More Advice for Writers (and for Editors)

Particularly the editor writing this blog post.

Read the ENTIRE e-mail before you shoot off a rude, terse response. Perhaps then you'll understand what the person was asking you about and you can address their specific question, instead of an imagined question in your head.

Then you won't have to make a phone call to apologize and explain what your response meant.

And while I will eat crow when I need to, I do not like its flavour.

Advice for Writers

When you're trying to show that someone has just thought of something disturbing or revolting or perhaps even frightening, and you want that character to do more than shiver, it's SHUDDERS with two 'd's in it, not SHUTTERS with a 't.'

Shutters are on your house. You can feel shudders when faced with something revolting.

THEY ARE NOT INTERCHANGEABLE.

Going forward I will automatically reject any story that mis-uses these two words.

Review Copies

If you are or you represent a place that does reviews of science fiction things, please contact me. Particularly if you are willing to receive electronic copies of issues for review purposes.

The recent change in shipping costs has made sending out review copies almost prohibitively expensive and if I could find places that would take electronic copies that would be great. I will freely admit that I have not done a good job sending out copies of the most recent issue for review because of two things:

1. The increase in shipping costs


2. The lack of reviews from copies I send out

The majority of copies I send out for review do not get a review. They are what I consider wasted issues. I want to get copies out for review to lots of places, but my resources are limited (both time and financial) to chase around to places to send copies, make sure they received copies, follow-up on whether review is getting written, see if they are interested in receiving copies in the future, etc.

So if you do reviews and you're amenable to electronic copies for review purposes, let me know. I'll send one your way.

John Klima
Editor
Electric Velocipede

So You Want to Start A Zine Pt. 5

Content Management

I'll admit it, this is where I get a little nutty. But it's how I do things, it's what I learned about this phase of the process from working in the pros. It's adaptable to this level, and I think vital for making a well-made zine.

We're talking about keeping track of what you're going to publish in a specific issue and how you're going to lay out that issue. A future post will speak to layout software and design. In this installment, we're getting into the nitty gritty.

As I select stories for an issue, I enter them into a spreadsheet. It looks like this:

This is pretty straightforward. You have the name of the author, the title of the piece, the word count (WC), the page count (PC; in my case, the word count/800), the format, E = edited or not, B = received bio or not, L = laid out or not, C = signed contract received or not, US? = whether the author lives in the US or not (could lead to interesting ways to pay), and $ = how much they're getting paid (blurred out, but the math is fairly simple since I pay one cent a word). The word count and page count columns are totaled so that I can keep track of how full the issue is getting.

Now, as is typical, this one is written on. In a moment you'll see phase two of my content management system. I was trying to figure out why I had 60 pages of content in InDesign, but still had items on this spreadsheet unaccounted for. Or so I thought. When I finally went through the PDF printout of the issue, I found that I had one full-page ad in twice, which give me the space I needed. The two highlighted pieces were the ones I was having trouble getting to fit. I wanted to give the new "Sampling the Aspic" feature three pages instead of two, and I didn't think I had it. And the KJ Bishop poem really is about a page-and-a-half. It's not an exact science.

I typically fill this out using Word's word count feature. This is not an account word count. Yes, it does count up how many words you have in your document, but as for how this translates into layout, the Word word count is extremely fallible. When doing layout, a word is six characters. This is why editors want you to use a mono-space typeface like Courier; every character in Courier is the same width. So, the letter 'm' and a '.' take up the same amount of space. You can count the number of characters in a line, get an average for the page, divide by six, and get the number of words per line. Whereas, a typeface like Times New Roman has characters that are different widths so the number of characters on a line are inconsistent from line to line in the story.

Why is this important? It's how you determine how many pages you need for a story, or a book, or whatever. As I said above, you get the average of the number of characters in a line. Let's call it 66 characters as the average number of characters in a line of text in your story. This means 11 words per line. (66/6 = 11) Then you count up the number of lines on a page, we'll say 25, and multiply the two together for 275 words/page. Then you figure out how many pages your story is by flipping through the pages and counting. We'll say ten-and-a-half pages for 2887.5 words, or 2900 words. Then divide by the number of words you get per page in the final layout, we'll use 800, and you get 3.625, or 3.75 pages needed in the magazine for your story.

Again, why is this important? Well, the process above counts a blank line as 11 words. It also counts a line with one word on it as 11 words. Why? Because that line will take up 11 words of space whether it's blank, had one word on it, or eleven words on it. You have to account for it as a FILLED line of text, even if it's blank. The story used in the example above could have 2500 words in it by Word's count. This would leave a half-page short when you went to lay it out. What if word counts this as 2000 words? (you have a lot of 'm's in it) That would leave you more than a page short of the space you needed.

