I submitted maybe ten times without ever cracking either top list. Then a few months ago, I made top 25. Just last week, I got a notice that I'd somehow managed to make the top 25 a second time. The editors told me they got over 1,000 for that one, so I was in the top 2% of a ton of people.
I ought to be happy. Maybe I sort of am. But also not. Mostly not. I had a project I really wanted to dive into a week ago. I wrote for a day and then just stopped, not because I was stuck but because I just couldn't see the point. I feel like I took my best shot with this last round of stories, and I'm coming up just short all over the place. This last near-miss with Glimmer Train feels like it has some finality to it.
Maybe that's because Glimmer Train is shutting down after 20 years. This was my last chance to get into it. I realize there are hundreds of other journals out there, but for some reason, I feel like missing out on my last chance to make it in Glimmer Train is somehow my last chance to make it, period.
I am, of course, enormously grateful to Glimmer Train for letting me know I was close. I wish every journal gave you some idea whether you were close. I have a scheme I would use if I ever ran a journal.
Side note: this is all random
That same story that just placed me in the top 25 got a form rejection after a week from a much lower-prestige journal. You might think that if a really strong journal was close to taking it, a lower-prestige one would snap it up. But it doesn't work like that. Sometimes, it takes the stronger editors at a bigger journal to even realize what they have. I can personally testify that at lower-prestige journals, the editors are so overworked, they really can miss good stuff. I did.
The other story that made Glimmer Train's top 25 has also had a couple of other "we almost published this" notes, but plenty of total ignores as well. So there's being good, and there's luck. Luck submitting a story at the right time relative to the other stories a journal gets, and luck just finding an editor who gets you.
Some people get lucky early in their careers, and some never get lucky. I'm feeling right now like I'm nearer to latter end of the spectrum.
Second place or tenth place in a winner-take-all species of contest can never be satisfying. You either win, or you're among the et al., which is why I so often advocate a fully self-sufficient and self-sustaining esthetic. No one gets have of what I put into a story: but then most readers maybe are not even qualified.
ReplyDeleteAs to being rejected by one or accepted by another: is raises the whole question about objective beauty....
It does, indeed, raise that question. Most journals are quick to admit that their choices reflect their "taste" rather than an objective, "right" answer. Even if there were an objective best choice, when a journal has a small number of readers and gets between five and ten stories a day to review, it's unlikely they'll always have the time to pick the best. Those are just the conditions you know you're getting into when you submit. It's useless to complain. Even though I do complain all the time.
DeletePick at random. The results may be just as good.
ReplyDeleteHave you thought of writing another draft? Almost there might mean almost there. (Deep, I know).
ReplyDeleteSometimes, I'll go another draft deep if I've got a story that almost made it a few times. I did that with this one: http://www.jennymag.org/fall-18-issue/dolly-and-biggie
DeleteWith this particular story, though, I've only had two responses, and one was Glimmer Train putting it in the top 25. So I think the story's there. I just need some chips to fall in the right place.