Friday, September 18, 2009

*smack smack* Wake up!

I only have four stories out right now. Unless I write some new ones or rewrite some retired ones, that's all I've got. It's not urgent to me that I sell them--I've made a lot of sales this year and I'd be churlish to complain--but dayum editors, wake up!

I've got one story subbed to Weird Tales. WT seems to have imploded with shock after they won a Hugo, and they don't appear to be replying to subs at all. Since I'm now way over the response time for them and don't have much hopes of selling to them anyway, I simsubbed the story to an anthology. And now that antho is not responding either. Is it me?

And I've got another story out at the only market that might want it, a market that does not actually even pay. I'm basically just dumping the story. And--yes, wait for it--they too seem to have stopped responding to subs!

And what's up with Everyday Weirdness? One of my stories is out to them too (and has been for a few months), and yesterday when I tried to go to their website, Firefox told me no way Jose, they're covered in viruses. Or whatever. And according to Duotrope, they haven't responded to anyone in about a month.

I don't know what's up with all this, but I'm getting kind of fed up. The main reason I write short stories anymore is for a quick egoboo. If these editors don't snap out of it, I won't even have that.

11 comments:

Aaron Polson said...

Looks like it's a strange time for markets with "weird" in the title. Everyday Weirdness has indeed gone ga-ga.

K.C. Shaw said...

Calling your magazine 'weird' is just asking for trouble, apparently.

Jameson T. Caine said...

After the month I had in August, I have no room to complain, but my Time in a Bottle story hit 200 days out today and I'm starting to get a little on the impatient side.

K.C. Shaw said...

I thought they'd gotten back to everyone on that one. Have you tried a follow-up email?

Jameson T. Caine said...

No, I'm trying to not come across as a nag. I may query on the first of the month if I haven't heard anything by then.

Cate Gardner said...

Careful what you wish for... I was bemoaning no responses a couple of days ago and yesterday I was hit with a double-whammy of no's. :)

K.C. Shaw said...

Jameson--I was really surprised that it took them so long to get back to people. I know they're planning two volumes of the antho, so maybe you're shortlisted for one of them.

Cate--I don't mind no's so much. That means at least I can send the stories somewhere else, somewhere better. :)

S. said...

K.C.: Weird Tales is indeed still replying to submissions; I beg your patience. Ann maintains the magazine's high standards by reading all subs herself; she does not use a slush assistant.

K.C. Shaw said...

Thanks for the update. And I will not say anything sarcastic, although many, many things have just popped into my mind.

K.C. Shaw said...

(Bad mind! Bad! No cookie.)

nelilly said...

Hi K.C., Thanks for the *poke*...

I've been dealing with family issues (including my grandmother's failing health) and then a server move caused a hiccup in my publications (all of my sites needed to have code rewritten). That was followed by a hacker adding malicious code to the sites (the virus warnings that you mentioned). However, there is some good news: I should have plenty of time to get back in gear with publication as I was recently laid off from my day job. Sorry I've been unable to give you your egoboo ;)