A tad harsh, don’t you think, Jordan?

I, too, was disturbed by Ed’s cry out.  Not, apparently, in the manner in which you ere, however; I felt saddened by it, and scared, too, for I’m just beginning to travel this road of publication and I honestly want my anthology to do well, for the sake of the author’s within it and for the sake of the genre to boot.  Even for the sake of the reading public.

I did not plan to purchase Ed’s anthology simply because I’m not interested in reading it.  Yet I feel for him and, due to his post, I have considered buying a copy.  This I would do in support, a show of solidarity.  I still doubt I’d read it, but I have several things I could do with the book – I donate to the local Veteran’s Hospital and I hold contests on my blog, for two ideas.

I agree with you that this is unnerving and uninspiring – but I don’t join with you in condemning him.

I was going to blog about this again, so Jason’s comment was the perfect excuse.

There is one cardinal rule of writing, and indeed publishing, and it is this: “Money should flow towards the writer”. This is true even in television and movie writing. Scam artists often unmask themselves because they violate that rule (they charge reading/editing fees).

The only place where this rule doesn’t apply is Vanity Publishing (or many of the “self-publishing houses” like Authorhouse, which itself is only a thinly disguised vanity publisher). When a publisher asks authors to purchase books, in effect they are violating this rule, and what does that make them? Yes, it makes them a vanity publisher. Personally, I want my writing to get published because it touches or moves people, not just because I want to see my words in print. If the only people that are buying my books are doing so because they eventually want to get published themselves, then my efforts at writing a compelling story amount to nothing more than mental masturbation.

A publisher’s job is to connect people who want to read amazing fiction with people who write compelling stories. A publisher who calls on authors to support markets simply so they can remain afloat is a publisher who isn’t doing their job, and we need to shout it from the rooftops.

EDIT: Looks like Mr. Knight has reposted the entry in the thread, and removed the text that I was complaining in this post. Kudos to him. 

I recently ran across this thread at SFReader.com. In it, Edward Knight literarlly begs for speculative fiction readers to buy his new anthology Unparalleled Journeys II. By doing so, he had just guaranteed that I, for one, won’t be reading.

There is a definite stigma in our industry against publishers who solicit authors to buy their own work or the work of authors they know personally. This marketing ploy has be employed (effectively, unfortunately) by vanity publisher PublishAmerica, who, as you can see from the link I’ve provided, has acquired a reputation as a scam publisher.

Why does this stigma exist? Well, it boils down to what kind of services publishers provide. In these days of easy Print On Demand publishing, where authors can literally have their books in their hands without any outside help within a week, a publishing house has to add value in order to remain pertinent. In theory, that value comes in the form of selling your books. By going through a publishing house, an author should be able to sell more books than if they had self-published (or else what’s the point?).

Now, an author can easily sell to their friends, and doesn’t have much difficult selling in the tight knit speculative fiction community. So where does that leave the publisher? Well, responsible publishers try to sell to the general public, either on much trafficked websites or in bookstores, and some do so very successfully. Those who don’t berate potential authors for not promoting or buying books they have no interest in.

It’s a bad sign that Journey Books Publishing feels that they have to beg for readers. I wish Edward Knight all the luck in the world, but I, for one, will not be reading.

Hey guys,

Sorry it’s been so quiet around here, but I’ve been working on my SUPER SECRET project, which, as you can guess from the title of this post, has already been revealed!

 That’s right, together with Camille Gooderham Campbell and Steven Smethurst, I’ve started a flash fiction magazine with the lofty goal of publishing a work of fiction of less than 1000 words in length every day.

We intend for Every Day Fiction dot com to fill a few niches. First, we intended to create a magazine that can be read with a minimum commitment of time. Web surfers spend a depressingly short amount of time on a site and attention spans are getting shorter. Here’s where Every Day Fiction steps in. Our goal is to provide a story that can be read in 20 minutes or less. We’re targetting office workers on their lunch, students on transit, teachers looking for examples for their classes, and even home surfers looking for some brain candy.

Our second goal was to help other authors. Our intention was to provide a venue where talented authors can advertise their work. Since we link to wherever the author would like us to, their story with us becomes an ad for them. We can drive traffic to their work on Amazon, their personal sites, or even a favorite forum. In addition to our token payment, they get a lot of free advertising.

The response so far has been outstanding. With a month to go before our launch in September we have over 100 subscribers, so your work will get read. We’ve got some truly incredible submissions that we can’t wait to publish, but with such an aggressive publication schedule, we will need more. Keep ‘em coming!

 So, Steve Goble ranted about what to do about markets that only respond to accepted submissions. I know Adbusters is such a market. Check out number 5 on their submission guidelines:

5. If we like your idea we will be in touch. It may take months, so be patient.

Read between the lines. They’re saying, “We’ll hold on to your work for an arbitrary amount of time and only contact you if we want it. Otherwise, keep waiting suckers!” 

This kind of policy is condescending in the extreme and disrepectful of writers. I mean, it takes all of perhaps 30 seconds to fill out a form rejection, probably less, and yet each of us labours weeks and months on our pieces. It boggles the mind how any magazine that treats its contributors this way can survive. The problem is that these magazines pay well, and therefore will always find a few willing victims.

I’ve heard a writers suggest a boycott. I (of course) have something more evil in mind.

SEND THEM EVERYTHING.

Yes, you heard me. Screw their “no simultaneous submissions policy”. Forget about their “no multiple submissions” (How could you know which pieces they’re still considering, right?). Who cares if it’s not in their genre? Make them waste the 30 seconds they saved by not responding to you in the first place. 

What if they respond and say the want to buy your work? If it’s still unsold, thank them, pocket their check, and keep going. If it’s sold, apologize and explain that you didn’t hear back so you thought they weren’t interested.

 These magazines don’t respect writers, why should we treat them any different?

* I think this idea has some legs. If these guys start getting overwhelmed by the slush, maybe they’ll change their ways. Please send this posting out to every writer you know and get them to blog about it. Maybe if we all work together we can actually convince these guys to change!

 Hey guys,

Music to write by: “I Want You to Want Me” by Cheap Trick

Welcome to post 8 in the Markets for New Writers series. If you missed it, the previous post was on the print and e-zine Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine.

Next up: Anotherealm.

Background

Founded in 1999, Anotherealm magazine is a monthly webzine focusing on speculative fiction of all kinds. It is famous for hosting Preditors & Editors (the misspelling is intentional) which has been the focus of a previous article.**

Why is the magazine attractive to you?

 Let’s face it, a webzine that’s been around since 1999 has some cred. Unfortunately, because the site’s recently been hacked (and since restored), I couldn’t find many names of authors who’ve been published there, but I know this author had a flash fiction piece in their summer 2006 issue.

The fact that they host Preditors & Editors is also a Big Deal, since it guarantees the magazine gets a lot of traffic. They also host an annual Readers’ Poll which votes on which are the best online stories/magazines/etc.

Anotherealm is also responsible for awarding the Anotherealm Editors Choice Award, The Goldberg Horror Award, and the Annual Higney Award so if you get a story published here, you have the chance to win one of these resume boosters.

Genre

Fantasy, Horror, Sci-Fi. Hard Sci-Fi is always welcomed.

Max Word Count

5,000

Payment

$25

Submission Guidelines are here.

** As a quick note, I have to apologize for the lack of background information on some of these magazines. Basically, I rely on their “about” page, Google, and forums where the magazine is discussed, and if any one of these is missing you get a short article. I’ve taken to e-mailing editors, but sometimes response times can be a little slow.