Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Aperdictulum

I was really slack once about subs. I'd lose my list of places I'd sent stuff to, then figure it didn't matter much anyway, because no one really liked the stories I was writing. But before I got to that place in my head -- before I came down from the high of the writing itself -- I'd think that I had the best story in the world and send it to like fifty places. As a result there was a story of mine that was once accepted at four different journals. And of course numbers 2-4 I can never send stuff to again....

Why am I thinking about this? Wigleaf has lost a couple stories in this way recently-- both to Quick Fiction, which I guess makes sense, since it's pretty much my favorite mag. One of the writers felt really terrible, and I wrote to her saying that I wanted to encourage in her the misguided idea that she owed me one. That writer was Molly Gaudry, and I guess I was successful in my appeal, because she wrote another, the fabulous "Come See the Monkey," which has just gone up.

7 comments:

Unknown said...

This is my worst fear, telling an editor the story they picked up has already been accepted elsewhere. I also feel bad for sending in a submission, and then, a day or two later, asking them to withdraw it. I always think that their thoughts are, Why'd you even submit this? But hey, at least you were cool about it.

Scott Garson said...

yeah...

hey, c: yours is next!

Unknown said...

Sweet!

Emerick Pond said...

I remember getting your acceptance. I was visiting my folks, and they didn't understand why I was freaking out and overexplaining to them that they just didn't "understand the seriousness of the situation." It all worked out, though, and in retrospect I'm glad it went down the way it did, because otherwise I never would have written my little monkey story (which, truth be told) is one of my favorites!

Thanks for being so nice about this, Scott. I'm glad you didn't respond the way journals 2-4 did.

M.

Robert Aquino Dollesin said...

I love that little monkey story and am glad it got into wigleaf.

Scott Garson said...

nobody ever asked what 'aperdictulum' means!

here's the answer: i had no title for this post and this is the word my fingers made....

DOGZPLOT said...

scott:

i just assumed it was mulutcidrepa spelled backwards.