But I use Word's word count function. Because for my purposes I only want a rough idea of how many pages. I usually take what Word tells me, and round it to something divisble by 400 (a half page in Electric Velocipede). For the most part this gives me the space I need. It's sloppy. And I get burned a lot when I go to lay out the issue.

So here's what I do before I fire up InDesign and start flowing documents in. This is the most important thing I learned from Asimov's while I worked there. I use this document to do a mock-up of the issue so I can visualize how things will flow from one story to the next. If I calculate the word count wrong, this document could be all screwed up. Here's the document:


Now, this one looks nice bcause I re-did it after I figured out what I had done wrong the first time. There are links below to PDFs of pages with 60 boxes, 70 boxes, 84 boxes, and 112 boxes. Here's how you use this sheet:

• Put the date and issue # in the upper right-hand corner of the page


• Cross out the first box. Your zine will never start with the left-hand page. That's the inside of the cover.


• Then you number your pages along the bottom, putting the number in the outer corner just like you'll do when you lay out the issue using software.


• Cross out the right-hand box after your last page. This way you don't accidentally go beyond the pages you've committed.


• (Asimov's always put the cover in their layout pages, but since I don't run any content on the inside or back of the cover, I just skip them.)


• I place 'ToC' in the first box for my table of contents, and 'contrib' in the last two open boxes for the contributor information; this way I don't skip them by accident.


• Then, start putting the stories/poems into the issue.

Now you have to make some decisions. Which story will be the lead off? Since this issue is going to be 60 pages, I mark the page 30 box so that I can start a story in the middle of the magazine, rather than having an ad, or the middle of a story. (zines tend to fall open to their middles, I try to make them pretty) What's the last story going to be? And then there's the whole issue of flowing one story to the next.

This is both simple and complicated. It requires you to think. I usually pick the placement of the lead-off story, the closing story, and the middle-of-the-issue story first. You could say that these are what I perceive as the three strongest stories in the issue, but that's not always the case. Sometimes your spacing of stories and all the other stuff going in the issue causes a strong story to be placed somewhere other than the first, middle, or last spot. Suffice to say, the stories I acquire are of such equally stellar quality that there's no stronger piece.

You can see here two examples of my initial lay out for this issue. They're not too different (other than getting cute with color) from the final version, but some things had to move around:



Interestingly enough, both of those were done on the same day. OK, maybe interesting to only me. Part of this exercise is to prevent two really long stories to be back to back, or a bunch of short pieces to follow each other. It can also help keep similarly themed stories away from each other so that the reader gives each an equal reading. Since I have such a mix of styles, I'd hate to put two robot stories on top of each other. Mostly I try to keep similar lengths apart and give reading the zine cover to cover a nice flow. But often I have to go into the style, tone, content of the story to determine the order they'll be in.

I do this for every issue. I even keep a version of the spreadsheet of stories I've accepted but not placed yet, and then I can just cut and paste the information from one spreadsheet to the next.

If you're interested, here are blank templates of the documents used above:

Contributor list: Excel Spreadsheet
The Open Office link isn't working, I'll fix it soon
Contributor list: Open Office Spredsheet
60 page layout
70 page layout
84 page layout
112 page layout

Logorrhea News

From my alma mater's (graduate school) eNewsletter:

Scripps National Spelling Bee prizewinning words from the last 100 years are the inspiration for this fantastical anthology of 21 original stories by well known and up-and-coming authors. Each genre-bending story's theme centers around the meaning of a word selected by the author. This quirky text captures all that is wonderful about the world of peculiar words.

You can see my book with other offerings from Rutgers graduates here.

A Few Updates

First, if you're wondering what happened to the Zine Series, I have three posts in progress, but I've hit a stumbling block. I need visuals for the posts. So I need to eithe photograph or scan some documents in (and in one case, post an actual document online for downloading) before I can finish the posts. It's not an actual block, as I have the means to get these images online, I just have not done so.

Second, I've gotten the majority of my books into my LibraryThing catalog. There are currently just over 1300 books in there. I still have our cookbooks, my grandmother' books, and our children's books to add to the collection. It shouldn't total more than a few hundred more books (you can get a lot of children's books into one box), but I'm no rush to add those. I'll probably get the cookbooks in the next week or so, as I can scan almost all of those in (and tag).

Third, I've created a Facebook group for Electric Velocipede, which includes a built-in discussion board. If you're on Facebook, come join the group. And while you're there, add me as a friend.

