Charlottesville Words

If you’ve been avoiding Glimmer Train because of their nix on simultaneous submissions, avoid no more. By way of Practicing Writer I have learned that GT now accepts simultaneous subs:

As of November 25, 2007, we’ve decided to allow simultaneous submissions. We’ve had a policy for 17 years against simultaneous submissions, but now that we’ve tightened up our submission-response times, we feel we can manage it better, and it’s been harder and harder to support our position when it is so darned difficult to get one’s work published. We do ask to be emailed immediately should a submitted piece be accepted elsewhere.

Speaking of tightening up response times, maybe things are getting a little too tight over at VQR. Check out Waldo’s post for a fascinating peek into the well-oiled machine of VQR’s submission review process:

Every time Ted [Genoways] sits down at his computer, he’s greeted by a suite of charts and graphs that illustrate the state of our submission process. At this moment, it’s informing him that we’ve received nineteen submissions this morning, 232 submissions are recommended for declination by readers, eight are recommended for acceptance, 1,469 submissions are currently in the hopper and readers have made six recommendations today. September submissions required an average of 18.89 days for a final decision to be made, October averaged 14.84 days, and November is at 10.5 days (though those numbers will continue to drift upwards as we process the stragglers.) We track this stuff because it matters.

Ever wonder where you fit into all that number crunching? Judging by the comments I’ve heard from agents, editors, and publishers, a fair proportion of the submissions they receive are scribbled in chalk on scented pink paper and mailed to them postage-due wrapped in a greasy lunch sack. What about those of us who slavishly follow the guidelines? Kevin Larimer of Poets & Writers wonders about this “x factor” when figuring your odds of publication:

Do literary magazine editors ever tire of answering the question, “How many submissions do you receive?” Probably not. After all, it’s a chance for them to quantify a job that’s largely subjective. Plus, it’s a fair question. Writers are supposed to do that kind of homework, researching demographics and aesthetics and whatnot. But one has to wonder if there are other reasons for wanting to know the actual number. A matter of pride? If a writer is successful and her work is published, she can use the information to bolster bragging rights. Maybe for others there’s a somewhat masochistic pleasure in knowing they’ve become part of an impressive statistic. Misery really does love company. But just how useful is knowing such a number? Does it really indicate one’s odds of getting published? Maybe not, because what is so often left out is the x factor: the percentage of submissions received that are so far off the mark—a mediocre sonnet sent to American Short Fiction (www.americanshortfiction.org), or a dashed-off sci-fi tale e-mailed to American Poetry Review (www.aprweb.org)—that they are shuffled into SASEs or deleted faster than Bradford Morrow can say, “Conjunction Junction, what’s your function?” (Although Morrow, who recently received the PEN/Nora Magid Award for Editing in honor of his work at Conjunctions[www.conjunctions.com], no doubt gives each and every piece a thoughtful read.) The x factor would be truly useful information, though, because knowing it, one could calculate the number of misfires, subtract it from the total number of submissions received, and get a truer sense of the scale of the playing field. All of which is simply to say that no one, not even the most egalitarian editor, would disagree that there’s a fair amount of detritus at the bottom of the slush pile.

Which raises the question, Who is the most egalitarian editor? Could it be the folks at Slushpilereader.com?

Here’s how it works: Writers upload their book-length fiction manuscripts to slushpilereader.com, where registered readers get access to the first fifty pages of each manuscript and vote for the ones they think should be published. The most popular manuscripts will be edited and published by Slush Pile Reader. Denize says writers will be offered a publishing contract based on The Authors Guild Model Trade Book Contract and Guide, and stresses that the winning books will be published using conventional printing methods, not print on demand. Initial print runs will be between five thousand and ten thousand copies. The author receives no advance, but is paid a standard royalty rate. “Slush Pile Reader will work with a national distributor to get the books out there,” Denize says. “The book will be available for purchase in bookstores, on- and off-line.” As of this writing, however, the company has yet to secure distribution.

Today’s challenge: Put your writing out there! Blog it, mail it, upload it, put it to a vote. Detritus or deathless prose? There’s only one way to find out.