Chantal Boudreau's Blog, page 17

April Submission Blitz – This Is the End

I sent off my final submission for the blitz, a reprint to a podcast in this case. Now it’s just a matter of waiting to see if any acceptances come back along with the multitude of rejections to follow (other than the lone acceptance that came in mid-stream). That’s actually the harder part of the blitz – trying to keep your spirits up while drowning in the sea of rejection that comes next.

Thanks for those of you who have followed me along the way and offered your encouragement. I’ll be at it again in October, once I’ve had the chance to recharge.

April Submission Blitz – One More Shot

I did end up taking one more pro-rate shot today. My chances are slim. I didn’t get very good feedback from this venue for my last two submissions, but I decided to give it a go anyway.

I’m running out of steam and look forward to tomorrow being the last day. Then I’ll give myself a break before jumping into something new.

April Submission Blitz – Closing In

Just a couple of days left and I’ll be done, other than the odd submission here or there, until October. I got back the final rejection I was waiting on from Simon 451. That ended as expected. I still have the three other novel submissions I’m waiting on. I know I don’t fit well in the big 5 box, but the smaller presses may like my quirky stories (quirky but epic, according to some.)

I like the challenge posed by this semi-annual goal I set for myself, but I’m pretty tired of submissions by the end of the month. I’m looking forward to just focussing on some editing and reading for a while. That and I’m bracing myself for the stream of rejections that eventually will follow. There’s a reason I only do this two months out of the year.

Almost there…

April Submission Blitz – Third Time’s the Charm?

I sent out a story to a British call for submissions today that matched the story really well, but it’s only a token payment market. I think the story has a good shot. It came back from two pro-rate submissions with rejections, but not firm “no”s. It made it as far as final selections with the first venue and it got positive feedback from the second and a suggestion that it only just didn’t make the cut. It’s a strange story – full of conspiracy theory-like implications and layers of plot – so I wasn’t sure how it would be received. It’s definitely not my typical story and has an ambiguous ending, but I still enjoyed writing it and I think it has some worth.

I may try to squeeze in one last new story before month’s end for another pro-rate market. We’ll see if I can finish it up in time.

More tomorrow J

April Submission Blitz – Charity

I normally aim to submit to at least a couple of stories to charity anthologies during a blitz, but today’s submission was the first for this April. I just haven’t seen a lot of opportunities at the moment, and the few I did run into didn’t match what I had available until today. Conveniently, I had opted not to submit the one and only ghost story I’ve written to another anthology I was eying, so when the post for this charity anthology came up, it was readily available. They may not like it or accept it, but I’m happy to donate it if they do.

I did get another rejection with mostly positive feedback, but on the whole, I haven’t received very many responses (other than acknowledgements of receipt) for the submissions I sent out this month. I’d like to see another five acceptances in addition to the one I’ve already received, but considering the number of pro-rate submissions I sent out during this blitz, that goal may be a bit lofty. We’ll see.

Only four more to go.

April Submission Blitz – Just a Quick Note

As I’m suffering from a bad cold and my head is foggy, today’s post is just a quick note to say that I sent off my last available piece of flash fiction today. Hopefully, my head will be clearer tomorrow.

Take care – hope you have a better weekend then I’ll be having *cough*

April Submission Blitz – Guilty as Charged

I love to push boundaries. Some publishers like that, or at least are willing to tolerate it if the story is good enough. I’m hoping the publisher to whom I just submitted “Heaven Scent” falls into this category. I went with inspiration while I was writing the story and I think it turned out all the more beautiful, dark and sensual for it, but I strayed into that blurry area just outside the posted guidelines in the process. I’ve done it before, many times and sometimes it has resulted in success. Other times, it has resulted in more attempts to get it published elsewhere. I’m not sure how this submission will turn out, but I may already have another venue in mind if this one says “no.”

The publisher may decide to adhere to provided thematic guidelines like glue. I met most of them, all but one in fact, so we’ll see if they like the story, and if they do, if that one straying from the marked path will get my story ousted. While I follow rules at work and the laws of society, I don’t think creativity should be too rigidly restricted. It does mean I sometimes lose out as a result, but a writer’s got to do what a writer’s got to do. The integrity of the story just happens to be more important to me, for some reason.

Only a few days left. Time to start something new.

April Submission Blitz – Dabbling in New Venues

Sent out one of my few urban fantasy tales today and received a rejection for an earlier submission this month. Most of the venues I submit to are horror or fantasy, so finding a fit for the odd urban fantasy tale can be difficult. Rather than using an open call page, I just googled until I found something struck my fancy. I’m willing to take a chance with these stories, since they aren’t my usual genre. We’ll see if anything comes from it.

I think I’ve worn out my desire to focus on pro-rate venues for the month and the last few stories don’t really demand it as they were experiments more than anything. Not that the stories aren’t worth publishing, they’re just not my normal fare. I’d just like to see if I can get a paying venue to pick them up, even if they only offer a token payment.

My little guy is sick so I don’t think I’ll be finishing up the editing on my WWW audio submission today – maybe this weekend.

TTFN!

April Submission Blitz – Reformatting Fun

There’s sarcasm to that title. I really do prefer venues that request the standard format for submissions. Otherwise, I can sometimes spend a half hour or more completely reorganizing a manuscript to match unusual formatting demands (like I did today and yesterday). I’ll do this with shorter stories but with longer ones, it has to be a very tempting call for submissions for me to bother making the effort. Consistency is a lovely thing.

I’m amazed what some venues will ask for when they are offering little to no compensation. There are demands that really make me scratch my head. One publisher looking for submissions and offering a token payment mentioned in their guidelines that they expected submissions to be polished and print-ready, stressing that if they noted any spelling or grammatical errors, they would not review the submission for inclusion in the anthology. This, when the prior sentence in their guidelines contained a glaring grammatical error. It’s no surprise they want the stories to come in thoroughly edited. Apparently they don’t hold themselves to the same standards as submitting writers.

*Sigh* – I spent all day finishing up my taxes and it has left me cranky. Hopefully, I’ll be in a better mood for tomorrow’s submission.

April Submission Blitz – Getting Busy

I’ve been busy over the last couple of days. I recorded my audio entry for Horror Addicts’ Wicked Women Writers contest, but it still needs some editing because it’s running about a minute long. I hope to submit it on Thursday, as that day’s contribution to the blitz.

I also sent retractions for three stories I submitted a year ago. I got an automated response from one of the venues that they’ve suspended publication until they can get their finances in order. Unfortunately, their webpage doesn’t state this and nobody was courteous enough to inform those of us with pending submissions. This is one of these issues a writer runs into while trying to get their work out there. This is not the first time this has happened to me.

And I sent “Zuka’s Misfortune” out again after getting that automated response saying submissions were closed when I last submitted it. I got no such message this time. I also set up possible submissions for the next couple of days. That will leave me only a week’s worth of submissions left to make. If I get my WWW submission and Heaven Scent finished in that time, I have five other stories available for submission and three options for podcasts that accept reprints – more than enough. The way I see it, I’m all set to wind up this blitz successfully at month’s end, without any novel submissions required. That being said, I do have two novels from my two existing series that need a final polish and then they have to go out to MDP.

More tomorrow.