Electric Velocipede #13 Table of Contents

Fiction
Novelettes
Corey Brown - Obituary for a Living Man
Claude Lalumière - Hochelaga and Sons

Short Stories
Jennifer Rachel Baumer - Until the Wind Changes
Marie Brennan - Selection
Richard Howard - The Dogrog Phenomenon
Philip J. Lees - Sand
Rachel Swirsky - How the World Became Quiet: A Post-Human Creation Myth
Damien G. Walter - Momentum

Poetry
KJ Bishop - The Crone Meets Her Son
Jon Hansen - Under the Garden in Dreams
Mikal Trimm - The Paper Trail
Marly Youmans - When Demons Ruled,
Marly Youmans - Why the People Disliked Art, Circa 2005

I finished editing this issue over the weekend (authors you'll get your edits today). It's a nice mix of things; from stories about superheroes to robots to singing animals to well, pretty much straight-forward fiction. The issue is not quite available for pre-order at this point but it will be soon. The issue will be available at World Fantasy in Saratoga in November, with subscriber copies going out after the convention.

World Fantasy

Mr. Robert Wexler has a World Fantasy membership for sale ($125). Please contact me if you're interested in it.

Robert Jordan 1948 - 2007

Late last night I started seeing reports that Robert Jordan (James Rigney) had passed away. Most people who read this blog will know Jordan as the author of the Wheel of Time books for Tor. I read the first Wheel of Time book and enjoyed it quite a bit. But, epic fantasy is not my favorite thing to read, so I never picked up any other books in the series.

I never worked with Jordan while I was at Tor, but whenever a new book was coming out, it seemed the whole office was working on them. I only met him once, and he was extremely pleasant and polite. What I remember most about meeting him was when Tom Doherty came into the room, they embraced each other like wrestlers. You could tell that Jordan was much more than an author to Doherty. I can only imagine how this news has hit Doherty, or Jordan's wife and editor Harriet MacDougal.

Jordan was easily Tor's biggest seller. I think you could safely say that Jordan was fantasy's biggest seller. No one else, including Tor's Terry Goodkind (whom I did worh with), another fantasy giant, had numbers quite like Jordan. In fact, you can read Mr. Wheeler's statements about fantasy sales here to get a sense of what sort of impact Jordan has had on the field.

I also know that Jordan's books (of which there should be at least one more, the final installment of the Wheel of Time) gave Tor the freedom to look into new authors, strange books, talented authors who didn't have big sales, etc. Perhaps this is crass in this moment (I don't want to dilute his life into nothing more than sales figures), but I can't help but wonder what Jordan's passing means to Tor's future.

Yes, there are other authors at Tor who have strong sales numbers like the aforementioned Goodkind and Orson Scott Card. But together they don't total the sales from one Jordan book (I'm speaking generalities, I don't have facts to back me up so I apologize if I'm wrong). And I suspect that while Tom Doherty remains at Tor, there is little that will change. There is, as I said, at least one more Robert Jordan book to come out, so there are no concerns in the short term.

I'll Bite

So people are doing the career meme. Here's the instructions:

1. Go to http://www.careercruising.com/
2. Put in Username: nycareers, Password: landmark.
3. Take their “Career Matchmaker” questions.
4. Post the top umpty results:

And here's my results (bolding the ones I've actually done):

1. Desktop Publisher
2. Cartoonist / Comic Illustrator
3. Artist
4. Graphic Designer
5. Medical Illustrator
6. Computer Animator
7. Website Designer
8. Interior Designer
9. Animator
10. Fashion Designer
11. Family and Consumer Scientist
12. Computer Trainer
13. Library Technician
14. Writer
15. Dispatcher
16. Print Journalist
17. Translator
18. Market Research Analyst
19. Critic
20. ESL Teacher
21. Foreign Language Instructor
22. Communications Specialist
23. Activist
24. Political Aide
25. Industrial Designer
26. Exhibit Designer
27. Librarian
28. Tour Guide
29. Professor
30. Dental Assistant
31. Craftsperson
32. Potter
33. Fast Food Worker
34. Music Teacher / Instructor
35. Public Policy Analyst
36. Corporate Trainer
37. Public Relations Specialist
38. Lifeguard
39. Airline Customer Service Agent
40. Wedding Planner

Interesting. I like how many artistic endeavors came up for me (cartoonist, artist, graphic designer, comptuer animator, etc.) when I have absolutely no artistic ability (don't ask my mom: "he draws beautifully") and would have a very short career in those fields. You know, from getting fired for incompetence.

Desktop publishing is probably the most rewarding thing I do of all the jobs I currently have. So that's cool it's #1 and probably reflects what I truly enjoy doing. Not that I make any money at it.

And it's nice to see my actual job (Librarian) appear on the list at all, even though it's lowly #27 out of 40 items. Strange to see Library Technician higher than Librarian, as I've never done any Library Technician work. I guess this is supposed to show my interests and not necessarily my work history, though.

