Quarter End

We just finished sending all new submissions before the editors, so things are wrapping up quickly.

We have received 358 submissions this quarter and our inbox is empty!

We have accepted 1 outright story so far, held 5 for voting, and sent 7 back for rewrites

We have rejected 282 submissions so far, and we still have 63 before the editors.

We will have everything wrapped up by January 11th and will notify all authors before January 17th.


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In other news:

While you’re waiting to hear from us regarding your submission, you can order a copy of our new 2008 Compilation CD, which has all four of our 2008 issues as well as some great behind-the-scenes information. They're only $10 and if you order one before April 30th we'll throw in a year's subscription to Flash Me Magazine as well!

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Editor's nits and gripes:

I've been saving up my list of complaints for a few weeks now and I can safely say that the quality of submission procedures has gone down hill. I hope it's just a year-end rush to get things submitted and not a wave of laziness overcoming authors.

We received TONS of submissions without the story's title in the subject line, which makes sending out rejection letters a real pain. I'm going to start sending back submissions without the title in the subject, both to save myself some time and aggravation, and to get the point across that we have submission guidelines for a reason and we expect authors to read them (and follow them!) when sending us their work. As far as guidelines go, we're not very picky, and putting the story's title in the subject line isn't very difficult.

We also received dozens of blank emails with attachments. Is it really that hard to put something in the email? Your name, perhaps? Your bio? A hello? We don't require cover letters, but this is the perfect place to give us the information we DO require. It really shouldn't be on the manuscript...

Email addresses that either don't work or require some sort of special process to prove we're not spam are both annoying. I avoid the aggravation by deleting the submission. Afterall, if I can't send you a receipt email, how am I going to send you an acceptance letter? If you're sending us an email and your spam filters are out of control, add our email address to the filter list. It's for your benefit, not ours.

The lack of professional manuscripts attached has also been surprising. We don't really care how the story is formatted, so long as it's legible. It still amazes me, though, how many manuscripts cover to us looking like third grade English papers, with only a title and the story, if we're lucky. I opened a few that didn't even have the title on the document! We're lax about formatting, but it wouldn't hurt authors to format every story in a standard way with your contact info, the title, your name as you want it published, and the story.

I suppose that's enough to gripe about for now:)

JDawson
Editor-in-Chief