Sean R. Robinson

Writing is a game of Hurry-Up-And-Wait.

You spend all sorts of time getting a piece done, research where its going, and then hit the send button.Then you wait…and wait…and wait. Websites like Duotrope will track average wait times from a particular market and you can guess where your piece falls on the timeline.

One of my pieces has been on the editor’s desk for almost a year. I like that story a lot. I hope that the editor likes the story a lot soon so we can agree that they want to publish it. They may also send it back to me. I could, if i wanted to, also withdraw it.

I withdrew a story from somewhere else yesterday…which brings me to my topic du jour.Writing can be a lot of things–a hobby,  a coping skill, etc. For me, its all of that and a little more — its a profession for me. I am trying to build myself a profession out of hitting the keys a bunch of times and selling my work.

The market in question has been around for some time. Its won awards in the industry. Its also under new management. I decided to send them a story after a lot of thought. I got a response a few weeks later, confirming the receipt of my work. It was via e-mail, which is sort of annoying (perhaps at a later date, i’ll discuss how this whole submission thing usually goes), but after looking at duotrope, they’re not responding to submissions. That is a red flag for me. They also changed their rates. They went from pro-rate (5 cents a word) to semi-pro (3 cents a word). That annoys me as well.

So the long and short of the whole thing is that i withdrew my story. I havent done that before, and it made me sort of sad, but i think , from a building-my-reputation, it becomes vital to think about the markets. It’s a waiting game, i dont need to send it everywhere just because i want a publishing credit, its important to choose where i send my things.

Have a great day.