My Grandmother's Books

In my last post I mentioned that I had several boxes of books from when my grandmother (on my mother's side) taught a one-room schoolhouse. I did a quick project for one of my MLIS courses where I suggested someone should scan all these books in and create a website dedicated to the history of American education.

Teaching materials/textbooks are typically left out of library collection development practices. They aren't considered worth keeping. It's only through the lens of history that we can see the potential value of the books.

Here's the list of books I had when I did the project for school. I've since uncovered another box of books that fills in many of the gaps I have here. I'm not sure what interest this is for anybody but me, but here it is:

Teacher's Materials

Corrective Arithmetic: For Supervisors, Teachers, and Teacher-Training Classes
by Worth J. Osburn, under the Editorshop of B. R. Buckingham
copyright 1924; The Riverside Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Geographic Principles: Their Application to the Elementary School
by Douglas C. Ridgley, PhD.
copyright 1925; Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

A Guide to Literature for Children
by Walter Taylor Field
copyright 1928; Ginn and Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

The Improvement of Reading: A Program of Diagnostic and Remedial Methods
by Arthur I. Gates
copyright 1928; The Macmillan Compan, New York, New York.

An Introduction to Education Measurements
by Norman Fenton, PhD. and Dean A Worchester, PhD.
copyright 1928; Ginn and Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

Material, Aids and Devices for Teachers: Practical Classroom Helps Volume I
arranged and edited by Florence R. Signor
copyright 1925; F. A. Owen Publishing Company, Dansville, New York.

Material, Aids and Devices for Teachers: Practical Classroom Helps Volume II
arranged and edited by Florence R. Signor
copyright 1925; F. A. Owen Publishing Company, Dansville, New York.

Present-Day Standards for Teaching
by F. Burker Fitzpatrick
copyright 1926; F. A. Owen Publishing Company, Dansville, New York.

Psychology of Elementary School Subjects
by Homer B. Reed
copyright 1927; Ginn and Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

Self-Help Methods of Teaching English: A Guide and Ally for Teachers of Elementary English
by Julia H. Wohlfarth
copyright 1926; World Book Company, New York, New York.

Silent and Oral Reading: A Practical Handbook of Methods Based on the Most Recent Scientific Investigations
by Clarence R. Stone
copyright 1926; Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

The Teaching of Ideals
by W. W. Charters
copyright 1929; The Macmillan Company, New York, New York.

The Will to Work: A Study in Character Education
by Charles L. Robbins
copyright 1928; Row, Peterson and Company, Evanston, Illinois.

Student Materials

The Aldine Speller: Parts Three and Four for Grades Five, Six, Seven, and Eight
by Catherine T. Bryce and Frank J. Sherman
copyright 1916; Newson & Company, New York, New York

An American History
by David Saville Muzzey, PhD.
copyright 1911, 1917, 1920, and 1923; Ginn and Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

American Literature: A Study of the Men and the Books That in the Earlier and Later times Reflect the American Spirit
by William J. Long
copyright 1913 and 1923; Ginn and Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

Ancient History
by Philip Van Ness Myers
Second Revised Edition, copyright 1904 and 1916; Ginn and Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

Caesar's Gallic War (Book I - IV)
edited by James B. Greenough
copyright 1898 and 1904; Ginn and Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

Community Life and Civic Problems
by Howard Copeland Hill
copyright 1922; Ginn and Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

Composition and Rhetoric
by Charles Swain Thomas, Will David Howe, PhD., and Zella O'Hair
copyright 1908; Longmans, Green, and Co., New York, New York.

Elements of General Science
by Otis William Caldwell, PhD. and William Lewis Eikenberry
copyright 1914 and 1918; Ginn and Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

Elementary Biology: An Introduction to the Science of Life
by Benjamin C. Gruenberg
copyright 1919; Ginn and Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

Elson Grammar School Reader Book One
by William H. Elson
copyright 1911; Scott, Foresman & Co., Chicago, Illinois.

Elson Grammar School Reader Book Two (missing)
by William H. Elson
copyright 1911; Scott, Foresman & Co., Chicago, Illinois.

Elson Grammar School Reader Book Three
by William H. Elson
copyright 1910; Scott, Foresman & Co., Chicago, Illinois.

Elson Grammar School Reader Book Four
by William H. Elson
copyright 1909; Scott, Foresman & Co., Chicago, Illinois.

Elson Primary School Reader Book Four: Fourth Grade
by William H. Elson
copyright 1912 and 1913; Scott, Foresman and Company, Chicago, Illinois.

