouldn't be submitting the ms to any publisher until it was requested and that would most likely have to be an exclusive submission, meaning you can't submit the same ms to anyone else unless/until the first one has rejected it... in that case, you should first try to get an agent to take it on, as most publishers won't even accept unagented submissions... the only exceptions might be small, new houses, or niche presses for gay, horror, erotica, and such genres...