Everyday Arithmetic Book One
by Franklin S. Hoyt and Harriet E. Peet
copyright 1915; Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

Everyday Arithmetic Book Two
by Franklin S. Hoyt and Harriet E. Peet
copyright 1915; Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

First Course in Algebra
by Herbert E. Hawkes, PhD., William A. Luby, and Frank C. Touton
copyright 1909, 1910, and 1917; Ginn and Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

A First View of English and American Literature
by William Vaughn Moody, Robert Morss Lovett, and Percy H. Boyton
copyright 1905 and 1909; Charles Scribner's Sons, New York, New York.

The Heath Readers: First Reader
copyright 1903; D. C. Heath & Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

The Heath Readers: Second Reader
copyright 1903; D. C. Heath & Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

High School Geography: Physical, Economic, and Regional
by Charles Redway Dryer
copyright 1911 and 1912; American Book Company, New York, New York.

History of Europe Our Own Times: The Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries: The Opening of the Twentieth Century and the World War
by James Harvey Robinson and Charles A. Beard
copyright 1921; Ginn and Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

A History of the United States
by Henry Eldridge Bourne and Elbert Jay Benton
copyright 1913 and 1919; D. C. Heath & Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

Latin for Beginners
by Benjamin L. D'Ooge, PhD.
copyright 1909 and 1911; Ginn and Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

Live Language Lessons First Book
by Howard R. Driggs
copyright 1917; The University Publishing Company, Chicago, Illinois.

Live Language Lessons Second Book
by Howard R. Driggs
copyright 1917; The University Publishing Company, Chicago, Illinois.

Live Language Lessons Third Book
by Howard R. Driggs
copyright 1917; The University Publishing Company, Chicago, Illinois.

Plane Geometry
by George Wentworth and David Eugene Smith
copyright 1888, 1899, 1910, and 1913; Ginn and Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

Practical Business Arithmetic
by John H. Moore and George W. Miner
copyright 1906; Ginn and Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

Practical English for High Schools
by William D. Lewis and James Fleming Hosic, PhM.
copyright 1916; American Book Company, New York, New York.

Primer of Physiology: Being a Practical Textbook of Physiological Principles and Their Applications to Problems of Health (New-World Health Series Book III)
by John W. Ritchie
copyright 1917; World Book Company, New York, New York.

Problems of American Democracy: Political, Economic, Social
by Henry Reed Burch, PhD. and S. Howard Patterson
copyright 1922; The Macmillan Company, New York, New York.

Rural Life at the Crossroads
by Macy Campbell
copyright 1927; Ginn and Company, Boston, Massachusetts.

Stories of Early American History
by Wilbur F. Gordy
copyright 1913; Charles Scriber's Sons, New York, New York.

Stories of Later American History
by Wilbur F. Gordy
copyright 1915; Charles Scriber's Sons, New York, New York.

LibraryThing

For the past few days, I've been scanning in books to LibraryThing. I have some 740 books entered in at this point. I'm about a third to half done with my books. Well, with the number of boxes. Depending on the contents of those boxes, I could be more or less done than I think (e.g., if the boxes have mostly mass markets, i.e., more books per box, then I have more books to scan than I think).

Adding books to LibraryThing is going really well. I'm so happy to have a CueCat (less happy to buy one after I threw one out a few years ago) to scan books since most of my books are fairly recent editions (1990s and later) so they mostly all have bar codes.

I do have some four or five boxes of books from when my grandmother taught in a one-room schoolhouse in the 1920s that I've been dreading and avoiding. I may need to enter these books by hand (not search by hand, but ENTER by hand, meaning I have to key in all the data about the book). I won't know for sure until I start searching for them whether or not they're available.

Another cool thing is that I am a LibraryThing author! What does this mean? Well, it means that I'm a published author who uses LibraryThing to catalog my books. So, if you're a huge fan of my books, you can search my catalog to try to see what makes me tick. Or something like that.

You can use my catalog through my profile page if you're curious what books I own. For instance, if you sort by most popular, you can see that we have multiple editions of the Harry Potter books. Or, you can see how many editions of Jeff VanderMeer's City of Saints and Madmen I own.

How Publishing is Like Time Travel

From Cherie Priest:

People will ask you questions about stuff you wrote, and you will say, "Um ..." By the time your book actually comes out, it will have been a full year or even two years since you actually composed the material. You will have moved on to other projects, in which you are wholly immersed; and when someone asks about why character X in book one does thing Y, you'll have no earthly idea. But you'll be confident that there was an excellent reason.

To which Justine elucidates:

This is true beyond trueness. People keep asking me questions about the trilogy but it’s almost a year since I last looked at Magic’s Chld and way longer than that since I looked at the first two books. It’s almost ten years since I looked at Battle of the Sexes. I can’t remember a thing about it. All I know is the book I’m writing right now.

(emphasis on Justine's quote by me)

When I read this, first at Justine's blog, and then going backwards so to speak to Cherie's initial post, I was struck at how some of this was true on the editorial side of publishing, too. I bring in this example and the one that struck most clearly.

I've been selling subscriptions steadily since the end of May, and people are getting issue #12 and the William Shunn chapbook just came out. I haven't gotten either of them out in vast quantities to reviewing agencies (I think I need some marketing help) but I don't know if I could keep up with a higher quantity of orders than what I'm getting now. So, right now, people are reading issue #12 of the zine (which I'm almost sold out of) and the Shunn chapbook. And some people are potentially reading the anthology.

In contrast to what's out in the wild for reading consumption, I'm editing issue #13, reading the Robert Wexler chapbook (to determine the ToC), reading the Tidhar chapbook, finalizing the ToC of issue #14, and reading for issues #15 and beyond.

Here's a rough timeline of when I finished working on the projects that people are reading:

Electric Velocipede #11 - October 2006 (published Nov 2006)
Logorrhea - October 2006 (published May 2007)
Electric Velocipede #12 - April 2007 (published May 2007)
An Alternate History of the 21st Century - August 2007 (published Aug 2007)

The longest lead time was for Logorrhea: I was done reading/editing the book in October (there were copyedits and proofreads after that) almost 8 months before the book came out. In May people wanted to talk to me about the book, and I had moved (literally and figuratively) onto other things by then.

The zine I usually have about a month of lead time before it hits the streets. However, I often have the contents of an issue set a year or more before it comes out. For some stories, it can be nearly two years from when I first read it until the issue is available. So often by the time I come back to edit it, I feels very strange. It's almost like someone else selected the stories. I read them and think wasn't this published somewhere?

So I totally get what Cherie and Justine are talking about. Once you finish with a project, you forget about it so that it doesn't influence the next thing you're working on.

So You Want to Start a Zine Pt. 4

Let's talk about submissions. This can be the most daunting task you'll face as an editor. It's also the main reason why you should consider not doing everything yourself. It may be difficult to get submissions in the beginning, but it won't take long before you get more submissions than you know how to keep track of. We'll break this down in three section.

Getting Submissions
In some ways, this is as simple as posting online (whether on your own page, MySpace, Facebook, a respected message board, etc.) that you are a new fiction market looking for submissions. However, there are a few places that you can have your information posted that will help drive traffic to you. They include:

Ralan
Duotrope's Digest
Spicy Green Iguana
Story Pilot
Science Fiction Poetry Association

There are more (and I know that I'm overlooking someone...), but that's more than enough to start. These are places that people go to when looking for a new market. If you're listed there, writers will find you.

But you shouldn't stop there. This is for the new writers, the writers with promise, the writers who are up-and-coming. They are great. They often give you something you've never seen before. But an issue full of unheard of authors will be a tough sell for a new magazine.

Once you're established you can start publishing more and more new writers (although you'll likely get more submissions from established writers, too), but until then, you should seek out writers with some name recognition.

How do you do this? Well these days, lots of writers also blog or have a website (or both) and there's often a way to contact them through their online presence. Heck, try MySpace and Facebook, too for that matter.

This doesn't mean you should go around asking Stephn King or William Gibson or Michael Crichton for stories just because they have a website (but you know, if you never ask, the answer will always be 'no'), but there are a lot of people writing out there. But even this online communication can be tough when you're not established.

I started out a little established because I had worked in the field. But, I also went to conventions and spent time chatting with authors. I know a lot of people feel differently, but for me conventions are the life blood of short fiction. Maybe it's because my day-to-day existence is not steeped in speculative fiction (but rather in a library) so it's only in conventions that I feel I get to interact with the field.

Nonetheless, I think going to conventions is paramount to your magazine's success. It shows people that there is a person behind the madness. It allows you to talk to writers that you would never get a chance to meet away other way. And if you present yourself as not barking mad, it's quite possible that you will be able to interest people in sending you a story.

To summarize: create a web presence noting you are a new market, go to conventions and talk to people.

Note: don't try this if you've ignored my advice and you've decided to not pay for stories. The professionals will brand you as unprofessional and word will get around quickly that you are not someone to work with.

Reading Submissions
OK, first things first. Are you going to accept print or electronic submissions? This may not be a concern these days as nearly all writers (and certainly all new) have some sort of electronic access. However, you may want to provide some sort of mailing address should someone need to mail you a physical object (like a check, or a box of cookies, or a manuscript). I dislike getting mail submissions. I'd rather get them all electronically, but I still get a few through the mail.

You'll want an e-mail address that can be dedicated to submission receiving. Trust me. You do not want to share your every day e-mail account with the submission account. You'll be overwhelmed. (of course, if you're like me and you have about ten e-mail accounts, that's just as overwhelming)

You'll need to decide if you want to accept stories as attachments or in the body of the e-mail or both. I do both. This is to make things easier for the writer. I do have guidelines for the formatting of the story, but I'm very lenient if someone sends me a story written in Times Roman rather than Courier.

There is one thing with which I am strict: your story has to have your name and e-mail on it somewhere or it will be rejected. You'd be amazed at how many people send stories that don't have their name on them. And before you point out that I still have your original e-mail, and putting aside the volume of e-mail I receive, I had a laptop get stolen which meant all of those e-mails disappeared.

So now you have all your submissions. I used to print them all out, but now I think that's a waste of paper and I read online. Set a schedule for reading them so they don't sit. (Don't be like me and let submissions pile up until you have irritated authors writing to you for decisions on their story. Also, if you're planning on moving halfway across the country and starting a new job, close to submissions until you get settled. You'll appreciate it later.) It becomes very easy to ignore submissions while you work on other things and it also becomes very easy for them to pile up to an insurmountable amount.

To help alleviate this stress, find a few people who can help read submissions. You will get a lot of stories that aren't good enough, and if your readers can cut out half the submissions you receive, that's half you don't have to read. When you look for readers, be very clear the types of things you are looking for. I went 12 issues without readers, so I was able to point to a dozen issues of published fiction to say 'that's what I'm looking for.'

You probably won't be so lucky. However, you can point to things othe people have published and tell your readers that's the type of thing you're looking for.

To be honest, the reading is easier than you'd think. You know what you like and dislike, and you'll encounter a lot of stuff that's just not good enough. It's finding the time that's hardest.

Responding to Submissions
Will you have a canned response that you send out to people or will you provide personalized rejections. I used to do all personalized rejections, but it only made my reading time longer. I still do some personalized rejections when I was really close to accepting a story, but I don't have time for comments on all stories.

I know that writers appreciate comments back on their stories. Even if they're not very explicit; it can be helpful for a writer to know that the ending didn't work, or that the story's set up was faulty. It gives them somewhere to start if they decide to revise.

Don't get wrapped up in feelings about rejecting stories. You will have to do it. You will hurt people by rejecting your stores. You will receive hurtful comments back from people after you reject their story. It's the way it is. Writing is a very personal business and people put their hearts into their fiction.

All the same, you can't let this bother you. You may all be sitting there saying 'why would it bother me?' Maybe it's only me who thinks about this, I don't know. This is why it's better to read and respond as quickly as possible. You aren't building up expectations in an author's mind that their story is under serious consideration when all it's doing is sitting in your in-box.

Logorrhea Website

I think I've been quite remiss in mentioning that Jeremy Tolbert helped me design the website for Logorrhea: Good Words Make Good Stories. Please go and check it out:

Logorrhea website

Monkey Brain Sale

The smart people behind MonkeyBrain Books are having a book-to-school sale. Well, that's what I'm calling it. They're calling it their September-Two-For-One Sale. Doesn't have the same ring to it, but it's much more informative.

Straight from the site:

For the month of September, MonkeyBrain Books is offering a special 2-for-1 sale. Buy any book direct from us through www.monkeybrainbooks.com at the regular price, and receive another book of equal or lesser value free of charge.

To pay online with PayPal, just select the book you which to purchase at regular price from our website, and when you reach the "Review Your Payment" step of the PayPal order process, select "Add special instructions to seller" and type in the title of the book you'd like as your free gift. If you'd like two copies of the same book, purchasing one at full price and getting the second for free, that's fine with us, too.

So what types of things can you get from them? Well, there are great books like John Picacio's beautiful art book Cover Story, or the forthcoming Hal Duncan novella Escape from Hell!, or Kim Newman's The Secret Files of the Diogenes Club, or Jeff VanderMeer's essay collection Why Should I Cut Your Throat?, or my favorite book from 2005, the truly stunning Fantastic Victoriana, edited by Jess Nevins.

You can't go wrong. As they point out, "You're losing money if you *don't* take this offer."

Fantastic Victoriana cover art by John Picacio

The BoingBoing Aftermath

I mentioned recently that I got mentioned on BoingBoing with the publication of William Shunn's chapbook, An Alternate History of the 21st Century. At the time, I promised that I would post an image of the spike in web stats to show what happened. I've cleared the numbers off since it doesn't matter how many visitors I get (it's not a lot compared to many places), rather it's more important to show the spike in visitors.

I grabbed this on early in the day on August 30, so that's why the stats tail off at the end. It should be pretty self-explanatory, but the yellow represent visits and the orange represents page views. It's always interesting to note how the stats plummet over the weekend and pick back up again on Monday. Apparently a lot of you are reading this from work! I also like how if I check stats first thing in the morning, there's a ton of non-US traffic.

I'm sure this interests almost no one but me, but I promised, and there it is.

UPDATE: I know the number pales in the face of other people, but this is post #500 on this blog.

Sybil's Garage; Presumably Where She Parked Her Personalities Cars

The totally awesome spec fic zine Sybil's Garage has bit the bullet and set themselves up for subscriptions. In addition to publishing some truly talented writers, their design is just amazing. It makes me sick with envy to see a new issue of Sybil's, and now that I'm a subscriber, I won't miss an issue!

But wait! Who have they published? Well, here's a sampling: William Shunn, Yoon Ha Lee, Cat Rambo, Richard Bowes, Bruce Boston, Ekaterina Sedia, and the list goes on. Seriously. Click on the 'truly talented writers' link above to see the whole list.

As is Typical, Worldcon Likes to Hang On and On

By the way, this year I'm not going to waste much breath on the number of people who vote (or more accurately the number of people who DON'T vote for the Hugos). I nominate and vote every year. I haven't gone out like Mr. Wheeler and list my votes, but I think I might start.

I feel then, I have the right to complain about the results since I took an active part in it. However, for some crazy reason, my complaining doesn't seem to alter the results. They never take a statue away from someone and give it to someone else.

My complaining also doesn't change the number of people voting.

My complaining also doesn't somehow get me two other nominations to show up on the extended ballot for Best Editor, Short Form (it's very depressing to see that people made the extended ballot with THREE nominations, and to know that I nominated myself and there weren't two other people I knew to nominate me).

But who the fuck cares? I'm up for a World Fantasy Award! I'll never beat anyone in Best Fanzine or in Best Editor, Short Form. It's ridiculous for me to care about it. Even if, as the numbers show, I could easily win just by promising free cake or something.

You want to change the voting numbers? Require a voting confirmation number to be shown at registration before people are allowed in the convention (not for those who bought after the voting deadline or for those who bought the day of the convention purchases of course). Or, how about a 25% discount coupon (or 10% or something) on the purchase of one item from the dealer's room with a voting confirmation number. Or perhaps a $5 off coupon for the next year's Worldcon with a voting confirmation number.

I'm sure all of these ideas have been mentioned by people much smarter than me. I don't care anymore.

I just feel all the arguing about results and pointing out the low voter turnout (and don't forget, voter turnout for non-US Worldcons is typically lower than US Worldcons) just hurts the people who did win. Congrats to them!

Worldcon 2009

BTW, in all the excitement of the Hugo winners, I forgot another important vote that was made at Nippon 07 this year, the location of the 2009 Worldcon. I'm very excited to say that it will be in Montreal.

While I'm sure that Kansas City would have thrown an amazing Worldcon, I love Montreal, and love the fact that I have an excuse to go back.

I'm so looking forward to it.

Hugo Winners 2007

Here they are:

Best Novel: Rainbows End by Vernor Vinge [Tor, 2006]
Best Novella: “A Billion Eves” by Robert Reed [Asimov’s Oct/Nov 2006]
Best Novelette: “The Djinn’s Wife” by Ian McDonald [Asimov’s July 2006]
Best Short Story: “Impossible Dreams” by Tim Pratt [Asimov’s July 2006]
Best Related Non-Fiction Book: James Tiptree, Jr.: The Double Life of Alice B Sheldon by Julie Phillips [St. Martin’s Press, 2006]
Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form: Pan’s Labyrinth (2006) Screenplay by Guillermo del Toro. Directed by Guillermo del Toro [Picturehouse]
Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form: Doctor Who - “Girl in the Fireplace” (2006) Written by Steven Moffat. Directed by Euros Lyn [BBC Wales/BBC1]
Best Editor, Long Form: Patrick Nielsen Hayden
Best Editor, Short Form: Gordon Van Gelder
Best Professional Artist: Donato Giancola
Best Semiprozine: Locus ed. by Charles N. Brown, Kirsten Gong-Wong and Liza Groen Trombi
Best Fanzine: Science-Fiction Five-Yearly ed. by Lee Hoffman, Geri Sullivan, and Randy Byers
Best Fan Writer: Dave Langford
Best Fan Artist: Frank Wu

Despite backing the wrong horse in nearly ALL the fiction races, I can't complain. Extremely nice to see Tim Pratt win a Hugo for Best Short Story, and for Gordon to win Best Editor, Short Form. Now begins his 17 year reign as Hugo winner, right?

It was also nice to see Electric Velocipede on the extended ballot. Still not very nominations, but none of the Fanzines receive a lot of nominations. Not sure what next year holds for me, but based on this year's Electric Velocipede, I will still be eligible for Best Fanzine for next year's ballot; it's the 2009 ballot that may change things.